Steph

Lisa's right. You're a great sport! I do not know what could be considered "true" about using the term "pre-freese" to describe a corkscrew. The best information we have is that the Freese machine was not used for marble making. It was intended to be, but never made it. Whoever stuck the Freese name on any Akro marbles made a booboo. Continuing to use it perpetuates the misunderstandings associated with it. Your more immediate concern is that it could reflect badly on your auctions. It increases the likelihood of more threads like this on the various marble boards because the use of the term sets off alarms. People who use it are often written off as uninformed or as hucksters. Being mentioned once or twice in a thread like this doesn't mean much. Especially while you're getting the hang of ebaying. But the more often a seller's auctions get flagged, the more likely the seller's name is to be remembered in a negative light. Ya need to ditch the word "Freese" altogether to help that not happen. You don't need the word. Akro corkscrews are vintage. Period. If you wish to focus on eyelashes in your auctions, that is a fine thing to do. It would be better just to focus on the eyelashes themselves though. As a classic feature. Without bringing the word Freese into it. IMHO. :-)

There are Whities with that sort of header, though a silver or gray background, not red. These appear to have the rich ribbons. They are pictured in an ad with Blackies, Cat Eyes, and Aqua Jewels. The presence of cat eyes date the ad to 1954 or later. Maybe as the Blackies came closer to what we think of as Blackies, the Whities became closer to what we think of as Blackies also. (pure conjecture) This was in a very very very cost-conscious time. (not conjecture) If the super nice seeming whities were made intentionally with a better white base at first, it would make sense for that to be considered less important in 1955 and later, as Vitro was battening down the hatches against the Japanese Cat Eye storm. As it was, All-Reds cost twice as much as Japanese Cat Eyes in 1960. So, if Whities cost even more to make, then (a) it's not surprising that they didn't last long, and (b ) it wouldn't be surprising if their quality declined before they were discontinued. p.s., two Vitro time-line threads I am/was/might be working on: Vitro Time Line (with info from the Vitro book) Vitro Bag Headers

Ah, I see that in AMMM about blackies coming first. I also see that I pretty much repeated what you were saying about depth of color and such, and you're being very polite about not saying, WELL DUH :-) Sorry, my brain has been somewhere else. FWIW the earliest Blackies might not be Blackies as we know them so just knowing dates, like from a dated price sheet, might not be enough for making judgements about when different styles were made. I think these may be some of the earliest. Derrick's bag. He says they're transparent inside.

There are some things I also wonder about. Some of the whities do look different to me. As if possibly they are not veneered marbles (*said with caution*). I do not fully undertand the the meaning of the term "veneer" as used by marble companies. But some do look different, whatever the name of the process by which they were made. I'm thinking about the ones with the deeper, transparent ribbons. Yet the blue blackie just left of center in your photograph seems to have some depth to the black ribbon. If Whities started out before Blackies then that might explain the difference on that one variation. I suspect the during the time of their overlap they would have had the same type base glass, or for most of the time of overlap anyway. On the other hand, if they had different base glass, some of one type could still get into bags of the other type because if Vitro employees were running low on anything they would make do. I think it is that general casualness, at least in part, which makes my friend with the beaucoups bags disinclined to find much percentage in trying to pin down which is a white blackie and which is a black whitie. I need to confirm/review some of this. I'm reporting on and extrapolating from discussions partly about blackies but mostly of other types, so I need to go back and see if I'm overgeneralizing or plain old speaking out of turn. I also need to double check when Whities and Blackies were made: which came first, how long each was made, and perhaps a comparison between # of blackies made and # of whities. Some info comes from ads. Some inferences are drawn from headers on bags. Some comes from Vitro employees. Etc. ?? Some simply isn't known.

The term "pre-freese" has been severely mis-used, even on this site. In a thread where Brian pointed it out as a myth, someone came on afterwards and called him an idiot. Sue was polite and invited explanation, but the fun atmosphere of the thread was pretty much destroyed and no one responded in it again. (I might go do that now.) The term has been used to mis-date marbles. You used it to conclude that your corks were made before 1920. They weren't though. One of the patents for essential cork-making machinery wasn't filed until 1928. It seems likely that the cork process was perfected during 1929. The earliest known cork advertisement is from Spring 1930. Yes, I see eyelashes on your corks. Really nice ones in the first pic. But they have nothing to do with Ira Freese's 1922 gob feeder. Sorry. :-(

I have been told by someone with beaucoups Vitro bags that the same type of white marble with black bands was sold in both whities and blackies bags. Someone else, who had two different looking white Vitros with black bands, proposed that one was a white blackie and one a black whitie. But I believe the bag owner's position would be that such a division would not make sense, that one would find a range of types of black even in whities bags. One certainly would in blackies bags. Look at the range of "black" simply on the blackies you show here: Pick another color. Say blue. What range of blue do you find on your whities? The few you have showing suggest to me that there might be much variation in any "single" color. If I understand correctly, quality control was not job 1 in the Vitro factory. Or not the sort of quality control which would result in consistently higher quality in one marble type than there was in another marble type made in, say, the same month.

There is no such thing as a pre-freese cork. As Felicia noted/quoted from the Akronmarbles site, Freese invented his gob feeder in 1922. Cork production began in 1929 or very early in 1930.

hmmm ... I saw a different explanation for a marble like that. I don't know much at all about wine or vessels to hold wine, so I'm not arguing exactly. I just really don't know. Would that have been a container used for fermentation? The explanation I saw was at Cees' site, Knikkerwereld. Functie 2 I keep saying "saw" because I didn't exactly read it. I had to let Altavista's Babel Fish translate. Here's their translation:

just adorable!

Found it! Vacor Cats? Funny I didn't remember me being the one initiating the thread. Just remembered Elizabeth's cats. Yeah, some of those still look oh so vintage to me.

:-) This isn't the thread I was looking for. But it's one I'll want to know how to find again later. So you get to see it too. The most foolingest one of these might be the turquoise at the bottom. Vacor Assorted Bag Opened I can't remember just how close the ones in thread I'm still looking for might come to seeming vintage. I'm not fresh enough with cat's eyes. I might be fooled more easily than you. Well, back to the search engine.

Akro chameleon?!!!! LOLOLOOLOLOLL!!!! I'm not laffing at your spelling. I had to look up the word myself. That's just the best name I've ever heard for that kind of stuff on ebay. Akro Chameleons! Too perfect. Whatever the seller wants it to be! lOLLOL :icon_lmao: :rol:

Now that I think of it, it's sort of surprising to see a whole box for sale. The biggest gift box in the Akro catalog I posted in that other thread today, that biggest box had 96 marbles. We're talking special occasion there. 100 beautiful glass marbles for a boy in 1931, or any earlier year, is really a wild thought. Clay marbles were still pretty standard in this time, I think. To have 100 brightly colored new pelts all at one time?

Hmmm ... looked at some other ads and they're all over the place in prices. I can't tell whether this one was a bargain or par for the course. One said the Peerless box was 50 cents wholesale in 1931. But that seems very high for wholesale. It didn't give me rainbos to compare the peerlesses to. I'll just call 50 cents a "clue" and leave it at that for now.

I don't remember much about the movie -- I think it was on video and I was playing cards lol -- but I read that those were Marble Kings.

Did you click on the pic? The whole ad is pretty cool, that's why I didn't just stick with the snippet, but the other should enlarge to the same scale.

I'm calling this a clue. :-) The peerless were from about the same time. You think they'd be less expensive than the NLR's? ... er .... NMS's? If so, I don't imagine by much. I might have another clue somewhere, about relative cost of Peerless in comparison to NLR's. Nice box, Charles.

Anyone seen these bags? I know of the Hot Shot. Can't remember seeing the others. (click pix to enlarge) That's from an ad I'd like to learn more about. I'd really like to learn its age. The "new" Akro Carnelians on the front page might be a clue, but maybe not as much as I'd hope. They were said to be "new" in 1934, but I think other years also. Need to confirm. In reference to yesterday's prize name discusion, at this point Akro definitely had white-based Prize Names, but the ad company wouldn't necessarily have known it. The ad which was changed, wiht the color combos being dropped IIRC, was the one where there were pix of the prize names. The proofreader would have flagged that and finally the outdated text was cut. (that's my theory) I sorta hope this is a clue to this ad, and any other ads mentioning No. 2 glassies. Hope it means they would have come after February of 1932, but there's some conflicting info still being worked out in one of those other ads with No. 2 glassies.

Ahhhhhhh, yes.

Okay. I see the difference. I don't understand it. But I see it. on top of the pulse?

(click pix to enlarge) . . . They were offered as a prize to the 4th place scorer in Madison, WI's marble tournament. The first place winner was to receive a new suit of clothes, dress shoes, and the trip to Chicago for the regional competition. But in the end, the hardware store gave both boys a box of marbles and a Cornelian shooter. . . .

Source: http://davies.halinet.on.ca/Newspaper/FA/1...on1941_0567.pdf 1.5 Meg The web address says 1941, but the content says 1942.

Anyone know the story on these? Whose they were? From a Morphy auction, 2005 I think.

Well, that sounds like what I usually hear. But has anyone here ever seen one with that kind of marble in it? Tonight I've seen pix of what appear to be five Ringer Marble Sets. (I suppose they could be come of the same boxes but with the marbles switched out. ;-). Two of the boxes contain popeyes and three have mibs which seem somewhere between cloudy and mossy. If a box was ever full of the marble Scott singled out, then that would be weird to me. It's not a known type. So is there a missing Akro name? Or was there a run of error popeyes one day which were sent out in Ringer Marble Sets? If they came in different colors, that wouldn't seem so much like an error. So that'd be weird. That's a good start. I like that together with, "And looks like it matches the known Ace examples". There's "something" about the texture of the base which stands out. I think it has a grain. Maybe not as conspicuous in general as the grain in Realers is famous for being, but the glass doesn't seem as smoothly blended as a lot of other Akros, translucent, white or otherwise. Also, with a marble as misunderstood as this one, I'd want to be very careful not to overgeneralize. I'd stick close to the known examples for awhile. On the other hand, if I'm holding a cork which has obvious fire in the base, I'm going to consider it nice enough to set apart, whether it is an "Ace" or not. Came in both cork and patch, and what seems to be a swirl. I'm not sure at the moment if the swirl is essentially a crazy cork or if it's more truly random. There are other colors of base. No need for whisps or white though, yeah, the cork/swirl version does generally seem to have greater numbers of colors per marble than the patch version. The patch version is what you are already familiar with. That's the trouble with definitions. We define ourselves out of accurate i.d.'s. We could end up saying the person who made the marble originally got the name wrong. But some other marble made 10 years after the real ones qualifies by sheer coincidence. Yes, slags were called Striped Onyx. The red ones could be sold in the Striped Onyx box or in Cardinal Red boxes. Then when Akro stopped making slags they kept the Onyx name for the corks made with white ribbons in transparent colored glass. The Cardinal Red name also survived the switch, but I get the impression it was discontinued before the onyx name -- maybe when they ran out of cardinal red boxes? (she asks half seriously) Tri-colors don't have to be on a white base. Do you see that Lifesaver in Dani's catalog pic? What modern collectors call "Specials" were Tri-Colors to Akro. Yes, they came in both cork and patch. The Prize Name description on the left up there didn't come with the picture on the right. Sorry I wasn't clear enough about that. The description had the original colors. The picture was evidence of the expanded line. Mainly I wanted to show that there were eventually white based Prize Names and that those were different from Aces. I think the description which came with the picture just said "two colors", with no specifics. Unfortunately the only copy I could find today was teeny tiny and pretty much illegible. If that's the copy I originally read, my eyes were much better then than they are now. Akro did have many booboos in their ads though. The people who did the ads probably weren't Akro people. The ads are nice looking, very professional. I think some ad guy(s) at an agency may have had some sample boxes and a stack of old ads to use for source material. Maybe a few notes from Akro people. Maybe not so many samples and/or notes. Have you seen the Sparkler description?

Oh hey, you broke the picture up. I liked them all together. No, I didn't mean that. :-) That was sort of a heads up about the possibility of confusing Vacors with Japanese 6-vanes. But mostly I was admiring Vacors. They're nice ! I'm too worried about which are old and which are new. Elizabeth / Pinx posted some examples of Mexican cats which could pass for Japanese. I'll try to get the link. Here's a pretty good example of the early Japanese I like. Just bright solid colors. Healthy stimulation for the retinas. Fills 'em up without overloading. :-)