crashbelt

I like the colours on this 1" onionskin.

Congratulations Melissa that looks like a nice original set. Wish I could help identify the maker but it's not by one of the British or European makers I am familiar with. I don't recognise the M mark or the design of the board, and Ive owned or seen 100s of sets over the years. Makes me wonder if it's a US made General Grant set but that's just a wild guess. Best thing is that there's every chance those marbles have always been with the board!!

Chad - thanks for your warm welcome to a rather lonely solitaire board collector on the other side of the pond!!

An original solitaire board with 33 red micas - in my dreams!!!

1 3/4" divided core swirl this Thursday. Wishing everyone a great Xmas and maybe some marbles!

Here's a 1 1/2" onionskin this week.

Another 1 1/2" tri-level faceted swirl with a lot of air bubbles!

Very nice group

Here's a 1 1/2" tri-level swirl with jelly green red and blue strands and faceted pontils.

I have very few larger mibs but here's a 2 5/16" tri-level swirl I found in the Scottish Highlands years ago!

Wow stunning!!! These beautifully designed and crafted huge examples must have predominantly have been exported to the US. We rarely see them in the UK compared with the plentiful small marbles for game boards. Amazing marble.

Inspired by last week's gorgeous marble with pink strands, here's a 1 3/8" single faceted pontil (EOD) cloud with some pink spots

Beautiful

Here's some brightly coloured, so-called English, 9/16" Josephs from one of my boards. One for Chad I guess!!

The polished ones look great. We don't have access to polishers in the UK so my jar of beaters stays that way - but I love them all!!

Just a nice brightly coloured one inch onionskin. One of my first mibs bought over 30 years ago.

I don't know anything about machine mades, but I've had these 7/8" mibs since childhood in the 60s. They might be Velliglas from what I've read here.

Love your Joseph's Chad. Great Halloween mib display Dave. We were staying with US friends just south of DC a while back during Halloween. Unbelievable displays and parades- we have a way to go in the UK

Another unusual 12" board this week. Probably Jaques c.1860s - the game known as Nine Mens Morris aka Merelles aka The Mill. Mibs not original to the board but set up as they would have been with 2 opposing teams of 9. The swirls are nice clear glass ground pontils and the onions are earlier faceted pontils. All 7/8" - really nice size.

Here's one of my rarer boards - the Jaques Royal Garrison Game (a variation of German Tactics) dating to around 1860s. I got the 12" mahogany board without any marbles but found a picture of an original one with what looked like micas. I had just enough spare micas to fill it in the correct configuration.

Great Josephs Coats Chad - love the light green colour. They must have been producing vast numbers of marbles in Thuringen in the later period, for the pontils to be finished so hastily. And the game board makers like Jaques and Ayres must have been happy with the finishing, as they met the later-Victorian rising demand. I have a theory that the finest quality turned boards were made in the earlier period too.

Here's one of my favourite sets - 11/16" Josephs Coats. Ground pontils so later period marbles - all my Josephs are later period so I wonder if its a style of Germans that wasn't produced much in the early faceted -pontil period. I'm sure someone will correct me if my hunch is wrong!! The marbles aren't original to the board which is beautifully made and presumably earlier. I bought the marbles loose a long time ago and matched them with the best quality spare board I had as they're such an attractive group.

Great find. The onions and indians are perfect for an old solitaire board. Here's an original one with an almost identical set of marbles to a group of yours.

Just love those micas Chad. Wow - huge gooseberry!

Great Bennies and divided core. Not so sure about that weird clay job!! All part of the fun of collecting!!