Steph

Fascinating! What an amazing pair to have. Nice way to wake up on a Saturday.

For fun ... a 1953 ad .... assuming the pictures show up ... (Photobucket is undergoing maintenance so I hope they show.) I consider the swirls Alleys ... even though this is four years into the Marble King company's existence. Now you have me wondering about the clearies .... good chance Alley made those also but I have no idea .... and I guess I consider them Marble Kings just because they're in the Marble King packaging. But I wonder what they would look like under blacklight -- if blacklight revealed a swirly interior I might start looking at them as Alleys.

Berry Pink ... AKA the Marble King. I consider the basic St. Marys swirls to be Alley even when they show up in MK bags. When MK was starting up they had much leftover Alley stock which they used while they perfected their own style. Edit: their style being the Rainbows and four-bladed cat's eyes. I don't know if they ever ran Alley-like marbles of their own, but I haven't heard that they did. Have heard of Marble King swirls -- with colors similar to Marble King Rainbows -- but am not aware of those being sold back then.

Here's a small and blurry pic of some St. Marys Alleys which yours might fit in with.

Stay tuned: http://marbleconnection.com/topic/22071-st-marys-alleys/

The ones in the Marble King bags will be St. Marys ... right? Some boulders ...

Anyone wanna post some classic St. Marys Alleys ... and maybe later talk about the range of variation. But first some of the ones which a new swirl student might have a good chance of recognizing? (I have a Mr. Peanut bag I can post but that means getting a picture, and you know me with the love-hate thing for my camera.)

Agree on the transparent ones being Pelt. If the red and white has a colorless base, it's a Sunset. If a green base, it's a 7-up. If other base, I guess we stick with Rainbo. Well, if you get a Mr. Peanut bag it might have St. Marys Alleys in it. And if you get a Marble King bag with Alleys in it, I think they're St. Marys. ... gonna start a thread to confirm ..... We have an awesome Alley thread, but they're not divided by place. Not sure if we have a special St. Marys thread.

Transparent swirl. Looks old. And nice. But I don't have a direction to go for narrowing down a company.

Very shiny in this pic. So shiny I might think new on them. But from the other pic, and together with the rainbos, I'll say likely vintage here also. And agree with St. Marys Alley.

Oh my! Ow ... I have busted ribs ... and between laughing and repetitive squeeing, I'm in pain. That is soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo cute.

The pink is dreamy. I started to suggest pink for all your bases but I'm not sure how ox would look on pink. Thanks for progress report!

U.S. Dollars here http://www.ebay.com/sch/sweetjewel23/m.html

Sweetness

Whoever thought of the Marble Mobile, kudos to them for the whimsy. I had sone adorable little Japanese tin litho cars which fit into matchboxes. Sold 'em. The next time I find any I'm keeping 'em. And getting special vintage matchboxes for them.

Thanks, Al!

I don't know a reason for it. Seems it has to change some time, eh? I first learned 1970 as vintage 10 years ago, and those bags from 1975 are ten years older now. At some point they have to qualify as vintage, right? heh

I looked at it before I read the description and I was oohing and aahing at how aquatic the pictures look. The chalkie V is silvery on my screen. Is it silvery in hand? Where is the green in the picture coming from? Inside? Neighboring marble?

Woohoo! You go, Timmy! Oh no, I gave it away. LOL ... yeah, I could play with that for hours!

I already love this thread.

You found a bin with ten cent marbles? That would be fun to play in. Good eye.

Richard got me wondering about this. Anyone have a good handle on labels from those "not officially vintage" but "getting kinda old now" times? Al, this question might mostly be for you, but of course anybody and everybody is welcome.

Tiny little p.s. ... I can usually ID MK bags from before the 60's. And there is one style of MK cat eye from the late 50's which stands out. The style known as St. Marys. If you see some of those in MK bags, then I'd say bid. Some St. Marys cats: http://marbleconnection.com/topic/20993-calling-all-cats-eyes/?do=findComment&comment=185300