Dust jackets, especially the ones produced from the 1920s to the 1940s, often featured spectacular, stylized artwork; after all, they were in large part intended to tempt browsers to buy the books. The problem was, then as now, it was a pain in the neck to read a book with the jacket on, so people removed them, set their coffee cups down on them, tore them, misplaced them … The result: books with damaged, soiled or – worst of all – NO jackets!

Little did those readers of yesteryear know, but those dust jackets can add geometrically to the value of the book, because of the great artwork, certainly, but much more importantly because of their rarity. To pick one example, the first edition of Nelson Algren’s first book, “Somebody in Boots” (1935) features a really cool image of the proto–James Dean/Elvis Presley–type hero. A copy of the book in pretty rough shape lists for $180 on Bookfinder.com; there’s only one copy listed with a jacket – both book and jacket in fine condition – for $2,600!

Needless to say, not all vintage books in knockout dust jackets are high-end; what’s more, given the beauty of the artwork, small wonder that some folks collect books specifically for their dust jacket art. For those collectors – and those who are looking for specific books that happen to have great jackets – a Connecticut bookseller, Babylon Revisited (www.YesterdaysGallery.com), has a really terrific selection and has just issued a new catalog. I asked owner Michael Manz about his books:

AmeriCollector: Your Web site used to say your specialties are “photoplays, mysteries, fantasy literature, plays, romances, Westerns, Hollywood interest and business fiction” – along with children's literature and 19th-century literature. Seems like an odd mix, doesn’t it?

Michael: The common link between the genres, more or less, is the era in which they were published. We like the way books were made during the Jazz Age and the Depression era, they have an appealing solid quality, often with dust jacket art that demonstrates real contemporary artistry.

AC: How old is your business, and about how many books do you have in stock right now?

Michael: My father started the business in the late 1970s. I’ve been involved one way or another since I was about twelve. You might say I grew into the business, literally. We have tens of thousands of books, but less than ten thousand currently online for sale.

AC: What is “business fiction,” anyway? And what is a “photoplay”?

Michael: We found that the typical genres – mysteries, romances, etc., didn’t always encompass the varied subject matter that novels from the 1920s and ’30s dealt with. We’ve created a few more genres, such as business fiction – that is to say, novels dealing with businesses, companies, executives and office workers.

Photoplays were a way for publisher’s to bank on the popularity of current feature films by printing, or usually reprinting, novels that the films were based on and including plugs and stills from the film.

AC: You also concentrate on pre–World War II material – which I take to mean Depression-era works – in their original dust jackets, many of which are wonderful artwork. In fact, your catalogs feature some amazing Art Deco images. Do a lot of people collect books of that period just for the jackets?

Michael: Collecting novels not typically considered important from before World War II – when the quality of jacket artwork seems to have taken a nosedive – is appealing to some of our customers simply for the artistry of the book and not the quality of the prose. Most collectors are interested in authors, but more than one are interested in the book itself as a piece of contemporary art.

AC: Sometimes paper quality prior to and during the Second World War wasn't that great. Was the jacket art intended to compensate?

Michael: There were some reprint houses that used pretty cheap or acidic paper; many of their books are now in the junk heap. Perhaps the jacket was a way to draw people into buying a book in which the quality of the book itself was substandard. However, we have found that many publishers from this period used high standards of production and their products live on today, and possibly will outlive many of their more modern cousins.

AC: I know that a scarce dust jacket is sometimes worth much more than the book itself: for example, the jacket for Henry Roth's “Call It Sleep.” Can you explain why? What advice would you give someone who wants to collect books in their original jackets?

Michael: Like many collectibles, the value is found in the most disposable part, or the most disposable items themselves – for example, baseball cards and comic books. Many a mom disposed of their children’s comic book collections and in doing so created scarcity and desirability in the collectibles market. This is the same with book jackets: They were the first to be discarded and are now the most valuable asset to a vintage book.

I would advise collectors to look for jackets in acceptable condition, keeping in mind that they have weathered 70 or 80 years of handling, as condition is always an important point for determining value. However, if a book has a damaged jacket, but there are no other examples available, that should not deter them from buying it.

AC: You have quite a selection of prewar books that appear from the outside to be pretty risqué. Were these writings really pushing the boundaries of acceptability? Were there film versions, and did they have to be toned down?

Michael: There were a number of publishers and authors pushing the boundaries of what amorous pursuits were acceptable for readers to consume. I think they were reflecting in their prose a growing sensibility among the populace, and meeting a demand for more realistic literature concerning what was actually happening in society. We’ve come across a number of Jazz Age titles that delve into “the fast life”: speakeasies, alcohol consumption and noncommittal romances. These were issues that were developing in society and needed to be addressed in literature.

AC: How did the look of dust jackets change after the war?

Michael: Books got thinner, paper quality got cheaper and artwork for jackets became more secondary in importance. There are still some great works out there by Salter and others, but the art of bookmaking definitely took a turn for the worse after the Second World War.

AC: What do you consider to be the highlights among the books you have in stock at this time?

Michael: I’m a big fan of early dust jackets, ones from 1910 to 1920 or even the turn of the century. These are naturally pretty uncommon, and they have a wonderful sense of appeal based on this scarcity. We also have some interesting photoplays for important films, and novels that deal with uncommonly found subject matter for the time, such as Hollywood, homosexuality, circus life, and women’s studies.

Images courtesty of Babylon Revisited Rare Books, www.babylonrevisitedrarebooks.com.

You can tell I’m very big on “History Detectives,” as a history buff and as a collector – although the folks who submit mysteries aren’t necessarily either: Someone in Oregon opens a trunk and finds a Revolutionary War–era poem apparently written by an American prisoner of war in Mother England; a guy in Seattle receives from his father a baseball signed and dated July 12, 1944 by former Major League pitcher Dizzy Dean, along his dad’s account of playing in an uncharacteristically integrated wartime Air Force ball game with Dean and Negro Leagues legend Satchel Paige … These are human-interest stories more than anything, but they demonstrate the kind of investigatory skills – the adventure of real research – that is part and parcel of world-class collecting.

What’s more, I note that “History Detectives” investigations often have a genealogical element. While many people think of genealogists as spidery and schoolmarmish, good ones know their beans about history and are as tenacious about pursuing a lead as Arnold Schwarzenegger was about tracking down Linda Hamilton in “The Terminator.” That’s an inspiration for collectors seeking as much knowledge about their treasures as they possibly can.

But I digress: Back to Elyse …

Originally from Baltimore, Elyse Luray graduated with a degree in art history from Newcomb College Institute at Tulane University in New Orleans. Her creds in the auction and collectibles world – what you won’t know just from seeing her on PBS – is extensive. For example, she was animation art specialist, managed the Popular Culture department and set up the Arms & Armor and American Indian Art departments at Christie’s, where she worked as a licensed auctioneer and appraiser for 11 years (in 2000 she auctioned one of the pairs of ruby slippers that Judy Garland wore in “The Wizard of Oz” for $666,000). She has captained the block for a host of other auction houses (Steiner Sports, Grey Flannel Auctions, Bertoia Auctions, etc.) and charitable causes as well. Elyse has appeared and appraised on the Home & Garden Television show “If Walls Could Talk,” HGTV’s “Endless Yard Sale,” “The Early Show” on CBS and “Antiques Roadshow” on PBS; and she has evaluated the personal collection of cartoonist/animator/producer/all-around creative genius Chuck Jones and the archives and collections of such little-known startups as Warner Bros., DreamWorks, Lucasfilm and Hanna-Barbera Productions. The list goes on …

So imagine MY elation when Elyse agreed to talk about her personal collections with AmeriCollector.com! Here’s our interview from earlier in this month. Visit Elyse’s Web site: www.ElyseLuray.com.

AmeriCollector: You must collect a lot of things. What’s your main collecting interest?

Elyse: My main collection is actually Marx Brothers posters: one-sheets and inserts, not reproductions. My children’s last name is Marx and I have two boys, so they’re “the Marx brothers.” (Laughs.) All over my house are Marx Brothers posters. I got my first one maybe 25 years ago, before my children where born; but then I actually had boys, whose last name is Marx, and I started collecting more and more and more. The prices got really high, but then they kind went down again. So that’s probably my biggest collection.

It’s also hard, because you need to have the space for posters, and I don’t really have that much space anymore, so that kind of limits my buying.

I went through a very big stage of collecting bulldogs, since I had one – anything with a bulldog – and I probably ended up with a couple of hundred pieces of bulldog paraphernalia, things with an image of a bulldog and mainly old advertising pieces.

AC: So you don’t necessarily collect antiques.

Elyse: Well, you know, it’s funny you say that. I mean, I don’t consider my bulldog collection or Marx Brothers posters antiques, but nothing is later then 1950; in fact, some pieces are from the turn of the 20th century. Each is one-of-a-kind, and I stay away from limited editions. So I guess they are antiques. I also collect sterling silver serving pieces and trays, both American and European, and I don’t buy anything new. I don’t buy contemporary.

I don’t feel I collect that much because, with my show and with my work, I’m constantly around collections. It’s really weird for me, but when I work on an appraisal or a story, I kind of feel like I’m sharing the collection with the owner for a while. Because of what I do and the nature of my business, I feel like I’m around collections all the time … Actually, I AM around collections all the time! (Laughs.)

AC: I know you were at Christie’s for a long time, and I think you were working in the areas of pop culture and art, so I assumed you collected art.

Elyse: Well, I have a lot of Western art in my house, which came from my parents, and I did help help set up the American Indian Art department at Christie’s. One area of art that I actually bought and collected recently with my mother: the “Les Maîtres de l’Affiche” series; they’re prints and posters from the turn of the century. Lautrec, Mucha and Cheret were some of the more known illustrators. And it’s a series of prints produced in the early 1900s. The whole series is about …I don’t know the exact number off the top of my head: Let’s say 350, 400. My mom has them, each framed on one entire wall in her dining room and I have a couple scattered through out my house. And that’s definitely artwork, but it’s more of what we call a “multiple” market, because prints are multiples, meaning they are produced in a series and there is more then one. Prints, posters, photography – they fall into the multiple category.

AC: How do you build your collections?

Elyse: If you want me to give advice on how to collect, these are my key points:

BUY WHAT YOU LOVE – hands down, buy what you love. If you find a passion, follow it. Anything that you want to collect is OK. If you want to collect Hawaiian shirts, ashtrays, bells – anything that what you find interesting – then that’s what you should collect. There’s nothing you can’t collect, because that’s the beauty of it. Follow your passion, follow your dreams …

When you do find that one thing that gives you some type of emotional satisfaction that you want to start collecting it, my biggest piece of advice, besides buy what you like, is BUY GOOD: Buy things that are in good condition, buy things that are not going to fall apart or have a lot of damage or have a lot of restoration on them, because I find that those are the things that sustain themselves the longest. And I hate to tell to buy things for value, but if you do ever need to sell your collection or want to sell your collection, you want to have things in it that are actually the best of the best. If you can’t afford to do that in the beginning, then “buy up”: Buy what you can afford and then trade it when you can get to the next better piece.

AC: Is there any particular “holy grail” that you’re looking for, in terms of posters or even bulldogs?

Elyse: No, I haven’t really found my “holy grail” yet.

I wish I DID have a “holy grail”: I always want more. I’d like to collect other things, actually, at this point.

I’m not sure that anyone should have a “holy grail,” because after you get it, then you’re kind of, like, what do I do now? You know what I mean? (Laughs.) I would hate for someone to stop collecting.

AC: What would you collect?

Elyse: Too many things to really answer. I love antique advertising. I love old jars: I kind of started to collect them; they’re not expensive, they look really good and they’re very decorative in your house.

I don’t have the room for it, but if I had room, I’d collect a million other things. I’d love to collect old photography – black-and-white – and when I say “old,” I mean early-20th-century photography, not contemporary.

The problem – and you would probably be the same way, because you’re a collector – is that you don’t think of some things, and then you walk into somebody’s house and you see what they collect, and you think: “That’s the greatest idea! That’s brilliant! I love it!”

I was just in Sun Valley, Idaho, on vacation over Christmas, and I walked into somebody’s house, and they collect nutcrackers. They were exceptional cast-iron nutcrackers, and they must have had 200 of them, and you know, the characters that were used and the mechanics of the nutcrackers – it was just a brilliant thing to collect! I would never have thought of that before.

The beauty is that there is always something to collect!

Visit the History Detectives on PBS online at:  www.pbs.org/opb/historydetectives

If you’re not Paris Hilton and actually have to work for a living, then
Bob Rosner is required reading.

A New Jersey native now based in Seattle, Bob writes “Workplace911” (formerly “Working Wounded”), the internationally syndicated weekly column about workplace issues. He’s also a best-selling author of “Working Wounded: Advice That Adds Insight to Injury” (Warner Books), coauthor of “Gray Matters: The Workplace Survival Guide” (Wiley) and “The Boss’s Survival Guide: Everything You Need to Know About Getting Through (and Getting the Most Out of) Every Day” (McGraw-Hill), a motivational speaker and employee retention expert, a surveyor of workplace attitudes and experiences, a radio talk show personality and a contributor to CNBC.

How’s THAT for a résumé?

But that’s not all: Bob can add, under “Additional Information”: “Collector of funeral home bowling shirts” – further proof that Bob really does care about the working stiff, so to speak.

How do I know Bob? Because I formatted “Workplace 911” for its weekly space in a certain Tacoma daily newspaper, so I not only got paid to read Bob’s column, I continue to benefit from it as I write these AmeriCollector entries. The fact is, Bob’s down-to-earth writing style – combined with his upbeat, positive approach to dealing with workplace issues and challenges – is a model for any blogger. The same goes for the varied content of each of his columns, which usually consists of a reader’s question, Bob’s advice in the form of four key points, some enlightening, often humorous survey findings and an inspirational or at least fun quote from someone notable who, very often, has been in your shoes.

For these reasons, I consider Bob a mentor.

So imagine our surprise, delight and gratitude when I asked Bob if he collects anything; and, if so, if he’d be amenable to being featured on AmeriCollector.com; and what does he collect, anyway? – and he replied: “Yes”; “Yes”; and “Funeral home bowling shirts”! (Talk about breaking new ground in the collecting field!)

Now, funeraI home bowling shirts may sound bizarre to some and downright macabre to others: Who knew such things even existed? To me, at least, bowling shirts may be as little as 50 percent cotton and 50 percent polyester but they’re 100 percent Americana, and FUNERAL HOME bowling shirts in particular have all the offbeat early-1960s black humor of “The Munsters” and “The Addams Family,” Ed “Big Daddy” Roth’s “Rat Fink” and Forrest J. Ackerman’s fanzine Famous Monsters of Filmland – pure boomer nostalgia.

Anyway, here’s my interview with Bob … (And incidentally, if you ARE Paris Hilton, e-mail us quick, we need a sponsor.)

AmeriCollector: Why bowling shirts???

Bob Rosner: Why not?

AC: Do you bowl?

Bob: Rarely. I was the captain of the bowling team in high school: not because I was any good; it just so happened that I had enough spare change to pay for a bunch of people’s shoe rentals. If you ever want to be an officer for a bowling league, I’ve learned, bring change!

AC: How many shirts do you have?

Bob: I have 21 shirts. I’ve been told by the Bowling Hall of Fame that this is the largest collection of its kind anywhere in the world. At least, that’s what they said when they tried to get me to donate it to their museum and called me every few days for two weeks.

AC: When did you get started?

Bob: I was looking through a bin of shirts at a vintage clothing store in Boston. I came across Carlson’s Funeral Home, 1174 Payne Avenue. It made me laugh.

One day I was at a party and a very beautiful woman and I got into a conversation. The chemistry was remarkable. There was actually beautiful music in the background as our eyes connected. It was pure Disney, although I don’t remember any songbirds flying around my head. It was magical and clear to both of us that we were destined to spend the rest of our lives together. Then I asked her if I could get her a drink. She said yes. When I turned she said, “Ugh. Funeral Home. That’s disgusting.” I replied, “How can you say that? I worked at Carlson's for three years.” (For the record, if you look at the word “replied,” it also contains the word “lied,” which you could consider an apt description of my response to her.) She asked what I did at the funeral home. I told her, “I was activities director.” She didn’t laugh. So I continued, “We had a balcony, we'd hook strings to the bodies and hold dances.” She slapped me across the face, still the only time I’ve ever been slapped by a woman. At that point, I knew I was onto something.

AC: What do you enjoy about collecting the shirts?

Bob: I love having bowling parties, watching people change shirts every few minutes. And, trust me, you haven’t felt love until you’ve gone into a bowling alley wearing a shirt from a funeral home. They automatically treat you like family … well, to be accurate, like a cousin twice removed, but family, nonetheless.

If you ever do get invited to a party, wear a long-sleeve shirt under any shirt from your collection: To preserve their cultural and historical impact and integrity, the shirts should never be washed.

AC: How do you build your collection?

Bob: A friend made me a business card. It was gray and said, “Bob ‘First Strike’ Rosner” on it. It also had “RIP” across the top (which of course stands for “Recreation in Polyester”), I would hand cut each one into the shape of a tombstone. The card became very popular at vintage clothing stores. In fact, the last five shirts were given to me.

AC: What’s the highlight of your collection?

Bob: embroidered version of the famous hand bowling out of a casket shirt (it’s in the middle of the photo). This is the only shirt that consistently frightens people.

AC: What are the characteristics of a great shirt?

Bob: A bowling shirt with the word “Funeral” on it. This is not rocket science.

Many thanks to Bob Rosner. (Visit Bob’s Web site at www.workplace911.com.)

First National Bank of Seattle ( Became Seafirst Bank, now Bank of America) - Territory of Washington, 1884

Kerstein became interested in antique stock and other certificates after seeing Confederate bonds at a Civil War show some years ago. He remarked on how he likes to envision Gilded Age entrepreneurs traveling the country by rail or stagecoach, hawking beautiful, ornately engraved stock certificates in order to raise funds for their corporate ventures.

“It’s almost like they went to extremes to make the documents professional looking, engraved with nice vignettes” and sometimes marked “payable in gold” to reflect the financial standing of their companies, Kerstein explained. “It gave people a false sense of security (so to speak), because they didn’t have the gold set aside; they’d only convert them to dollars.”

Wells Fargo Mining Company - Virginia District, Story County, Nevada 1879

So, who are Kerstein’s customers? “We sell to everybody,” he says: people in the financial community, of course – for themselves or for friends, colleagues and family members – but also families with a connection to a particular company. “We sold something to a family whose grandfather was a secretary of the company, Pontiac Spring and Wagon Works, and signed it, and the company became a part of General Motors. It made the first Pontiac car; the certificate was dated 1907.”

Stock certificates make excellent conversation pieces for brand-loyal adults, and there are dozens to choose from. Got a Bill Gates wannabe on your gift list? How about a rare specimen share (an unused sample certificate) of Microsoft from 1990, with the engraved signature of then-president Michael R. Hallman, for $169.95? Does Uncle Bud like his Bud? He’ll appreciate a certificate for 10,000 shares in Anheuser-Busch (dated 1980) for $99.95. Want to broaden a youth’s capitalist horizons? A specimen certificate for Reebok ($195) or Nintendo ($149.95), or a single share of Sony ($59.95), will smell like teen spirit. For the woman in your life, how about a share in House of Taylor Jewelry (Elizabeth Taylor’s company, from $79.95), Frederick’s of Hollywood (from $24.95) or Hershey (from $69.95) to go with that diamond ring, lingerie or chocolate bar you were planning to give her? Was Dad a perfect Angel this year? A certificate for shares in Harley-Davidson (from $124.95) would look great in his den or garage? Americana aficionados can find everything from Krispy Kreme, Pepsi and Lionel to Boeing, Ford and Union Pacific. And for those with a bullish sense of humor, there are even certificates for the bad boys of business: companies like AIG, Enron, WorldCom and Lehman Brothers …

A number of factors influence price of a certificate – the pictures, the signatures, the company history – but a search of the Scripophily.com Web site shows many well under $100 and ranging to the thousands. Here in the Pacific Northwest, local trainspotters will like a 1910 Seattle-Tacoma Short Line certificate ($69.95), and baseball fans are bound to covet a 1939 Seattle Rainiers certificate signed by president Emil Sick ($695). And speaking of presidents, how about a 1927 certificate for The Buckeye Steel Castings Company of Columbus, Ohio, hand signed by president Samuel Prescott Bush – George W. Bush’s great-grandfather? “When Bush became president, that thing was hot, but now we can’t give them away,” Kerstein laughs. (Actually, it’s priced at $69.95.)

For those who find an old stock certificate in their attic or among family papers, Kerstein also offers a very popular stock research service to delve into the company’s history and determine if the stock is still active.

Want to give the gift of history? Visit www.scripophily.com.

Westinghouse Air Brake Company Check signed twice by George Westinghouse (Revenue Stamps on Back) - 1872

Images courtesy of Scripophily.com

Sports memorabilia is a BIG BUSINESS – to the tune of a $1 billion annually, I’ve heard – and a major chunk of that is autograph material. Amid this high-stakes collecting area, Mike is a voice of authority. According to his bio on the Heritage Web site (www.ha.com), “Mike has over 26 years experience and is one of the few universally respected authorities left standing in a field racked with fraud and forgeries. The industry has been plagued by FBI investigations of fraud and Mike is the single most respected repository of trust in the business.”

Mike has appraised sports memorabilia from the estates of martial arts icon Bruce Lee, NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle and heavyweight champ Muhammad Ali, as well as St. Louis Cardinals heavy hitter Mark McGwire’s 70th home run ball for the Fireman’s Fund Insurance Company.

A couple of years ago, when I was writing a collectibles column called “Northwest Collector” for the classifieds section of the Tacoma News Tribune, I called Mike to ask him about sports memorabilia. In the course of the conversation, I asked him what sports items he collected; to my amazement Mike said he didn’t collect sports material at all – he collected guitars! I never wrote that sports memorabilia story, but I did keep Mike in mind as a story subject himself.

Recently, I interviewed Mike about his guitars and mentioned that I’d seen a number appraised by other experts on “Antiques Roadshow.” Interesting, he replied that those are the guys he hangs out with off-camera or after the segment is recorded.

Some highlights of Mike’s guitar collection:

• A 1961 Fender Precision bass, “my first serious guitar that I got in 1970,” he said. “It’s probably my #1 piece for weight, for comfort, for body contour. I don’t have to think about any player issues and can concentrate just on the music and having fun.” (He plays classic and ’60s rock, by the way.)
• A 1966 Rickenbacker 4005: “That has the best neck that I ever put my hands on.”
• A 1978 ProE II bass guitar owned by John Entwistle of The Who, which Mike purchased at a Sotheby’s auction in London in 2003. Mike has a photo of Entwistle holding this particular instrument, which is the most valuable (in strictly monetary terms) in Mike’s collection.

Mike told me he always goes to the Dallas and Arlington, Texas, guitar shows – “the top two guitar convention shows in the business,” he said.

Here’s are a few more questions I asked Mike:

AmeriCollector: Have you collected only guitars? When did you start?

 Mike Gutierrez: “I used to have a collection of deceased Hall of Famers. At one point I had upwards of 90 percent of them, up to 1988 or so. Then I sold them off.

“As far as collecting guitars, I started around 1970. I have guitars that I would go to the grave with: because of the feel, because of the sound – NOT because of the collectability. You put your hand on that thing, the feel of the neck, and you think, man, I’m home: Everything – the comfort, the sound, is me.”

AC: What makes you want to get a particular guitar?

 Mike: “The design, the sound, the feel of the instrument and its response.”

AC: How do you manage your collection? Do you ever sell your guitars?

Mike: “It’s a revolving door. I have a connection with guitars that I’ll never move. Also I have a revolving group that changes.”

 AC: What advice would you offer to someone who wants to start a guitar collection?

Mike: “Always pick a guitar that feels good and sounds good. If you’re getting a collector guitar (as an investment), you’re a businessman. Decide which you want to be – and you can be both. But if you’re going to sell it, always go for the best condition, in the most original state.”