Tuesday Treasures - November 26, 2024

 I had a different post scheduled for today, but on second or third preview I realized it was very boring!  If I thought it was boring, and it was my stuff, it would be really boring for you! 

So, instead, here are five of what I think some interesting items passed down to me.

This German Erhard & Söhne brass box with cherubs was made in the repoussé technique, where the metal is shaped by hammering from the back to create the relief images.  It is lined with padding of red velvet, now worn.  It was one of my mother's dresser-top jewelry boxes.  c1920, so she may have been given it as a child (she was born in 1919). 

Something else from the 1920s is this Guittard brand cocoa tin, unopened.   I don't remember if we found it in the back of a cupboard when we emptied out my paternal grandmother's house, or she had it on display as I do.

It even has the key still attached! 

I don't know where or when my father got this Chinese stoneware soy sauce jug.  It's from the late 1800s, when many Chinese immigrants came to California to help build the Central Pacific Railway, so there was a market for imports such as soy sauce. 

My father bought these at a flea market when I was a child.  I have a vague memory of going to Lodi, CA (a memory and some photos) to a fair, or used book fair, or flea market, or all in one.  Lodi is 60 miles from my home town.  I think he got them there.  Oh... they are chalkware composers plaques, Beethoven and Mozart.   He paid 15¢ each for them.  He also liked to go to the craft fairs that were in city parks during the '60 and '70s to look at art and pottery.  I think I must take after him!  

Both have writing on the back, but I can't make it out, either due to handwriting or perhaps being in a foreign language. They always hung on the wall above the console record player/radio and telephone table.  I have them hung in a bookcase. 

This is one of the pottery items, dated 8/67.  I was ten that month and year.   He kept paint brushes and artist tools in it.  

I found some photos from Lodi.  That's me.  I was wild for horses, like most little girls were!  Are they still?

This is two years after the ones above, but I think it was Lodi.  I can picture outdoor tables set up with used books for sale. 

It was disappointing to learn that the Lodi mentioned in Creedence Clearwater Revival's song is a town in Wisconsin and not California.  Because, "Oh, Lord, stuck in Lodi again" fits Lodi, CA!  It does have a cute little zoo, Micke Grove.  It's been a bit over 40 years since I've been, but it's still there.