Steph

Here is one of the recent offerings of a seller who has sold some clearly dubious bennies in the past. What do you think about these?

Updating with some of their February 2011 offerings: It's hard to choose which ones to pick. I've pared it down to these. Focusing on the greens because those have improved quite a bit but other colors have improved also. They don't get anything like the money they got for the eagle bennies. One of the lots of 3 greens sold for $17.50, including shipping. Quick check of the final bids for their current completed auctions show a lot go unbidded upon. When they make the sale, some of the lots go for almost $2 per mib, while some go for less than $1 per mib. So, not a high dollar racket. Let's have one more. Are these browns real?

Enjoy one of their recent lots: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=250778788486 They really have improved remarkably since 2007.

Any benningtons they're selling, assume they're fake. They've been improving their art over the last few years. Two years ago we noticed they seemed to be dabbling with a lined china type of marble. Looks like they're still working on that. (This is the person who brought us the eagle bennies in 2007.)

Not a bad idea. I understand wanting all green. But the others colors could provide interesting accents.

That's a nice response. Well done.

we're sneaky like that.

Jupiter! Neat! Thanks for the pictures! Nice marbles.

Me gusta Cracker Jack!

Hi Howie! Nice to meet you! Hope you have a fun time here. I would like to see your grandpa's marble. That would be cool. See you later. Steph

The bottom one looks familiar. I'd guess American on that. I have a similar color combo in my Champion box. I vaguely remember that color combo attributed to another maker also.

The Vitro lookalikes. That fella yesterday was acting like we were pulling the rug out from under the value of his conquerors by calling them Japanese. Just got me wondering .... how does the value of one of those conqueror lookalikes compare to the common conqueror? Neither would be very valuable. Might the Japanese marble actually be worth more?

I really have no idea how much people who buy Wales style marbles would pay for them .... How much are they worth?!

Hi Joe. Welcome. I'd recommend Everett Grist's Big Book of Marbles, by Everett Grist and Lloyd Huffer. The Fourth Edition has been freshly released. Another good book is American Machine-Made Marbles, by Dean Six, Susie Metzler and Michael Johnson. It is heavy into historical information. For older handmades, Baumann's Collecting Antique Marbles is a classic. There are some classics by Bob Block but some of that information has become dated. For example, in some cases, different terminology and additional information about makers have come out since their publication. I wouldn't discourage you from getting them, and maybe someone else would put them high on the list. This is just my $.02. There is also a classic by Stan Block, called Marble Mania. Does that have a new edition? (muttering to myself while I go look that up) Yes, it does. I haven't seen the new one yet. There are lots more marble books, including specialty books on cat's eyes, Jabos, ceramic marbles, etc. I don't mean to leave anyone out. I just picked the ones I thought might be good first buys. I look forward to seeing others' recommendations. Disclaimer about values given in books. It's very tricky to get a handle on marble values, in case you're getting books to help you assess your marbles instead of just identifying the marbles. I've used books to estimate marble values for sale and received quite the lesson when my $2500 marble sold for only $80 on ebay and my $50 marble went for $5. .

Is this person's coins fake like their benningtons are? A lot of the coins they sell are billed as errors. Got me wondering if they were real errors or somehow doctored. I have no idea whatsoever what would be involved in that kind of fakery and am not making accusations about these particular coins. I just wonder ...... http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=250777312438 http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=250777307927 fwiw: they have been given negative feedback in the past for using chemicals to artificially tone authentic old coins. http://toolhaus.org/cgi-bin/negs?User=youhave2bid2win&Dirn=Received+by

That's great! Wouldn't want to put it down.

Bump. Just two hours left. Some beauts.

imposter? Vitro whirlpool:

Looking at this one underwater might "clear" things up.

No amber? My eyes processed it as lavender and white in an amber base.

sounds good to me (unless it's european) p.s. nice mib

Awesome. Thanks for all the work you do on these reports! I need to get in touch with George about that poster ......

Chiminey Crispness! What a marble!

Thanks Art. Have you seen any of the bigger ones full? Would 100 marbles fit in it? I'm thinking about the 1932 Playthings article about Rosenthal which mentions "Assortments of 100" and I wonder if this would have been that.

What size Rosenthal boxes do you have or know about? The one in this auction looks wider than usual. Using "usual" loosely, since I haven't seen that many Rosenthal boxes to begin with. Pix from the auction: (click to enlarge) For comparison, here's a more narrow box BJ posted awhile back: (click) Thanks.