Kent,

I'll give you $100 bucks cash money for those clunky old silver things you lug around! Ya know, Buddy-Pricing!

MMc

Well, I'm finally done (for now) with all the the pictures and the captions and the uploading to photobucket, thanks to all the helpful suggestions I got right here at the Magic Café, especially from Bill Palmer. Many thanks to all of you. For a neophyte with a camera, I must say that I am not displeased with these initial results although there is, of course, room for improvement. Anyway, I've attached the link to my Photobucket website. There you will find four separate albums for (1) my micro-brass magic - these are just non-captioned group pics; (2) my chink-a-chink collection; (3) my Okito box collection and (4) my cups collection. I've put up pics of about 80 or so sets of cups in my collection (in most, but not all, cases there are two pics of each set). I've left out my chop cups (relatively few anyway) and those cups that are damaged and in need of, or already in process, of repair. If you click on the small pics in each file, a larger pic will open up with the descriptive caption. Some vintage cups are unidentified. If you have any info in this regard, it would be much appreciated.
This is the link :
http://s759.photobucket.com/albums/xx238/Fortasse56/

You have done a lot of very good work here. I'll be back later to give you a few pieces of information.

Thanks, Bill. I PM'd you a short while ago too.

Fortasse,

Those photos turned out great! Idon't know an awful lot about Okito / Boston boxes etc but Ilove those custom engraved ones. Do you engrave them yourself?

I love your cup collection too, a few sets I have not seen before and I really like the "props" such as books and glasses etcto set off the cups. The wand with the silver centre is interesting...

Bri

Bri :

Thanks for your comments. The "wand with the silver centre" is actually a musical conductor's baton. I have a small collection of these that I picked up on visits to antique shops in London, and off of Ebay as well. These are nearly always of ebony with hallmarked sterling silver knobs, tips and centres. The centres usually bear an inscription of some sort describing the occasion and the name of the person to whom the baton was presented, and the date (they were popular as presentation pieces early in the 20th century). In nearly all cases, it was some retiring conductor or the other who received it as a memento of his service They tell a story and that makes them interesting. They also do decent service as magic wands! That's what attracted me to them and what I use them for.

As for the custom engraved Okito boxes, these were done for me by Tom Bartlett of Tulsa who can be found right here at the Magic Café. He's quite an artist, isn't he?

Thanks for your interest.

Fortasse

Great stuff, looks great. The photos are really very very good! I just set about photographing my own yesterday and discovered that I can't find the plate to attach the camera to my tripod. Oh well, that sets that idea back a while!
Scott

Thany you, Scott.

Fortasse… What a great collection, I really enjoyed looking at all the photos. Besides all the Cups, I was fascinated with all the coin boxes.

I can see that it must have taken quite a while to take all the photos, thank for doing this!
Bruce

That's a fantastic collection, Sean - and the photos have turned out beautifully.

Love the monogrammed Okito boxes with the 'SMcW' on them!

The baton looks very much like a swagger stick - a ceremonial (usually military) baton for leading bands and/or marching. I've got one that's very similar - black with silver tip, but mine's nowhere near as nice as that one in your photos.

Richard

After seeing Sean's collection(s) mine seems more like a small clutter!

Iwonder Sean, you have a couple of bill tubes in your pics, would you happen to be able to help id these please?
http://www.themagiccafe.com/forums/viewt......um=115&0

Thanks,
Bri

Thanks much to all of you for your very kind comments. I am most grateful. I am also indebted to Bill for helping to identify some of the cups whose origins were unknown to me. I will include the correct descriptions in the next "edition", whenever that is.

Bri : The best person to assist you in identifying the brass bill tubes you have is probably George Robinson at Viking Magic Manufacturing. He's a great source of information on this sort of thing. The problem with bill tubes is that they generally do not involve any sophisticated manufacturing techniques and as such are ideally suited to mass-produced cloning all over the world. Bill tubes, for example, are being mass-produced in India and China. To the untrained eye, there is little difference between theses bill tubes and those of excellent quality that have long been made by Viking Magic and, further back in time, Brema. Some of the Brema tubes were monogrammed ("CBS" for Carl Brema & Son). The Viking tubes bear the VM symbol as well but except where you have such hallmarks it can be awfully difficult to tell one bill tube from another. But ask George. He's bound to have some useful insights into the origins of your bill tubes.

Fortasse

Those Okito boxes are wonderful. So are the Chink-A-Chinks.

Fortasse,
Thank you for the info on the Bill tunes, I will mail George.
Kindest,
Bri

Nice pics Fortasse, nice props too!

That is a lot of work there, thank you for sharing it with us.

Tom

Thanks, Tom.

Fortasse

What a wonderful collection! Thanks so much for taking the time to photograph and caption all of them. I could spend hours looking at photos like those.

Best,

dc

Thanks Fortasse,

I have also really enjoyed looking at your collection.

This has inspired me to develop an improved way of displaying my cluttered collection on the cabinet.

Eric

If only there was a smiley that had eyes popping out of its head...
Great looking collection, organized, labelled & photographed great.
Thanks a ton for sharing it here.
Don