AmeriCollector.com

If Great-Granddad was a ship captain – or just an armchair adventurer with a real nice library – and you have old nautical books, logs or charts that you want to sell, Greg Gibson of Ten Pound Island Book Company (www.tenpound.com) of Gloucester, Mass., may be the man to contact: He’s looking to purchase good, [...]

Old photos: part I Ever seen a ghost? The next time you look at a 19th-century portrait photo, look real hard: You may feel closer to the vale than you ever thought you would. Maybe it’s the moody monochromatic tones, the frozen stares – seldom a smile in those days (at least, not for the [...]

Mount Rainier … Mount Saint Helens … the Space Needle … Microsoft … Costco … Amazon.com … Washington State is famous for lots of stuff, but the world never seems to get enough of D. B. Cooper. In case you haven’t yet recharged your memory with a morning Doubleshot at that other Washington icon (the [...]

Serious collectors – actually, collectors of ANYTHING mass-produced – know that, apart from the writer’s, artist’s or maker’s signature or something that imparts association value (Herman Melville’s annotations in a natural history book on whales, for example), it’s all about getting the item in as close to its original state as possible. With books, that [...]

I was saddened to read that artist Frank Frazetta passed away on May 10 at age 82. Frazetta was the guy who gave a face to Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian, and his cover illustrations for horror comics like Creepy and Eerie in the late 1960s and early ’70s had a huge influence on [...]

Having just entered my bids in Railroad Memories’ auction no. 76, which I wrote about on June 7 (“Trainspotters: Railroad Memories auction leaves the station on Friday, June 18”), I thought I’d remind my fellow railroad enthusiasts that a specialized auction like this is the ideal way to build a collection or get a unique [...]

One such person is Marc Blau. Born and raised in Tacoma’s North End, Marc is a graduate of Stadium High School and the University of Washington (where he earned a B.A. in recreational planning and administration) who worked for Pierce County Parks & Recreation for 31 years (retiring in 2004), managed Sprinker Recreation Center and the Lakewood Community Center and is now a sales associate for Winning Seasons, a screen print and embroidery business in Lakewood.

It’s here, and just in time for Father’s Day: Ol’ No. 76, billowing steam, boiler clanging and ticking, is waiting at the platform, doors open and waiting for railroad enthusiasts to climb aboard for one wild ride … Actually, it’s the NEW No. 76 – as in Railroad Memories’  (www.RailroadMemories.com) auction no. 76, featuring a [...]

If you had a chance to read “Got Ink?” on April 15 (about the 2010 National Tattoo Convention in Seattle) or “Tattoo you: 8 tips for first-timers”, you’ll understand why I’m about to recommend a Seattle tattoo shop, Slave to the Needle (www.SlavetotheNeedle.com), to tattoo aficionados. While writing National Tattoo Convention post, I took a [...]

Tattooing knows no season, but with the warm weather fast approaching and people showing more skin, you can bet that tattoo shops everywhere are looking forward to more business as people decide to adorn themselves.