Inherited Values

People have asked what the pretty floral fabric item is in this photo of the antique child’s chair: The long fabric piece which rolls up onto a tube (also wrapped in the fabric) is a part of textile history nearly forgotten.  It’s a doily holder! Ladies would roll their doilies, runners, etc. up in this [...]

This lovely antique child’s chair came from the Hammett estate in Sheboygan, WI. As the estate company folks noted, “The family was once listed as one of the 250 most important families in the USA. The grandfather was the vice president of Northern Furniture ..the family also owned the Hammet gift shop on the 4th [...]

One of the fine things we bought at Ida Carlson’s Barn was this funky mid-century modern endtable. It has a very “nordic” style, made from flat pieces of wood and in that fun atomic acute-angle style that people love from the 1950s: It has a very odd shape — it looks different no matter what [...]

Usually when’ there’s beer on a man’s clothing, we tend to ignore it — but who can ignore this vintage Pabst Blue Ribbon vest?! Authentic vintage, from the Golden Threads line by Brill Brothers of Milwaukee, this is an incredibly rare piece of vintage fashion and breweriana. I’ve only seen one other piece like it; [...]

Found here in North Dakota, this antique promotional booklet is an authentic piece of pioneering & homestead farming history! Compliments of Samuel Lange, a dealer in Farm Machinery, such as Buggies and Carriages, Cream Separators, Plymouth Twine, Defiance Listers & Plows, La Cross Disk Harrows, pioneer Buggies, Surries & Wagons, agent for Queen City Creamery [...]

Vintage dairy cream separator funnels have a great industrial look — and a great primitive look when rusty. They make great candle stick holders! If you plan on lighting the candles, you should place them on an appropriate heat resistant/fire-safe container — antique saucers and plates work well for this and you can even mix [...]

A few weeks ago, Eva Mendes was spotted with a skull in her Kiki de Montparnasse lingerie bag — which sent the celeb-stalking world into a 50-Shades of kink gossip cliche tailspin. But as it turns out, the antique papier-­mâché skull, a ceremonial prop from an Odd Fellows lodge, was purchased at Obscura of Oddities [...]

Are you a heavy collector of weird (as others may perceive) yet cool stuff? Want to try something new to hang on your wall? Usually, it’s a painting, a cross-stitch, a vintage movie poster or a celebrity sketch that would make a sophisticated and noticeable framed wall art. For this year, here is the challenge: [...]

I’ve been shopping for “lots” on eBay lately: sellers box up a bunch of low-end things, like cameras or 8mm movies, and then sells them as a set.  I’ve found I can get some pretty cheap fun stuff — plus, the mixed-bags aren’t always described very well, so sometimes you get a surprise.  In a [...]

Once upon a time, brightly-colored graphics on pressed layers of cardboard in the shape of characters from nursery rhymes, Mother Goose stories, and other childhood tales covered the walls in baby nurseries and children’s bedrooms. Once the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and the United States joined World War II, Japanese imports disappeared from store shelves [...]

Today’s scrapbooks are filled with photographs of family & friends, complimented by decorative papers and supplies purchased for the sole act of creating fantastic looking photo albums. But once upon a time, scrapbooks bore more resemblance to their name: they were books full of “scraps” of paper. Some of these vintage scrapbooks did chronicle personal [...]

In this vintage photo, two children play with water and a tin lithographed pail. You can see Swee’Pea and Olive Oyl from Popeye The Sailor Man. This is the vintage pail in color, along with some other vintage Popeye sand toys. The photo was found in a 1956 magazine from Sweden, confirming that this was [...]

About a Union Oil credit card. This ad was found in a 1960 theatre programme; hence the opera glasses and the “your season ticket to the finest performance” headline. Of course, the fine performance was also a reference to the new Royal 76 gasoline.

These vintage Valentine’s Day cards are also holders for lolly pops or suckers. The half-circle tabs pop-up, and the stem of the sucker would be slid through the openings, thus delivering an extra sweet greeting — with pop related puns, of course! Produced by the E. Rosen Company of Providence, RI, these vintage die-cut cards [...]