Toy Tales
Collector Interview
The Halloween Retrospect’s catalog collection is a market history seen through vintage pages filled of gewgaws, thingamabobs, whatchamacallits, doohickeys, and holiday curios (including my personal favorite Halloween) dating 1900 to 1979. Since the library began as a bit of a side-project as a relatively new venture built on past interests, it is flattering to receive attention from the good folks at Toy Tales with their Collector Spotlight (Friday, February 16th, 2024) interview:
Aaron Wiley, Halloween Ephemera by: Joanna Hauser – February 16, 2024, Filed to: Collector Spotlight, Otherworldly.
As but a quick overview of the discussion (points below), please read the interview from Toy Tales for further details on The Halloween Retrospect archive library including:
1) a basic description of the catalog collection,
2) a history prompting the collection focus,
3) a description of collection management,
4) the target accessions of the catalog collection, and
5) closing advice from the collector…
Below are just a few of the catalog images shared with Toy Tales, but read the article to get a peak at pages inside a couple of these – particularly if you are interested in those things which are not Halloween. (Also, please see the Collection Trade page in case you collect vintage favor/novelty catalogs for other items).
A few hard-copy catalogs on the shelves here at The Halloween Retrospect – see the Toy Tales article for more on these – particularly if you are interested in more than just Halloween.
toytales.ca
“Toy Tales is North America’s premier independent toy journalism website with a nostalgic focus.c focus. Every day, our writers cover the toys, games, and objects that captured our attention as children and continue to fascinate us today. We chronicle the stories behind weird, wonderful, and entertaining toys and games, the people who brought them to life, and the modern-day individuals and toy companies that uphold their legacies.” (About Toy Tales, 2024).
Have you read this far and still have yet to visit Toy Tales? Well, the best way to experience (or re-experience) all the fun toy nostalgia is to visit their website for all the great stuff happening there. If you are still reading this… here are few target links get you there now! Check out this link for Vintage Toys and Games or this link for Pop Culture, or People (my current favorite being Collector Spotlight), or Places. Also visit Toy Tales on Instagram @toytales.ca and on facebook https://www.facebook.com/toytalesca.
Vintage Halloween
Collectibles Guidebook
While I did not intend to discuss The Halloween Retrospect publication during the interview (imagining the preferred focus would be on a greater range of catalog content), still, I am grateful the Toy Tales interviewer initiated some discussion about the new vintage Halloween collectibles digest series. As often mentioned on this site, the various volumes correspond directly to the collection – and are an archivist-librarian record of the discoveries of the catalogs and of the items within the pages (part of the overall Halloween collection in the archive).
The Halloween Retrospect vintage Halloween collectible book series (sample images shown above) is available from the THR shop on Etsy.
Plans have already begun for Volume 3. In the meantime, here is a link to more website info about The Halloween Retrospect, Volume 2 and The Halloween Retrospect, Volume 1. And here is a direct link to the THR bookstore to purchase a copy via Etsy checkout.
So, to “bookend” this entry, following is a photo out-take created for the article. The illustration in the banner hails from that very Slack MFG Co catalog, while the figure (take your pick left or right) is chalkware, and the backgrounds are vintage school posters.
Aaron Wiley, Halloween Ephemera by: Joanna Hauser for Toy Tales – February 16, 2024.
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