All Dressed Up and Nowhere to Go

 

QUESTION: Over the years, I’ve noticed dresser sets at flea markets and antique cooperatives. They seem to be made of some sort of plastic and look like they date from the 1940s and 1950s. I’d like to begin collecting these sets. They’re affordable and some are quite beautiful. What can you tell me about them?

ANSWER: Ever since Ancient Egypt, people, especially women, have been obsessed with their looks. As time went on, the utensils for maintaining a person’s looks evolved into a group with common elements—a brush, comb, mirror, hair receiver, powder puff holder, manicure set, and later on a pin box, atomizer, and button hook. And the material needed to make them evolved from that needed to make billiard balls and dentures. 

Dresser sets were the original make-up organizers. Manufactured from Victorian times through the 1950s, these sets changed in form but not in function. Women prominently displayed them on their vanities and men on their chests. 

The dresser sets you’ve been seeing are made of Celluloid. Most people associate Celluloid with motion picture film. But it was one of several plastics developed in the latter 19th and early 20th century.

Celluloid was first manufactured in 1870 and continued until 1947. After the Civil War there was a need for a substance with moldable properties that could replace dwindling supplies of natural materials, such as ivory. During the latter part of the 1860s, brothers John and Isaiah Hyatt worked on developing a thermoplastic material that not only simulated expensive luxury substances but also became widely used hi other applications In fact, Celluloid became so successful it ultimately gave birth to a thriving American industry. That industry lives on in the collecting of a great variety of Celluloid items that 'range from colorful advertising premiums, embossed albums and decorative storage boxes, to figural toys, ornate jewelry and fancy household and personal accessories.

The development of America’s plastics industry began in Albany, New York, around 1863 when a journeyman printer named John Hyatt began experimenting with various composition substances in an attempt to create an ivory for the manufacture of billiard balls. Elephant ivory was becoming scarce and the billiards industry had offered a $10,000 reward for the invention of a suitable re-placement material. In September 1865, Hyatt applied for a patent on his invention of a billiard ball coaled with a combination of shellac mixed with ivory and bone dust. In 1866 Hyatt and Peter Kinnear formed the Hyatt Billiard Ball Company.

It was around this time when Hyatt discovered that collodion, a liquid solution of pyroxylin (cellulose nitrate and alcohol) that printers brushed on their hands to protect them from ink and paper cuts, formed into a hard, but pliable, clear substance when dried, Hyatt patented the use of liquid collodion as a coating for composition core billiard balls.

In his efforts to perfect the billiard ball, Hyatt enlisted the support of his older brother, Isaiah, a newspaper editor from Rockford, Ill. Together the Hyatts discovered that camphor acted as a plasticizer when combined with solid collodion (cellulose nitrate) and under certain conditions yielded a clear, moldable material. John further developed a "stuffing machine" that forced the material into shape using heat and pressure. They named their substance Celluloid, a word that Isaiah came up with by combining the two words cellulose and colloid.

Ultimately the scarcity of high priced rubber and the abundance of inexpensive Celluloid forced dentists into using the new material. Celluloid eventually became the most popular material for dentures until the introduction of cellulose acetate in 1929 in Newark, New Jersey. It was there that the mass production of the nation's first commercially successful plastic began.

The years that followed found John Hyatt diligently at work building molding machinery and finding successful applications for Celluloid. Harness rings, utensil, handles, knobs and dressing combs were among the earliest of molded articles, introduced for the first time to consumers around 1873.

Clear in its original state, celluloid could therefore be dyed in the finest imitation of expensive luxury substances. In 1874, chemists discovered successful formulas for flawless imitations of genuine coral and tortoiseshell, soon followed by convincing simulations of amber, onyx, and grained ivory. Suddenly, the potential for applications of molded Celluloid expanded, shifting from utilitarian and sporting goods, to decorative and ornamental objects. Beautiful accessories like jewelry, eyeglass frames, fans, hair ornaments, parasol handles and a myriad of other fancy items became available, and immensely popular with those who previously couldn’t afford such luxury items. As a result of its convincing appearance for the genuine material it imitated, Celluloid became coveted for its beauty and fine quality.

Four businessmen involved in the manufacture of natural plastic hair ornaments, dressing combs and novelties, formed the Viscoloid Company of Leominster, Massachusetts, in 1900. One of the founders, Bernard Doyle, had been traveling throughout Europe to purchase horn, when he became acquainted with pyroxylin plastic. Upon his return. Doyle began a series of experiments with the material and determined that it had qualities superior to that of natural materials for the molding of hair combs and accessories.

The more items included in a dresser set, the more rare and valuable it s to collectors. Most often, however, the sets will have a brush, a comb, and a hand mirror. 

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Over the Topp

QUESTION: When my son was just a young boy back in the 1960s, he seemed to be constantly buying bubble gum. I told him it wasn’t good for him, but he bought pack after pack. It wasn’t until later that I realized he wasn’t buying the packages for the gum but for the cards that came along with it. He’s got his own family now and his kids are grown and off on their own. Recently, I was going through some old shoe boxes and discovered over 100 of these bubble gum cards. To my surprise, they didn’t picture sports heroes, like baseball players, but instead showed everything from animals to stars of T.V. shows. What can you tell me about these cards and are they worth anything?

ANSWER: Believe it or not, your son’s cards are highly collectible. While they may not have a high monetary value, their value is in their collectibility. These cards, often called “bubble gum” cards are commonly known as “non-sports” cards because they depict subjects that aren’t sports related. They’re also referred to as “entertainment” cards because their subject matter, at least in the past 20-30 years, has portrayed subjects such as comic book heroes, T.V. shows, movie stills, cartoon characters, as well as pop culture, science fiction, trains, dinosaurs, music, history, and the military.

The original makers, including bubble gum makers like Topps, the leading producer of sports and non-sports trading cards, designed them to be collected into sets. But to do so required young collectors to buy lots and lots of packages of bubble gum in order to find the cards they needed to complete a set.

Cigarette makers over a century ago provided the earliest popularly collected versions of most trading cards—issuing one per pack. At that time, most of the cigarette cards featured images of sports figures, but eventually, cigarette manufacturers began including images of various subjects from outside the world of sports. These included scenes of famous places, exotic animals, and people from the world of entertainment.

As the cigarette makers stopped issuing cards with their products, bubble gum, cereal, and candy makers began to include a non-sport or sports card as a bonus in their packages. By the 1950s both sports and non-sport cards had achieved a popularity that made the cards, themselves, the point of sale. While bubble gum makers continued to include a piece of gum in most packs of non-sport cards up until about 1990, after that, they stopped including the cards in their packs. Very few card issues since 1990  have included bubble gum in the packs, making the once common term "bubble gum cards" a misnomer today.

While non-sports cards initially featured real world subjects such as entertainers, animals, and famous places, their success expanded with the introduction of new concepts created specifically for the cards. These included the popular Wacky Packages product label parody sticker cards from the Topps Company, issued originally from the late 1960s through the mid-1970s. Cards depicting historical events have also been popular with collectors.

Over the past 50 years, cards based on television series and movies have really gained a foothold. In fact, media-based cards account for a large portion of the cards produced. Some of the most popular media-based non-sport cards have been based on Star Wars, Star Trek, Batman in both T.V. and movies, Planet of the Apes, Lord of the Rings, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. There are also sets from the Munsters, the Addams Family, and the Three Stooges.

Cards based on movies and TV shows such as Star Wars often relate the story of the movie or series in both picture and editorial form. The front of the cards have a picture of an event or person from the show or movie, while the back describes the event pictured on the front. Often these sets will include character cards as well as behind the scenes or quote cards.

Other popular modern day non-sport cards feature characters from comic books, including Batman and Spiderman and others from Marvel Comics, DC Comics, and comic books from independent publishers.

While most card sets include a title card and a checklist card—the first and last cards respectively—most non-sport card sets now include different levels of insert cards in the packs. Topps and other companies started this by including a sticker in each pack of cards. Now inserts can include autograph cards, sketch cards (featuring the original sketch for a card), cards that complete a nine-card puzzle (usually by combining the backs of the cards), memorabilia, along with parallel sets which mimic the standard cards in the set with some slight difference like the color of the border or the finish on the card. For instance, the background might be plain or holographic as in a set from Star Trek Voyager.

The goal for collectors is to assemble complete sets, either of different subjects or variations of one subject. For instance, take Batman from DC Comics. The character has been the subject of dozens of trading card sets. A collector interested in assembling a complete collection of Batman trading cards today needs to search eBay for unopened boxes of up to 60 cards—six packs of ten cards each. Out of these boxes, a collector should be able to compile a complete set, as well as several duplicate cards for trading or resale.

The greatest potential for investment-quality cards lies in the vintage sets published before 1980. These sets, in premium condition, can be difficult to complete but are highly collectible. Collectors may also choose to assemble complete sets of the same cards printed specifically for the Canadian or UK markets. Because of the popularity of these sets, it’s common to find reprints on the market that look similar to the originals. Beginning collectors should remember that it’s unlikely that a 1966 Batman Black set in mint condition will appear on eBay for $20.

Virtually every major pop culture phenomenon of the past 50 years has at some point been immortalized in non-sport trading cards. However, the places where collectors can find these cards have become limited. Non-sport card shows, held in every major city around the country, feature dealers selling every type of non-sport card. And while retailers like Walmart do carry sets devoted to hit movie blockbusters, they do so for only a  short time. Comic book stores used to be a great source for purchasing and trading these cards but even they sell fewer of them. Besides the card shows, the best place to find cards to start or fill out a collection is online.

There are plenty of vintage sets and cards worth hundreds of dollars and many more worth tens of dollars, but newer cards aren’t really worth the paper they’re printed on. The availability of non-sports cards allows collectors a quick and relatively inexpensive way to begin or add to their collections. With non-sport trading cards, it’s all about the love of collecting. 

Victorian Hair Recycling

QUESTION: I bought an unusual item at a yard sale last weekend. It’s a small round container, which I believe is made of some sort of plastic, that has a lid with a one-inch hole in its center. Can you please tell me what this object would have been used for?

ANSWER: You bought a hair saver, an item that isn’t seen anymore. Hair savers, once found on the top of most dressers and vanities, were small containers with a finger-wide hole in the lid, through which women poked pieces of their hair. Made of a variety of materials, including glass, silver, bronze, and later celluloid, a form of early plastic, some of the nicest ones are of hand-painted porcelain.

After brushing her hair before bed each evening, a Victorian woman would remove the accumulated hair from her brush and comb and place it through the opening of the receiver for storage.

She could use the accumulated hair to stuff into small bags of sheer netting to make a ratt which looked like a tube of sausage. A woman would insert a ratt into her hairstyle to add volume and fullness, especially for popular styles like The Pompadour or The Gibson. Hair could also be used as stuffing for items like pin cushions or small pillows. Unfortunately, it was too knotted and broken to use to make jewelry, which was popular in the 19th century.

Since Victorian women didn’t wash their hair as often as they do today, they often used fragrant oils to add scent and shine to their hair. The residual oil made the hair an ideal stuffing for pincushions because it lubricated the pins, making it easier for them to pierce material. Also, because hair was softer and less prickly than pinfeathers, it was ideal to use for stuffing small pillows.

Glass hair receivers often had brass or silver tops. Though manufacturers produced hair receivers in a variety of shapes and sizes, most are round or oval. They consist of the receiver bottom and a removable top with a round hole in the middle through which to put the hair. Some were made with graceful legs or pedestals to rest upon, but most have flat bottoms. The more unique ones are in the shape of animals and other figures.

Artisans working for companies such as Limoges, Noritake, O.S. Prussia, R.S. Prussia and Wistoria hand-painted porcelain pieces with floral or Oriental designs on both the receiver and top. Simpler ones featured merely a gilt border around the edge of the top.

Because articles made of hair were most popular prior to the 1891 McKinley Act, many older hair receivers show no mark of maker or country of origin. Pieces made after this date bear Japanese and European markings.

Prices for hair receivers, based upon condition, intricacy of design, whether it’s hand-painted or not, manufacturer, and age, vary widely. Celluloid and plastic bring the lowest prices, usually $15 to $30, while hand-painted porcelain pieces from a major manufacturer in excellent condition can bring $65 to $100. Many beautiful single pieces average $50 to $75, while sets containing other dresser items usually start around $100.

What About Early Boob Tubes?

QUESTION: While helping a friend clean out his attic, I discovered he had an old television set. Though it was covered in dust, it looked like it may have been from the 1950s. When I asked him if I could have it, he said “Sure, I don’t want that piece of junk.” But now that I have it, I’m not sure what to do with it. The screen seems to be suspended in a U-shaped ring which sits atop a box with control knobs. It bears the name Philco Predicta.

ANSWER: You have one of the prime post-war television sets, dating from 1959. This famous set had a rather bad reputation. Although collectors love them for their sleek modern look, they couldn't overcome their performance problems. In fact, they often caught on fire. So you probably shouldn’t think about restoring it to working order.

But to truly understand the evolution of television sets, you need to understand a bit about their early history. In 1908 Alan Archibald Campbell-Swinton, fellow of the Royal Society (UK), published a letter in the scientific journal Nature in which he described how "distant electric vision" could be achieved by using a cathode ray tube as both a transmitting and receiving device.

Originally, televisions were mechanical and simpler, consisting of a motor turning a spinning disk and a neon lamp. Scotsman John Logie Baird and American Charles Jenkins perfected the mechanical system in the mid-1920s. The projected image was only business-card size, but a magnifier enlarged the image.

Though Philo Farnsworth was working on an electronic television system in San Francisco during the late 1920s, it was engineer Vladimir Zworykin, a Russian immigrant working for RCA, who claimed the invention. However, the U.S. Patent Office gave the nod to Farnsworth in 1934 and RCA agreed to pay Farnsworth $1 million over the next 10 years to use his patents.

It's generally accepted that the 1938 DuMont Model 180 with a14-inch picture tube was the first commercially available electronic TV set in the United States. The 12-inch 1939 RCA Victor TRK-12 followed soon after, launching it at the 1939 New York World’s Fair. In the set’s brochure, RCA claimed   the receiver would allow an average family to see a program simultaneously at a cost for electricity of about one cent per hour. Viewers actually watched the image on a mirror because the long picture tube was mounted vertically in the cabinet.

RCA dominated the pre-war U.S. television set production, as well as the postwar technology, until about 1948.

Color T.V. sets appeared in the mid-1950s. RCA began to manufacture the first "mass-produced" color TV in 1954, the CT-100, called "The Merrill,"and also licensed its technology to 70 competing manufacturers. However, Westinghouse beat it to market with its H840CK15, a 15-inch set priced at $1,250. The company produced only 500 and only a few of those sold.

The CT-100 debuted at $1,000, about $7,400 in today's dollars, a bit pricey for the average American household. Within months, RCA reduced its price to $495, then the company recalled most of them and swapped them out for a 21-inch model. Fewer than 5,000 CT-100s made it to retail stores and fewer sold. Only about 75 exist today, perhaps 25 in working condition. If you can find a CT-100, you'll pay about $5,000 for it.

Even so, by the end of 1957, only 150,000 color sets had sold. That’s because there wasn’t much to watch in color at the time. The first national color broadcast was of the 1954 Tournament of Roses Parade from Pasadena, California. But only a handful of TV studios were capable of color broadcasting, with the transition to color by local TV stations done slowly on a market-by-market basis. By 1960, only RCA remained producing color sets.

Things changed dramatically with the premiere of NBC's Sunday night Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color in September 1961. Other major shows followed in the 1960s and color sales began to surge and competition roared again. CBS began regular colorcasts in the fall of 1965, and NBC became the first 100 percent color network in 1966. In 1967, sales of color TVs surpassed sales of black-and-white sets.

After a lengthy duel to the death over which color technology would rule in the United States, CBS's partially mechanical color system or RCA's all electronic one—RCA emerged victorious. The broadcasting industry adopted the National Television System Committee's electronic color TV system, which was compatible with existing black-and-white T.V. broadcasting in the early 1950s and is still used today.

Though T.V. sets in the 1960s used vacuum tube electronics, that all changed by the early 1970s when solid-state electronics appeared on the market. This allowed for significantly more reliable televisions with better picture quality.

Most collectors want TVs from the 1930s and 1940s just the way they are. However, non-collectors want sets from the 1950s and 1960s that have been color converted to go with their 1950s or 1960s retro decor and in working condition.

There are millions and millions of discarded sets out there, so not all will be worth collecting. But there are key sets throughout each decade that collectors want to own, including newer ones from the 1970s and 1980s. You can pick up an early postwar set on eBay for $100 to $300. With newly made replacement parts and a good supply of new old-stock vacuum tubes available, you might take a stab at restoring one yourself.