Cross-traffic in vintage communities

[Miss Neecerie]

They're also both about one hundred percent male workin' joe oriented. This offers a good chance to get away from da missus and spend some serious shed time. Never underestimate the appeal of that.

Well unless one doesn't have a missus....and in that case, it tends to not let one -find- a missus

 

[Fletch]

It's easier with cars than with radio. Surveys show that approximately .0005% of women are attracted to a man with a really snazzy radio, and then only if there's no evidence of a 78 collection around.

Typical 78 collector's abode.

 

[pdxvintagette]

It's easier with cars than with radio. Surveys show that approximately .0005% of women are attracted to a man with a really snazzy radio, and then only if there's no evidence of a 78 collection around.

I had no idea I was in such a minority. I have a very snazzy radio/record player myself (from the mid-40's), and it doesn't work! I don't have any records, but I'd sure be charmed if some vintage-ified fella offered to fix it - and then proceeded to supply proper music for cocktail time.

It is a beautiful piece, but I admit it makes me cranky - it worked PERFECTLY when I tested it at the estate sale, and was in great condition. It got a rather largish scratch from the fellas loading it out of the house, and when I got it home and tried to turn it on - nothing but a horrid buzz of speakers or tubes or whatever warming up ... without end.

To those without any other vintage communities (or scenes, gah, hate that word, even when accurate) ... don't you wonder who is supporting all the vintage clothing shops in the area?

 

[BeBopBaby]

It is a beautiful piece, but I admit it makes me cranky - it worked PERFECTLY when I tested it at the estate sale, and was in great condition. It got a rather largish scratch from the fellas loading it out of the house, and when I got it home and tried to turn it on - nothing but a horrid buzz of speakers or tubes or whatever warming up ... without end.

Sounds like one of the tubes is loose or needs replaced. It probably got banged or jostled in transport.

 

[BeBopBaby]

Fletch - that picture looks like my grandmother's and mother's houses! My grandma was a "vintage" collector in the 1940s, collecting victorian things and odds and ends. I guess it runs in the family for me. When we cleaned out her house, we had to get a dumpster because her collecting went far beyond antiquities. Stacks of newspapers, old canned goods, an entire room of things that she collected (pine cones, plastic soda bottle, popsicle sticks, etc.) to make crafts out of (that she never made). Now my mother is the same way. After having spent a lifetime around rooms that look like your picture, I've gone the opposite route and became a ridiculous neat freak in response. lol

 

[Fletch]

That's actually the townhouse of the legendary Collyer Brothers, who set the style for generations of eclectic bachelor New Yorkers to this very day.

Time was, of course, that only pathological packrats like them and your gm had anything unusual in the way of old things. In the postwar era especially, Americans had had enough of saving and making do. You had to throw things away and buy new or be stigmatized as a nut.

My favorite (sad) story is about Bill Bryson Sr., the sportswriter and father of Bill Bryson the just-plain-writer. They'd assembled a serious collection of baseball cards, supposedly worth about $8000. But as soon as young Billy moved out and went to England to live, Mrs. Bryson put them all out with the trash. Nice people didn't keep old things like that around.

Mary Bryson, BTW, was the antiques writer for the Des Moines Register.
I have a clipping somewhere from her story on my great-aunt, who also collected Victoriana in the 50s.

 

[BeBopBaby]

Time was, of course, that only pathological packrats like them and your gm had anything unusual in the way of old things. In the postwar era especially, Americans had had enough of saving and making do. You had to throw things away and buy new or be stigmatized as a nut.

I slightly disagree with you. I think some people never got rid of that depression/wartime saving mentality because they were raised in it and that's what they knew. My grandmother was one of them. My mother's neighbor growing up was one of them. You should have seen the things I pulled out of their trash when their kids cleaned out their house - boxes of 30s and 40s silk nightgowns, shoes, coats, galoshes. All stashed in bags with old rags, newspapers and string. I don't think he threw away one rag or piece of string his entire life. I can think of quite a few other older people that I knew with the same mentality. Surely, they weren't the only ones?

 

[BeBopBaby]

That's actually the townhouse of the legendary
My favorite (sad) story is about Bill Bryson Sr., the sportswriter and father of Bill Bryson the just-plain-writer. They'd assembled a serious collection of baseball cards, supposedly worth about $8000. But as soon as young Billy moved out and went to England to live, Mrs. Bryson put them all out with the trash. Nice people didn't keep old things like that around.

I had a collection of first edition Dr. Suess books that my mother got rid of, that I bought from the original owner at yard sale. One of the books alone I've seen valued at $5000 in good condition. I feel their pain. lol

 

[Fletch]

Depression people saved what might be useful. They didn't know, couldn't imagine, what might be valuable. What does "valuable" even mean when you've lived thru crashes and bank panics? And what function can baseball cards and children's books serve? Better by far to give 'em the heave-ho and concentrate on jars and string.

I am never surprised what people will throw away. What's surprising is what they don't.

 

[Foofoogal]

After having spent a lifetime around rooms that look like your picture, I've gone the opposite route and became a ridiculous neat freak in response

lol

fftopic: my daughter calls herself a minimalist because of me and I am neat with my stuff. Raised by depression era parents I just cannot help it. I tell her my stuff has been able to make me money to leave her an inheritance. Never know. One mans junk is another mans treasure.

speaking of radio tubes. my father in law had a shop that he did tv and radio repair work for people and piddled. One main reason I got into the antiques business seriously is because when honey and me were very young and very broke a dealer ripped us off royally on the tubes and schematics.

 

[Paisley]

Anyone who has a houseful (barnful, storage-unit-ful) of stuff owes it to their children or executor to at least have the stuff organized and neatly stored. It's no small task to dispose of even a small estate, especially when you are in mourning. I don't think estate sale companies will deal with a room like the one shown above.

 

[Paisley]

To those without any other vintage communities (or scenes, gah, hate that word, even when accurate) ... don't you wonder who is supporting all the vintage clothing shops in the area?

Yes, I do. I don't see people on the street wearing the stuff. Of course, I'm thinking of three or four stores in a city of two million people.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Yes, I do. I don't see people on the street wearing the stuff. Of course, I'm thinking of three or four stores in a city of two million people.

To say nothing of what it's like in a town of 8,000 -- no vintage stores at all, unless you count the Salvation Army and the Goodwill, which there's really no point in doing anymore.

I think the whole idea of "scenes" is population dependent -- the more people you have in an area, the more likely specific groups will be to gravitate to those of like interests and form subcultures. But if you live away from major population centers, there simply isn't enough depth of population for that to happen -- growing up where I did, when I did, there was no such thing as the sort of music-based subcultures that were common in the cities, and therefore no "scenes." I would love to have known someone in high school who shared my appreciation for Rudy Vallee, but alas, it never happened.

There's been little change, really, since then -- there might be kids who identify themselves by the music they listen to, but that's about all they do. They don't go out to clubs, because there aren't any. The only thing we've got locally that might qualify as a sort of a "scene" is the local blues crowd -- there's a bar downtown that features live blues shows and draws from all over the state, and the annual North Atlantic Blues Festival is held here -- but most of that crowd seems to be folks more interested in getting hammered than they are in the social aspects. They aren't so much a "scene" even though they occasionally make one.

As for the local "vintage scene," I'm it, in its entirety -- ask anyone in town about "that forties gal on the bike" and they'll tell you where to find me.

 

[Dr Doran]

As for the local "vintage scene," I'm it, in its entirety -- ask anyone in town about "that forties gal on the bike" and they'll tell you where to find me.

But that is cool in its own way.