Mike

Whoa! What a load of crap! We got people posting here saying that machine marble makers should not be using certain colors because someone used them in the past. Give me and every other sane person in the world a break. That statement is (fill in the blank). Does this mean that I can never paint my bedroom white because someone used white 75 years ago. Personally, I wish Dave and Sammy would have actually tried to duplicate old marble colors. It would not have bothered me at all. If one can't tell the difference, don't buy, get smart or get out. By the way, the world is not flat!

Steph, If that is the one you got from me, it is a great one. Hope you find it for all to see. Mike

I like it that some folks are all concerned about Jabo/Sammy and they are the topic of heated discussions. 15 years ago, a fairly high percentage of marble folks were dismissive of the Jabo product and had no time or interest in them. It did not matter how nice they were yet some would not even give Jabo a second look or stop by a room where Jabo would be traded and sold exclusively at a show. Maybe it is that old "what goes around, comes around" thing. Think back about when some collectors would only look for vintage handmades and were dismissive of even nice machine mades. This next statement may ruffle a few feathers but in some respects, Jabo may be a lot like Beanie Babies. Some very nice and somewhat hard to find examples of Jabo/Sammy are out there, they are still very affordable for the most part and certain of them will be sought after long after the bloom is off the rose. People still pay high dollars for the certain Beanies and others can be purchased in bulk for pennies on the dollar. I have three large plastic storage tubs of Beanies in my attic that were aquired when my children were on the hunt at the peak of the Beanie thing. I overpaid a couple times for a Peace or Diana bear but that was it. I could care less that the market for them went bust as I still think they were worth the $5 paid. If I every get a grandchild, they will be worth a million bucks when they are swimming in them on the living room floor. I get the same enjoyment today and the child comes out when I play with my Jabo marbles and I think I paid way less than they are worth.

Hummmmm? Let me think about this one with regard to machine mades. Should I spend $500-$900 on a Christensen Exotic or some rare vintage round hunk of glass or buy a really fine Jabo or Sammy example for $.50 to $20.00 if I am into the really nice, mint examples and multiple colors of glass on one hunk? Contemps will be a different discussion. Won't be long and I will be selling every vintage and old marble that I own except for a few worthless ones from my original bag when I was age 10 or so and I am now 66. Watching the price that folks pay for some of this stuff reminds me of buying Enron or buying gold for $2,000 an ounce. Some informed collecters say they cannot tell the difference between a modern Jabo/Sammy and a vintage old valuable marble. If that is the case, save your money, don't get duped and do not overpay. My prediction is the goods will come way down in price. Baby Boomers dying and very few young collecters entering the market. Most of the folks with large holdings buy dear and sell high.

Ok.......I thought I would put this paragraph or two down as just food for thought. It appears that there are some that think that those who make marbles in recent years should not employ colors of glass that are so close to the colors that were used years back making what are now vintage marbles. I submit that that is never going to happen because who would want to buy modern marbles (machine or handmade) that did not have red/white/blue, red/yellow, green/white/red and the rest of the color spectrum used? There is a reason why the greenish (coke bottle glass) cateyes from China languish in the dollar store toy isles forever and 200 can be purchased for a dollar. I suggest that marble makers will never stop using color to enhance the product they make to protect the hobbiest who collects valuable vintage marbles of old from being duped. Maybe collectors of marbles ought to purchase the modern ones for a buck or two and forget about paying hundreds of dollars for something that looks almost the same that is old. Some of the marble pricing reminds me of the tulipmania (Google it) the first bubble in the 1600's. Yes, some are old, colorful, some are few and condition is great but is that vintage marble that you may not be able to discern the difference between a modern made Jabo/Sammy marble worth hundreds more? I guess it is if you bought, found or own some good old ones. If you do not own any valuable vintage and want to protect yourself, listen to these long-time experts who are saying they can't tell the difference. Nuff said?

I am just dying to see the marbles from Jabo/Sammy's that might confuse a long-time serious and educated marble collector/afcionado with any vintage marble that might wholesale for $50.00 or more. Please post them all right away. I am not really taking sides, I would just like to see the marbles that might qualify so that i might form my own opinion. Seems this subject hits a bunch of folks "hot button" so let us all see what you are talking about. Show them if you got them.

Just for the hell of it, I thought I would post because someone reminded me of my early years of collecting marbles in one of these earlier posts. My house burned pretty much to the ground when I was 15 years old. 30-40 years later my mom asked when I was going to get my marbles out of the basement. I asked "what marbles" as the house burned down and I lost all? She told me glass don't burn so come and get them. We got them and used them for decorating and let the 3 boys play with them and I had a wastebasket full of them. Started to see some of them selling for big bucks at antique shows and other and thought I had good stuff. Looked at marble books and decided I had marbles worth hundreds each. Not so. What was thought to be three hundred was less than $3.00. Anyway, bottom line was that I was confused 20 years before Jabo/Sammy's started doing any special runs. I did decide to research and learn though. Today, I purchased a couple jars with over 100 Peltiers for a small amount of money but I am really not too sure what they are as they might be Jabo's or Sammy's. People spend hundreds on marbles every day on Ebay getting nothing. Why not worry about every house sold being structualy unsound, a stock purchased that is going bankrupt in the morning, or a car sold on Ebay with a bad engine. People can't even get food or medical help. Thank God that mostly all we have to worry about here is the color of glass used in toy marbles by people trying to make marbles. Think about it!

I don't know about you folks but now that I have seen this batch, I am all torn and conflicted! I now need to weigh my options as to spending/investing possibly hundreds on a great collectable vintage marble or two or being able to buy hundreds of these Saundra marbles for $30-$50. What a conundrum! Please show me a few more of those flame-type multi-colored Saundras to help me make up my mind. I have to agree with an earlier post and say that if Dave & Sammy would have used old recycled Coke bottle glass, tried only one color with it (brown comes to mind)and gone back to making them out-of-round with plenty of flea bites and cold-roll marks my decision-making process would be much easier.

I too like a good discussion where you get all sides. Makes things a lot more interesting and one smarter. Sometimes you can take it as gospel and sometimes with a grain of salt. Think about motive sometimes too and then one must also remember a famous line from All the President's Men when Deep Throat (Holbrook) tells Bob Woodward (Redford) "Follow the Money."

Reading all this gets me in a holiday mood and reminds me of an old Christmas tune........... "I Saw Mommy Pissing Santa Claus"

I got some encouragement so I thought I might comment further. Listen to the music Bob Dylan "The Essentials" tonight. We are pretty much all so lucky to be part or a member of a small circle of folks that know how and where to get any Jabo or Sammy of about any vintage whenever we want in some quantity. You might like them and you may not. I'm putting them in but that's all I got! The man Moon comes in from Kansas on the harp The above was the start of a tune with Bruce. Anyway, You can get them wholesale even if you do not like any of them. Put them in dirty Mason jars, Cigar boxes spiked, claim you grandfather,uncle or dad died and gave them to you. Sell hype for $50 or more as it is all rock and roll to me.

The very first post on the subject was..........Who is running this lot? Did it ever get answered. Reading some of this got me thinking. I discovered Jabo in 1998 and I liked the marbles and found myself in a minority. Most marble purist thought Jabo junk and some still do. Dave sold me 25 pound boxes for $10 or so and later on I paid him $17 and sometimes $20 because I felt they were going too cheap. Now one can get 7-10 or more boxes for $2,000. How about that? Now I look on Ebay and and see 1,750 listings for Jabo and a couple hundred for Sammy marbles. Jabo marbles/Sammy Marbles sell often now for big bucks and that I think is a good thing! As for the dividing marbles, I have been a $500 investor and a $5,000 investor in Special Runs. For $5,000 I ended up with more great ones and more crappy ones. Not sure that I added anything to the thread but the marbles will seek thier own level when it comes to value/price/quality/look/maker. Supply, demand, condition, pretty, interest, advertising, rarity and other will ultimately be determined in the marketplace. I have an opinion but do not really think it matters. Thanks Mike

About fifteen or so years ago, I stopped into an antique store in Powell, OH which is just a little north of Columbus. The owner asked if he could help and was I looking for anything in particular? I said toy marbles and he said he didn't have anything good at the time as he had no Sulphides, handmades and nothing with pontils. Told him I just like common machine mades with some color and anything from the 30's to the 60's was just fine with me. He said that he had a big cake tin under the counter with marbles but they were not worth anything. He had picked up about 20 of those round Ford gumball machines and was putting a few handfulls of marbles in the gumball machines as they displayed better and sold faster. I asked if I might look at the marbles, picked out about 10 or so and asked if he would sell them to me as they were pretty colorful and some had some great patterns. He shot me a price, I did not even bother to ask him to go lower paid him and walked out. I think it was $7.00 or so and he even gave me a few extras as he was out of stock on the good marbles. I thought I might have some OK stuff but was somewhat new to marbles and wanted to check Block's Marble Mania book. A few weeks went by before I got serious about ID'ing them. Turns out I had a handful of mostly Christensens and one was a three color flame with many points. I knew nothing of the internet and consigned it to Bob Block who sold it for over $300. I later sold some others at shows for a total of another $100 plus or so. I went back to the shop and trid to buy what was left of the marbles in the cake tin but he had used them all to sell the gumball machines. Somewhere, all around us are gumball machines that may have great marbles in them and the people that bought them probably have no clue as to what they have as they were in it for the machines and not the marbles. Probably threw the marbles out and replaced them with gumballs in the playroom for the grandchildren to get. Go figure! That's my story and I am sticking to it! Mike

The photo of the goods in post # 4 makes me want to go to Sistersville and get some. Really liking where machine made marbles have gone in the last few years. Now if they can just get them back down to $10 a case for twenty-five pounds. OK.........I will throw in an extra $10 per case for the sparkles.

Edna, Very nice looking goods coming down the pike over there at Sammy's. Your last photo has a yellowish cast to it when I open it. Are they whiter than what I am seeing or are they an off-white pale yellow custard color? Can't wait to see more as I have always been a big fan of 5/8" marbles. Looks like the Sammy group has got it down. When you run some more, tell them I like purple and yellow if you can influence them some. I think these would look good in a Series V Lost Your Marbles box! Of course I would need first pick of about 500-600 pounds. Good Luck to all! mm

Can anybody elaborate? What does this mean and is anyone actually in the know? I thought there was a new run coming any day. On a temporary hold and back next week? Just very curious as I have been a big fan of Jabo for quite some time and look forward to every new run? I like everything that Dave and the Crew does!

On the picture of the big marbles, can someone please tell me one more time who made the two marbles closest to the bottom of the photo and what the approximate value/selling price might be? Thanks for your help.

Winnie, That is some nice stuff! Cat Eye Cobra's would be a good handle. Very unusual, colorful and I have not seen any like these but I also do not get around much. Some might say as good as any handmade, end of day, or any other exotic valuable marble that might have come from a machine. See how many others show up here in the class of these and if nothing shows, put them away and ask $1,000 for them. Someone needs to set a record price for a cateye and right now you are getting my vote.

Seems one is able to donate to this site to keep it running. Can the admins hold a seperate account for donations to someone and an address to send it to? I do not know how busy Sissy (Edna) is but I would trust her with my money if she would be OK with having it sent to her to forward and somehow get it to the right party. I believe any of us could list stuff on Ebay and just advertise it here and on Ebay saying that half or all proceeds would go to the fund for one in need that someone would take responsibility for. I am not big on folks taking fees to help someone but time is money and even if one would volunteer and say that they need 5% for admin and time, that would be less than most charities get. I would hope that someone should step up. I would but I am a crook. Thanks for your consideration.

I guess what I am reading is for real and there is a really good guy in trouble. I believe everyone that has ever met or encountered the man would have to agree that this is a really good soul, a kind person who is generous with his time and knowledge and willing to help anybody. Just the sort of fine person Alan is! Alan has helped me and my wife and got no formal thanks and now I wake up. Funny how it takes some crap to wake one up. I am sure that Alan is going to need help, financial assistance and other from huge medical bills and other care. I believe that this is the man that sets up a fund for donations to help animals and now he needs help!. I do not know how such a thing is done but I hope someone with experience in such matters might come forward and set something up where a percentage of marble sales or just flat-out contributions of money might get to Alan. I believe marble people are better because of Alan's contributions and maybe it might be time to pay something back.

My dad was a meat manager/butcher for A&P Tea Company his whole life. They cleaned the glass cases with a mix of warm water and ammonia. I clean my glass marbles the same way. I probably use a half-cup of clear ammonia to 1/2 to a gallon of water, let them soak a little while, swirl them around some with my hands, rinse a couple times with clear water and throw a towel on the kitchen counter and roll them around to dry. I really like looking at them in the water as know you get an idea of what wet mint really is.

Dear Marboman, I saw that you did wonders for a poor Peltier K & M going nowhere on ebay. Please help me with your marketing savy and link expertise. I believe everyone would like to take a look at the Pelts, Akro and other I have listed on Ebay. The item # is: 290606981895 and my user name is Mikeymarble. Thanking you in advance for your help and support, Mike

WGT, Neat box and an early one. There appears to be Tie Dyes, Hot Tamales, Harleys, Harley Hybids ( color tends to run gray rather than black) Butterscotch and the blue marbles I believe on the right are closer to 1998 Jabo than 1999.