Beaming bakers. Knights in armor. Singing chickens, a solemn Sphinx, and even a corn cob or two, outfitted with airplane wings.
What gives? Well, one and all are examples of “feed sack art.” Those colorful logos on cotton feed sacks provided a healthy dose of Americana from just before the turn of the 20th century well into the 1950s.

Cloth feed sacks were the mid-1800s successors to the wooden barrels that had previously handled storage chores. Industrial sewing machines now made it possible to sew reliable seams. Although dubbed “feed sacks,” the bags were put to work carrying plenty besides animal feed. Among the contents: seeds, flour, sugar, tobacco, bath salts, corn meal, and even ammunition. While early bags were often burlap or jute, by the 1890s cotton was king. Cotton bags were more pliable, cheaper to produce, and reusable.

Actually, “repurpose-able” is a better description. No homemaker intended to refill her empty Blue Feather Potatoes bag with more potatoes. But with a good washing, and by picking out those sturdy seams, there were plenty of other uses for that good cotton–and there was plenty to use. The standard 100-lb. feed sack, when laid flat, measured approximately 37” by 43”. With enough bags, there was soon more than enough material on hand to sew up a variety of household necessities, from dish towels and bedsheets, to new curtains and quilt backings.

Just about the only thing early white cotton bags were less than desirable for: clothing. Initially, the logos and product information inked on the bags was there to stay. The only hope for removal: dousing them with bleach, or other “sure-fire” home remedies, before engaging in some vigorous scrubbing. If that didn’t do the trick, printed info was sometimes left as is. After all, who would see it? Only the disgruntled little girl heading off to school, knowing that her new set of drawers had “100 lbs. net weight” plastered across the posterior. (Patterned feed bags, which came into vogue for clothing use in the 1920s, solved the problem. Their labels and logos were either water-soluble ink, or on easily removable tags. This led to a surge in dresses, play clothes, aprons, and other types of feed sack clothing during the Depression and World War II years).

By the early 1940s, more than 30 companies were churning out feed sacks nationwide. There was an ongoing effort to come up with distinctive, uniquely-themed logos, sure to drum up buyer interest. This explains the warbling poultry and flying corncobs on some bags, which vied for attention with more traditional illustrations of farms and countrysides. 

Are you a pocillovist? Wait. Let’s rephrase that.
Do you collect egg cups? If so, you’re into pocillovy (from the Latin, pocillum ovi, “a small cup for an egg”).

Like many other serving dishes that nowadays are prized as collectibles, egg cups initially provided a practical solution to a perplexing problem. In this case, how to serve an egg with a minimum of morning frustration. A traditional bowl was too roomy. A plate was too flat. And so, the egg cup was born. Its sole purpose: to hold an egg safely within its confines. “Eggs-asperated” breakfasters around the globe breathed hungry sighs of relief.

Throughout their lengthy history (some egg cups date to ancient Pompeii), the servers have been fashioned of whatever proved handiest, and up to the required task. Wooden egg cups, from warm cherry to burnished ebony, are prized for their elegantly turned shapes, which bring out the natural beauty of the wood. They’re often adorned with silver or ivory protective edge trim. Metal egg cups have been fashioned of silver, pewter, aluminum, gun metal, and a host of other metallic possibilities. Designs range from sleek, undecorated examples basking in simple, shiny glory, to those embellished with piercings, embossings, and engravings. China and porcelain cups were produced by name manufacturers including Spode, Goebel, and Wedgwood.

They were hand-decorated (or, in the case of less pricey competitors, decal-decorated), with fruits, flowers, and other sprightly images. Pressed glass cups, in clear colors or marble-like “slag,” were less expensive than china, and could feature molded-in patterns or be shaped in such apropos forms as chickens, ducks, and bunnies. Also inexpensive: plastic egg cups, which came into vogue in the 1930s, with the development of durable plastic formulas. For the most careful eaters, there were even rubber, straw, and papier-maché egg cups.

Standard egg cup shapes run the gamut, from those identified by design (“Footed”; “Bucket”) to those identified by purpose, such as the “Goose and Chicken.” This “double cup” had a smaller end just the right size for a chicken egg, with the larger end intended to hold a goose egg. The real egg cups to beat, however, are novelties and figurals.

Even the most hard-boiled collector cracks a smile when greeted by egg cups that pay tribute to such pop culture icons as Mickey Mouse, Snow White, Bugs Bunny, and those ever-purply Smurfs. The cups are a special hit with Baby Boomers, conjuring up childhood recollections not that far in the past.
Many are in traditional cup shapes, with the character likeness an applied illustration. The really good eggs, however, are figurals, often of heads (a natural), but sometimes full body depictions, such as “Noddy.” He’s the winsome scamp who now and then showed up in the Downton Abbey kitchen.

Other popular themes are fairy tale and nursery rhyme favorites, animals, buildings, and vehicles such as toy trains. And, when Easter egg time rolls around each year, you’ll find a flock of chicken cups and a hutchful of bunny cups on antique dealers’ shelves. Giving these to wide-eyed youngsters each Easter—complete with an oversize chocolate egg—was a tradition in the early 20th century. Candy maker Fanny Farmer even made sure recipients knew where that delicious chocolate was coming from: its duck cups were emblazoned with the company name. In recent years, the tradition of an annual Easter egg cup has been carried on by candy companies such as Cadbury’s.

Toys are for kids, right? Well… except those intended for “kids at heart,” like the battery-operated figures which hopped off store shelves and into customers’ shopping bags in the 1950s and ‘60s. Parents took one look at the gleeful “Monkey Clanging Cymbals,” or the dainty “Dog Lady Watering Flowers,” and said to themselves, “Now wouldn’t the kids get a kick out of that?”

And they did—for awhile, at least. Battery figures required little interactivity. You turned on Mr. Monkey, watched him clang his cymbals, and then what? Back in the box he went.

The truth was, as toy manufacturers quickly discovered, that kids weren’t the ones getting a kick out of these battery wonders. It was the actual buyers (i.e., their parents) who were getting the kick, thinking how much fun it would have been to own one of these toys back when they were kids. That’s why so many of the battery ops eventually found their way to a shelf in Dad’s den. And that’s why so many of the figurine themes were a bit further afield than what authentic kids might be thinking about. (Really, how many boys and girls spent their days dreaming about owning a “Charley Weaver Bartender” or a “Pipe Smoking Rat”?)

The earliest “battery toys,” dating from just after World War II, were essentially “mechanicals.” Friction, or a wind-up spring-driven motor provided any movement. Battery-powered components were just there to offer a little something extra – car head-lights that actually lit up, or a noisy police siren.

Wind-up toys only ran as long as their wind-up lasted. Then it was time for another turn of the key. Japan’s intro-duction of miniature battery-powered motors in the late 1940s meant that toys could essentially run forever (or at least until their batteries wore out). Even better, battery-operated toys could be designed to perform what-ever imaginative actions came to the designer’s mind. “Piggy Cook” could merrily sprinkle seasoning on his latest entrée. . . “Teddy The Boxing Bear” could deter-minedly attack his punching bag… and the “Down The Hatch Sea Captain” could send another healthy slug…well, “down the hatch.” With some battery figures, the actions were even more ingenious: Magnetic fish helped the “Fishing Bear” reach his daily limit; “McGregor the Cigar Smoker” actually blew “smoke” from his cigar, while the “Bubble Blowing Bunny” did just that.

It’s 2025! Out with the old, and in with the new! Clean those closets! Dump those dresser drawers! Jettison the junk and start the new year with a clean slate!

Wait a minute. . .you’re not going to throw away that nifty wall calendar, are you? Not so fast!
Wall calendars fall into the category of “collectible ephemera,” which pretty much says it all. “Ephemeral” means something short-lived, or transitory (In other words, here today, gone tomorrow or thereabouts). Like Christmas cards, Halloween decorations, sheet music, homemaking magazines, and other paper goods, wall calendars were never intended for lengthy life spans. Once they’d served their purpose of marking the days, it was off to the trash heap, as an up-to-date model made its debut.

Except. . .a lot of those wall calendars were so gosh-darn appealing that folks couldn’t bear to part with them. Maybe it was that heart-tugging illustration of a freckle-faced lad with a frisky puppy. . .or the promo for a once-familiar, now long-vanished local business. . .or even the coy glance of a perky pin-up girl, on the calendar that once held pride-of-place over Dad’s workbench. The days may have disappeared, but the memories lived on.
Calendars have been around for awhile. A long while. The oldest thus far recorded dates from 8000 B.C., discovered during an archeological dig in Scotland. Of course, that one was carved in stone. Paper calendars had to wait until the discovery of paper (or, at any rate, papyrus). Even then, the tedious task of hand-lettering meant that calendars were primarily the province of scholars, in need of details on phases of the moon, liturgical observances, and the like.

And then, in 1440, along came the printing press, and calendars could be printed. A later development: broadside printing, which meant calendars could be printed on a single sheet of paper. By the late 1800s, calendars were within almost every budget, and businesses took note. If folks were going to hang calendars with a pretty picture on their kitchen walls, why not calendars that also included, in addition to that pretty picture, a prominent ad for the local gas station or funeral parlor? It would, after all, be up all year, subtly implanting a message ready to emerge when the time was right (Need a new Frigidaire? Who to call? Well, how about “Berg Hardware”? It says right on the calendar that they carry refrigerators. And look—here’s their phone number!).