RINKER ON COLLECTIBLES — Column #1511

Copyright © Harry Rinker, LLC 2015 

Questions and Answers

QUESTION:  I own a carnival glass plate.  The center has a raised design featuring a wreath made of tulips surrounded by a block band.  The edge collar is fluted ending in a crimped/swirl edge.  The color is a light orange.  I have shown it to several people.  One group says it is period carnival glass.  The other claims it is a reproduction.  What information can you provide about its origin and value? – JG, Email Question

ANSWER:  Not recognizing the pattern, I turned to Bill Edwards and Mike Carwile’s “Standard Encyclopedia of Carnival Glass, 9th Edition” (Collector Books, 2004).  The book contains illustrations of American, Australian, and Canadian patterns plus a section on whimsy pieces and hatpins.  I began at page 1 and was blurry eyed by page 355.  I did not find the pattern.

[Author’s Aside #1:  Many key antiques and collectibles references books are now out of print.  Edwards and Carwile’s carnival glass books are examples.  Often discarded because the prices found in them are out of date, these references books still are the best visual identification resources available.  When trying to identify an object, a picture IS worth 1,000 words.

Digital identification guides are being developed.  David Doty’s Carnival Glass website www.ddoty.com is excellent if you know the pattern name.  Greystone Web Publishing “Carnival Glass Identification and Price Guide” [http://greystonepriceguide.com/carnivalglass/pattern
_library.php?ctype=W&start=16] is picture focused but does not include all patterns.

Not convinced your plate is post-1945, I sent the two pictures attached to your email to Debbie and Randy Coe (www.coesmercantile.com), my primary source for questions about glass, authors of a number of books including “Elegant Glass: Early, Depression & Beyond, Revised and Updated 4th Edition” (Schiffer Publishing), and good friends.  Debbie responded immediately identifying your pattern as Diamond Glass’s Windflower.

In 1904, Thomas and Alfred Dugan, cousins of Harry Northwood, and a group of investors purchased the National Glass Company’s old Northwood Works located in Indiana, Pennsylvania.  Dugan Glass Company began producing iridized (carnival) glass in 1909.  In 1913, the Dugans left.  The company was renamed the Diamond Glass Company. John P. Elkin served as president.  Diamond continued making glass using the Dugan (some former Northwood) molds.  A fire destroyed the plant in 1931.  It was not rebuilt.  [See: www.carnivalheaven.com/carnivalglass101/id17.htm]

[Author’s Aside #2:  The windflower pattern information was in Edwards and Carwile’s book.  I missed it.  Past experience taught me that when looking through large blocks of information or objects, it pays to take a break after every 50 to 60 pages or objects and walk away.  It helps refresh the focus.  When scanning hundreds of pages at once, it is common to lose concentration and miss things.  The old adage “haste makes waste” applies.]

Edwards and Carwile provide this information about the windflower pattern: “Made by Diamond Glass in 1914 or 1915 and produced for several years, this pattern is found in bowls (6 ruffled, 8-ruffled, and 10-ruffled, ice cream shape, and deep round), plates, and a one handed deep nappy shape….plates are found in marigold, amethyst, or cobalt blue….”  More detailed information about the pattern is found at www.ddoty.com/windflower.html.

The marigold windflower plate is common.  Doty reports several pieces sold within the last three years between $20.00 and $30.00, the same price found in Mike Carwile’s “Standard Encyclopedia of Carnival Glass Price Guide, 16th Edition” (Collector Books, 2009).  As one might suspect, several eBay “Buy It Know” sellers have listings with higher asking prices.

QUESTION:  During the 2015 Christmas holidays, I attended an auction at Dale’s Auctioneering Services in Holland, Michigan.  A large Hansa, 45 inch, plush kangaroo with a baby in the pouch sold for $145.00.  When I went home and checked the internet, I found an internet seller asking $514.94 for the same toy.  How do you explain this? – M, Holland, MI

ANSWER:  I also found the listing for $514.95 on the internet at www.houzz.com/photos
/41755102/Life-Size-Kangaroo-Stuffed-Animal-modern-kids-toys-and-games.   The listing indicates the toy is still in production.  The sales pitch notes the toy is “made to educate, to provide creative play, and to wow collectors of all ages, artists created this animal from portraits of the creature in its natural habitat.”  I also found the 45 inch Mama and Joey Kangaroo plush toy on Amazon.com for $439.99 with free shipping.  Big Box stores such as Walmart also carry Hansa plush.

In response to an email request for a history of Hansa, Richard Martinez of Hansa Toys USA, responded with four single space pages of information.  Hans Axthelm, a German living in Australia, founded Hansa in 1972.  His goal was to develop and produce “true to life” replications of animals as found in their natural habitat.  Hansa entered the plush market in 1989, selecting the Philippines as its production hub.  Initially created for European collectors, Hansa products now enjoy a global following.  Each stuffed animal features a “Toys That Teach” tag providing detailed information about the animal.

Hansa manufactures over 700 plush toy variations of African, Arctic, Asian, and North American animals.  The website www.hansatoystore.com lists over 50 animal types, over 15 mechanical animals, life size animals, and two types of ride-on animals—life size and mechanical. The “Company Information” found at the bottom of the home page features a URL on “How Hansa Animals are Made.”  The Hansa Toy Store website lists the life size Kangaroo at $449.90, reduced from $489.90.

The secondary resale market for Hansa plush toys falls into “Rinker’s 30 Year Rule”—for the first 30 years of anything’s life, all its value is speculative.  As a result, there is no stable secondary market pricing.  An example is worth what it brings on any given day.

Collector, decorator, and reuse are the three basic antiques and collectibles market values.  Hansa plush toys fall in the reuse category.  As such, their secondary resale market value is based primarily on a cheaper than new basis.  The auction close of $145.00, roughly thirty cents on the initial purchase dollar, is a very strong result.  The kangaroo’s quality of workmanship and size helped.

The secondary collecting market for plush took a major hit at the beginning of the twenty-first century with the decline in collector interest in Grund, Steiff, and teddy bear markets.  Hansa plush collectors must exist but do not appear organized in terms of a collectors’ club or chat groups.  A checklist reference book might serve as a collecting trigger.  At the very least, it would make a fun picture book.

QUESTION:  I have a Zippo lighter in a silver motif on a black ground that features a night scene of a quarter-moon above mountain peaks.  The lighter is heavily used.  Does it have any value? – H, West Chester, PA, Email Question

ANSWER:  With apologies to Timex, Zippo lighters take a beating and keep on heating.  If your lighter works, it has value.  The amount of value depends on how often you might use it.  Due to its condition, it has little to no collector value.

Given the number of case bodies, which has to number in the tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands, Zippo has used, I was skeptical about my ability to date the lighter.  I mentioned my challenge on the December 20, 2015, edition of WHATCHA GOT?  Within minutes, I received a call from a KBOZ listener in Bozeman, Montana.  He suggested I check out the gift products from Crazy Mountain Ranch near Clyde Park, Montana.  It was good advice.

Philip-Morris (Marlboro) owns Crazy Mountain Ranch, used to host award contest winners who receive an all-expense paid vacation for a few days. Previously known as the Deadrock Guest Ranch, Philip Morris acquired it from Glenn Patch in 2000.  The ranch features a frontier town of 20 buildings – including a saloon, two-story hotel, and a stone jail.  Visitors receive a $150.00 chit to purchase souvenir material at the general store.

The Marlboro Moon over Mountain lighter dates from around 2000.  New in the box examples are listed on eBay for prices ranging from $25.00 to $35.00.  A like-new example without the box had an asking price of $11.99.  An eBay seller, obviously not attuned to the marketplace, listed a badly damaged example for $15.00.

Harry L. Rinker welcomes questions from readers about collectibles, those mass-produced items from the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.  Selected letters will be answered in this column.  Harry cannot provide personal answers.  Photos and other material submitted cannot be returned.  Send your questions to: Rinker on Collectibles, 5955 Mill Point Court SE, Kentwood, MI 49512.  You also can e-mail your questions to harrylrinker@aol.com. Only e-mails containing a full name and mailing address will be considered.

You can listen and participate in WHATCHA GOT?, Harry’s antiques and collectibles radio call-in show, on Sunday mornings between 8:00 AM and 10:00 AM Eastern Time.  If you cannot find it on a station in your area, WHATCHA GOT? streams live on the Internet at www.gcnlive.com.

SELL, KEEP OR TOSS?: HOW TO DOWNSIZE A HOME, SETTLE AN ESTATE, AND APPRAISE PERSONAL PROPERTY (House of Collectibles, an imprint of Random House Information Group, $17.99), Harry’s latest book, is available at your favorite bookstore and via www.harryrinker.com.