Steph

Yup, great pix of the Realers. Saved!

Someone's gonna get a treasure! And it's marked Gropper? That's interesting.

Some great dates and pictures and information there, Ron. Thank you. And thanks to Nancy, of course.

I've seen some glimpses of some pretty fancy Marble King cat's eyes on facebook. But facebook is hard to follow and I don't spend much time there. They were even fancier than the ones here: http://marbleconnection.com/topic/21800-interesting-cats/ Anyone have or know about the fancy multicolor ones? I remember back when the the MK Pixie Dusts came out. With the aventurine. And I'll guess MK has been doing some more fancy stuff since then. Would love to see.

I would estimate nearer the beginning -- I would guess the 30's. Rainbos got more plain toward the end of production decades later. As far as I know.

If this thread stays alive long enough I'll have to search a flowbee demo on YouTube. Now I'm gonna distract myself by trying to figure out how you make short lines with no space between.

Well, I'm not THAT familiar with bees. Just the kind of familiar which comes from seeing 'em all one's life! And getting stung and stuff.

Add "cochonnet" as a French word for shooter. See comments here:

Very cool on coming up with the date, Kestrel! It was so fun to talk with you about these. Would love to see a link to the auctions ... if no one else scoops them up before they make it to ebay.

"An implausibility of gnus"? Someone is pulling our leg! A grist of bees? Odd to hear a brand new name for an animal I thought I was so familiar with.

I just noticed one good thing in your animal names thread. Now when we click on a link in a post, it automatically opens in a new window. So I don't have to figure out how to navigate back to the site if I forget to right-click and open in new window.

Can't say Alox didn't get the swirls from someone else. (The did get marbles from other companies before they got their own marble machines.) But Alox did make swirls (and did make patches) and I don't see any reason not to assume the swirls in that box and your bag are Alox.

They're crazy gorgeous.

Yes, says Alox on there somewhere. Pretty sure it says St. Louis, Mo. I had a couple of 'em but sent 'em to a friend.

Ric, some records said Eugene Louisa and some records said Eugenia Louise. And probably there were variations on those. Those are just the two I remember from when I was doing my genealogy as a teen. Took me until a few years ago to realize which name my great-grandmother probably whispered over her as she rocked her. Hoody, I started plugging in some of the names I knew which used to be for men and now are for women, starting with Evelyn and Meridith, and eventually I plugged in enough to come up with this page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unisex_name

Some records have my grandmother's name listed as Eugene. I'm quite sure that her French-Canadian mother meant that to have a soft, beautiful sound, with three syllables and a gentle "g". But she ended up as just Gene or Jean. Makes me think maybe her family got tired of correcting people's pronunciation after they moved from the French-friendly population of Wisconsin down to the Wild West of Oklahoma.

English has many names which started out male but are mostly female now. Got this list from Wikipedia: Ashley, Beverly, Evelyn, Hilary, Jocelyn, Joyce, Kelly, Lynn, Meredith, Shannon, Shirley, Sidney, Vivian, and Whitney Supposedly all those were once masculine names but most of them sound completely feminine to my American ears.

Thanks for the Woolworth history and the Canadian information. I have fond memories of dime stores as a kid. Then I turned around and they were gone.

Stunner

Hello. I'll let someone else field that question. Just wanted to say hi.

These are not Cairo Novelties. These are a different era. I'd guess at least 20 years apart. 30 years apart is probably a better guess. Very interesting since it's a Canadian branch of Woolworth. Did five-and-dime stores last longer in Canada than they did here in America? .... were they called five-and-dimes in Canada? Anyway, Cairo Novelty marbles are from the 40's and they look like this: They were made in America. Cat's eyes from Asia were introduced in the 50's, first from Japan. Then Hong Kong. Then later Taiwan. Now China and probably other Asian countries. So I'll guess 1970's on your bag. But I'm not familiar with Canadian packaging and labeling.

yes!

Alox shoelaces .... many/most Alox shoelaces were made in America. This made in Japan version appears to have pictures of marbles on the label.