Steph

Manddrakes isn't Reliford.

Happy Birthday Lady! Here's to a beautiful Thanksgiving weekend in Tennessee.

lolol

Someone recently showed pix of a big "Champion" cache. At least I remembered it has having a Champion connection. And I think there were cat's eyes there. Whose thread was that? And weren't there cat's eyes in some of the Bicentennial bags? Or were my bags fake? Anything is possible, I guess.

You might need to wait for Al. They look like they could be marbles which Champion would have had on hand. If there are cat's eyes in there, Champ wouldn't have made them, but they might still have had them around. Especially in the 1970's. Are there 21 marbles in the bag? There are some real Champ bags, filled with real Champ mibs, but not with the permission of Champion. If I understand correctly. Champ bags are a tricky area.

If anyone would know, I think it would be Al.

Corals have been found in Pressman Bull's Eye bags. My impression, based on statements made by Ron, is that the swirls in Pressman bags would be Alleys. Here is an example Al posted in a thread about a Pressman bag with corals in it. The company name is chopped off here though, so I am only guessing it was Pressman. Al?

I think the ribbons run deeper than normal MK would. The white parts could be from the scanner. Awfully bright light involved there.

Is this the same Leo? http://marbleforum.blogspot.com/search/label/Leo%20Contreras%20Collection

Those are like sunsets. Real sunsets. Very nice.

those pastels are sweet.

I also was under the impression that Bogard made cat's eyes. However, they did have a relationship with Marble King. Bought cat's eyes from MK for Bogard bags, sold industrial marbles to help fill MK industrial orders. (this according to AMMM)

I believe those are Christensens. I can't remember exactly what the box said but I think the labelling was clear. Might have said both Gropper and Christensen. I definitely need to find the pix. Supposedly the mibs weren't all as swirly as these four look. Some had seams. Since so many companies made single color mibs, I wouldn't have a lot of faith in being able to identify one in the wild as Ravenswood or CAC or Alley or Champion or whoever. However, I have a diaperfold in blue which would fit right into that box. I'm completely convinced that mine is CAC.

Thanks for salvaging Sue's post! USPS insurance on $3000 is 32 bux.

Sue, I deleted your post! I'm so sorry! I was trying to delete a double post I made. I immediately saw I pressed the wrong button but it didn't give me the regular "are you sure you want to do this message" before it went ahead and knocked it off. aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh. Now I've deleted my post too in shame.

What a good question. It would be awesome to see something comprehensive on corals. Which all are Champ varieties. Which are Alley, Ravenswood, CAC, .... Did anyone else do them?

lol. good catch!

LOLOL I'm a cat person. (p.s. that's way cool. have a fabulous time)

Calling IT what IT is is different from calling SOMEONE something. That's all's I'm really saying. It's gonna be hard to call anybody anything if the board is shut down. The Bo who talked me through some of my struggles earlier this year seemed really good at stepping around the poop. I appreciated it. :-)

Unfortunately, the sense of humor seems to be the first casualty at times like this. :-) Your art really does have something refreshing about it. Thanks

Bo, that was not cool. It is not all good fun to call a board member a braggadocio. Sure this thread was provocative but it was going along okay. No good reason to stir things up. In fact every reason not to. If you don't care about the future of this board, keep poking fun at Steve. If you care at all, please don't. If Steve is stirring stuff for any unkind reason, let him stir alone. (Not saying he is. That's between him and him.) Please help neutralize the conflict and not feed it, that is, if you don't want Lou to shut this place down. Marble Mental has already been shut down (temporarily I hope) over these vendettas and agendas. The administrators are good people peforming a service. .

LOL. I'm not arguing! LOLOL Buttttt . . .

And duh, of course Martin's mechanization itself helped make the manufacturing process less expensive. Obviously a big factor. Of course cost matters. As I said (again and again lol) I wasn't arguing. This subject is simply fascinating to me all around, that is, the subject of the marble business back in the day. Did you know that hardware business owners back then were advised to sell mibs and pocket knives to boys as close to cost as possible? Ya know why? To get them hooked on the store. Get the boy's business and you have the man's in later years. :-)

I guess I take some issue with which market glass mibs were trying to take over. Maybe the answer is both. Being able to break into the German agate market is touted as one of Martin Christensen's accomplishments. His artful advertising - using names of various stones - was given part of the credit. But the marbles still had to be good. Martin was notorious for quality control. But I'm not arguing. Don't think there is too much difference of opinion here. Mostly mentioning facts I find interesting. Cheap German labor was a big issue to Martin. He did benefit from tariffs. A spokesman for U.S. glass manufacturers lobbied Congress for higher tariffs specially to protect the newborn American glass marble industry. All two glass marble making companies in the U.S. at the time, if I recall correctly. And Martin had affordable natural gas . . . until WWI. LOL. Just talking. Not really debating. I love thinking about these guys. Martin is definitely a fave.

Thanks Craig! Very cool. Every now and then I need to look through my marble books again. (doh!)