By Dean Schaffer (Copyright Collectors Weekly 2010)

Stephen M. H. Braitman has had a lifelong love affair with music, and has more than 20,000 vinyl records to prove it. In this interview, he discusses the British Invasion from a collector’s perspective, and explores the evolution of the technology behind the tunes—from 78s to 45s to LPs, from mono to stereo to quadrophonic. Braitman, who is both a music appraiser and collector, can be reached via his website, MusicAppraisals.com.

I was a Hollywood kid. My father was a TV and radio editor in the San Fernando Valley, and he allowed …

continue reading | 2 Comments

By Maribeth Keane and Daniel Bohm

My boss was a bit skeptical when one of my colleagues threw out the idea of interviewing one of the stars of the History Channel’s “Pawn Stars.” After all, pawn shops don’t exactly have the best reputations. Sure they handle vintage collectibles, but most of the stuff they see is nickel-and-dime junk, right?

Well, maybe. I always equated pawn shops with the places the cops go to in “Law & Order” when there are stolen goods involved in a case, not the sorts of locales where …

continue reading | 1 Comment

By Dave Margulius

There are lots of great museums in the world, and if there were a museum Olympics every four years, it would be extremely competitive. The games would be dominated by powerhouses like the Victoria and Albert, The Metropolitan Museum, and the Smithsonian. In furniture and Americana, you’d have specialized contenders like Winterthur. And, of course, in railroads, the California State Railroad Museum.

But here’s another way of looking at this: what if you were stranded …

continue reading | 0 Comments

By Maribeth Keane and Brad Quinn

In this interview, author and scholar Dr. Linda Arthur talks about the evolution and history of the aloha shirt. She discusses such important designers as Alfred Shaheen and explains when and how the shirt became a fad on the U.S. mainland. Arthur’s numerous books include “The Art of the Aloha Shirt” and “Aloha Attire: Hawaiian Dress in the Twentieth Century.” Arthur can be reached via Washington State University, where she is a professor and curator in the department of Apparel Merchandising, Design and Textiles.

When I came to Washington State University, I brought …

continue reading | 4 Comments

By Daniel Bohm (Copyright Collectors Weekly 2010)

In this article, we consider what Audrey Hepburn’s little black dress is really worth.

I recently had the pleasure of updating our Audrey Hepburn overview, which probably took me longer than most, mainly because every time I saw a picture of her I would inevitably have to wipe my drool off the keyboard. Once I was able to get past her everlasting beauty (who am I kidding, I never got past that), I was amazed at some of the things I learned.

As you may have …

continue reading | 0 Comments

By Lisa Hix (Copyright Collectors Weekly 2010)

A writer explains the reasons behind her love-hate relationship with high heels.

Behold the power of the stiletto heel. Despite all the advances women have made, it’s one fetish we can’t seem to escape, a paradox epitomized by “Sex and the City.” The characters embodied a late-’90s vision of independent women, enjoying the spoils of feminism: They had the financial power to support themselves, and the personal freedom to sleep around. Yet, they turned into swooning schoolgirls at the sight of a pair of Manolo Blahniks….

continue reading | 3 Comments

By Dean Schaffer (Copyright Collectors Weekly 2010)

You may not have noticed, but Collectors Weekly just turned 100!

Okay, that was a lie. We’re old, but we’re not that old. But we do have some news that’s just as exciting. One of our visitors, Savoychina1, just became the first to reach 100 posts on Show & Tell, a new interactive feature we launched a little over a month ago. In order to celebrate, we wanted to get to know him a little better.

Hailing from North Carolina, Savoychina1 is a jack-of-all-trades when …

continue reading | 2 Comments

By Daniel Bohm

I’ve long been fascinated with the popularity of the Brooklyn Dodgers. Growing up in New York, I often saw Brooklyn Dodgers gear around the city. I had friends whose parents swore by the long-gone Dodgers. There was such a mystique around the team that little impressionable me even bought (and wore) a replica 1914-1924 Brooklyn cap, even though I was a New York Yankees fan.

So why is Brooklyn Dodgers memorabilia so collectible? After all, Walter O’Malley turned his back on the city after the 1957 season and …

continue reading | 0 Comments

By Lisa Hix

Harvey Pekar carried himself with a slouch. He had a disheveled comb-over and dark, haunted eyes. A file clerk at the Veterans Administration hospital in Cleveland, he spoke with a cantankerous rasp. If you sat next to him on the bus, you might not even notice him.

Yet this ordinary man, who died this week at age 70, made his unremarkable day-to-day life in a typical city immortal, thanks to his comic, “American Splendor.” Through these autobiographical comic books, Pekar found a devoted following, moved by …

continue reading | 0 Comments

By Maribeth Keane and Bonnie Monte (Copyright Collectors Weekly 2010)

In this interview, author and collector Mark Bahti shares his lifelong appreciation for the artistry of Southwest Native American jewelry. Bahti has written numerous books on Native American culture and crafts, and he’s the proprietor of Bahti Indian Arts based in Arizona and New Mexico.

Thanks to my father, I basically grew up involved with Indian arts and culture. He was a graduate of the University of New Mexico and wrote the first popular book on Southwest Indian arts and crafts. In the summer of 1949, he opened a little shop …

continue reading | 6 Comments

By Dean Schaffer

I know I’m going to date myself when I say this, but the Smashing Pumpkins’ “Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness” is my favorite album of all time. Yes, I know it was released in 1995. Yes, I know that there are “better” albums out there (like the Beatles‘ “Sgt. Pepper’s,” of course), but it’s still my favorite.

But enough about me. A vinyl LP of “Mellon Collie” in near mint condition sold the other day on eBay for £147 (or about $221). (Here’s the link if you want to …

continue reading | 3 Comments

By Daniel Bohm (Copyright Collectors Weekly 2010)

A tribute to the The Boss.

You and I may consider ourselves baseball collectors, but we will never reach the level of George Steinbrenner, the longtime owner of the New York Yankees, who passed away today at the age of 80 at his home in Tampa, Florida.

I am not suggesting that “The Boss,” as he was affectionately known, was sitting on a goldmine of old Yankee artifacts, although you have to assume he had a few prize pieces. But for Steinbrenner, getting his hands on …

continue reading | 2 Comments