Steph

Alan, you're saying more than one marble gets made from the same glob the worker has gathered up onto the end of his punty, right? When I was picturing the worker putting a single marble sized glob on his punty at one time, I thought I understood the tail. Now I'm back somewhere near square 1. Hopefully a little further, lol, but not sure! So, how does the tail get on the hand-gathereds? When the helper with the shears cuts one glob off, it drops to the rollers. That cutting action gave the cutline on the marble that dropped. so far so good? But the same cutting action tugs out a new tail on the glass that is left on the punty? And then does the worker continue to twist the punty after each glob is sheared off, to keep the glass more or less stable, and is that how the new tail gets looped around?

My guess was mica for the klondike! For snowstorms! But lutz would make a lot of sense given the date of the catalog. The Klondike goldrush started in 1897. Then again ... a flurry of mica flecks might have reminded someone of gold in the water.

Yeah, my guess was the 'opal threaded glass marbles' are clambroths. Wondered if maybe the brandies could be gooseberries.

What were Klondike marbles and Brandies? This is from a catalog page shown in Grist's Big Book of Marbles, 2nd ed. The caption said Lyon Brothers catalog, 1900 - 1910, Chicago, Illinois. The 2nd edition didn't explain the names. (Does the 3rd?) Guesses are welcome. Thanks!

It's totally sweet. I'm having fun trying to imagine what the story behind it could possibly be. Such an unusual subject for a photo!

Mike takes his marble pictures with the Hubble telescope.

This will be an invaluable resource for id's. Not to mention that they're gorgeous marbles. I expect I'll pick up on something new everytime I look at this thread, for some time to come. Thank you so much Alan!

C'mon, how can you ask us to choose?!

Carole, I'm with Felicia wondering what type of marble #1 is. (And Sue, yeah, that's a fun looking necklace.)

Squid Ink! LOL Good one! I've wondered about this before. But couldn't ever get a picture which showed it right to ask the question. (Nice camera work, Joe.)

Pyramid Play-Time Marbles: . . (source) For Ron's discussion about the rarity and contents see here.

Tiny beads of platinum magnified through the marble. Would make me feel rich! Might also be pretty. :-) p.s. Pardon me for not noting the dedication needed to experiment with vaporizing platinum. I am impressed. Talk about transcending materialism for art!

Thanks Kevin (and Sue). my next question would be whatever gave anyone the idea, hey, let's put this gold here in the torch and see if something good happens

Ah, found it. Felicia has pointed it out to me on your "about me" page at eBay. I coulda sworn I read the whole page, but apparently I stopped too soon.

A double ingot is two marbles which got rolled together when they were still hot enough to merge into one round ball. Sometimes double ingots are made from two corkscrews. When they merge their ribbons can do very strange things. They can look like Peltiers or like unusual WV swirls. Sometimes they're joined so tightly that you can barely tell they are two marbles. If they have wild ribbons, it can be really easy to miss it. Ronnie's examples are patches, which makes it so much easier to see that's what they really are -- two marbles stuck together. Thanks Ronnie! Perfect pix.

There, I asked it. Felicia once said she'd read your explanation and appreciated it. I think I missed it. I don't know whether I didn't see it, or whether it went over my head.

Well maybe not 50 but it's pretty neat.

Utterly fascinating look inside a polished onionskin. Wow times 50. (From an ebay auction.)

Here are eBay pix of Bicentennial Special Packs from a couple of different listings. I didn't get the seller names on either of these. (sorry) Both of these have lots of the white swirls. I'm pretty sure I've had some Bicentennial bags with almost none of them. If I remember correctly there could be wide variation between the contents. I can't recall exactly because I got my bags a long time ago and couldn't resist the temptation to open them. I'll try to keep my next bag sealed. :-) Actually I got my first bag in 1976 when I was 12. The teeny tiny ones were fun. If you look closely you can see some Vitros which look like all reds but without red. I mention this because it has been a bit of a puzzle to figure out where those came from if not from all-red bags. Looks like some Heaton black cat's eyes too.

Here are some from Rinesmarbles auctions. Here's some from another eBay seller. Didn't get the name. Are these the ones called "brains"?

Thanks for the numbers, Mike. That's a great story.

How many were made? How many were released to the public? How many were given to kids or other unsophisticated collectors who might have allowed them to escape into the wild?

No. 1 Shooters (from eBay auction) This box sleeved box of No. 1 Shooters doesn't say Vitro on it anywhere, according to the seller. "Everyone" knows what the contents look like! (LOL) but these are some nice pix newbies might appreciate: (click to enlarge)

Just checking: is the plus needed? would 3/4" be okay? update: Ron wrote this at LOM: (source) While I'm updating, here in Post #4 is another nice quote from Ron which talks about the numbers of colors on parrots. Also talks about good stuff like aventurine. Vitro multi color marbles - Are these Parrots?

p.s. regarding the name game ... Yep, I'm a player. But I'm trying to keep it true. As close to historically accurate as possible.