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Sunday, July 26, 2015

What is a Rebus Puzzle? See if you can figure these out!


I found this puzzle - known as a Rebus at a local antique shop. The coincidence bug hit me again because just that morning I was thinking of tossing a 1958 ATT Almanac (promo piece) when I saw a Rebus puzzle in the back. I thought, "That's kind of cool, maybe I will scan it and blog it." Later that same day I walk into my friend Justin Krul's antique shop (Just In Antiques and More) and saw this image above. What are the odds of that? 

Try you hand at solving these but they may not be easy as the clue for solving them was well known people. The box they came from was a sort-of adult party game set which looked to be from the 1940's or 50's. 

Friday, July 17, 2015

Magic Show Revealed 1919


Back in my early days, when ever I saw some other "older" kids toys at a tag sale I would always see the AC Gilbert Erector Set. It seemed too complicated and, because it included a real electric motor, too dangerous, which of course made it "too cool." I bought at least one set when I was 13.
I didn't know Gilbert also made a magic set.
Most kids at one age or another are natural performers and this set not only feeds into that but actually shows you how...

I have never seen a magic set that actually took you through the steps and even how to recover from your mistakes - see above.

As you can see the young person that owned this set took the script serious enough to examine and edit those sections he didn't want to include in the act. When he was done and had sufficiently practiced - it was time to type up programs...


This was a full show and given that the boy was probably in his young teens, I would have to guess that he grew up to be the next Houdini - or maybe...
He was!

Tuesday, July 7, 2015

"Back in Business" Poster from 1945

There were innumerable inconveniences suffered by the american people during WWII. It doesn't compare to the citizens of the oppressed nations the Allied powers would ultimately defeat.  That aside, the food and gas shortages, and overall reduced services from local businesses combined to make what might have been normal life (for a post depression society) even more bleak. 

When the finally ended it wouldn't be "all back to normal" for  a while. In the mean time, businesses had to do what ever they could to let customers know that they were making progress. This original poster I found likely hung in the window of a hotel in the most visible spot. It is an awesome find!