A rare and early trade card from Louis Vuitton, the pale aqua checkerboard background of which alludes to Vuitton’s iconic Damier pattern — which was developed just five years earlier to help combat (even then) numerous imitations and knock-offs. The card gives the addresses of the comany’s iconic Paris store at 1, rue Scribe, which had opened in 1871; it also lists the firm’s second London store at 454, the Strand. Although the card was printed in Paris, it is in English (it advertises “Trunks and Bags”) and has an extremely early London telephone number (simply “Charing +”). Therefore likely produced exclusively for the London store. The address of the Vuitton workshops in Asnières-sur-Seine, now the home of the Louis Vuitton private museum, is printed across the bottom of the card. The emblem at the centre shows the French flag, the Union Jack, and the Stars and Stripes, which dates the card to around 1893, the year George Vuitton visited the United States for the first time and Vuitton luggage was displayed at the World’s Fair in Chicago. A decidedly ephemeral trade card from one of the most famous and enduring brands in history, documenting an early example of the signature visual identity that remains the cornerstone of the company’s look to this day.

$1,500

The birth of an iconic brand. Founded in 1854, Louis Vuitton was an trailblazer from the start, designing his trianon canvas trunks to be not only lightweight and waterproof, but stackable. These innovations, however, led – almost from the very inception of the company – to a host of imitations and knock-offs. So by 1876, Vuitton created the striped design seen on this card in order to help distinquish his brand, the beginning of a process that culminated in 1888 with the development of the Damier pattern that remains the cornerstone of the company’s look to this day. The card dates to approximately 1885, listing the addresses of Louis Vuitton’s iconic Paris store at 1, rue Scribe, which opened in 1871 in the fashionable district around the Place de l’Opéra; also listed is the London store at 289 Oxford Street – the company’s first overseas – which was opened in 1885, but closed after only a few years in favour of new premises in the Strand. A rare and early example of a trade card from one of the most famous and enduring brands in history, capturing the transition to its signature and defining visual identity.

$2,500

Diary written by one Lois B. Whitwell in the ‘voice’ of of her daughter Maxine Alice Whitwell (then three years old), updated near-daily through the year 1933. Without breaking character, the writer carefully records all things seen, done, and spoken by her daughter, to mildly unnerving effect. (“It is another cold day. Mother was sick in bed all forenoon and she thot I nearly worried her to death.” And: “I decided that when I get big and Mother gets little, she will be my little baby and I’ll be her mother…I played that things were about to get me tonight, to get Mother to fight them off…I wanted badly to play in the fire but they wouldn’t allow it.”) Small glimpses of the family’s working life appear throughout: sowing oats and planting cabbages; buying calves; making and mending clothes; driving trucks and tractors. “Daddy went to town today and Mother had to tend the store…Mother meant to kill a chicken for breakfast in the morning but Daddy had been hunting and came back with two squirrels….” While her parents work, the toddler diarist preoccupies herself with pet hens, rabbits, imaginary foxes, Sunday school, hair curlers, and troublemaking. Census records show the family living in the Ozarks in the town of Kelly (and the diary, a promotion for an insurance company in nearby Doniphan, further supports). Again, according to census records, they did in fact own a store, though by 1940 her father lists his occupation solely as “farmer.” A child’s-eye view of rural Depression era domestic and family life, observed and impersonated at close range.

$950

Remarkable and extraordinarily readable collection of over five years of letters from two increasingly estranged parents to their young son and daughter, sent from London to friends in Baltimore in the early days of World War II for safety from German bombing and the feared seaborne invasion of England. Each parent writes separately to the children and to their American guardians, offering parallel accounts of the War and of their dissolving marriage, which come to a simultaneous end. The correspondence offers a near-seamless narrative of the war years — inevitably, letters were lost in the transatlantic post, but remarkably few gaps appear.

The majority of the archive dates from 1940-45. The two parents, Jack and Audrey, have incompatible philosophies of life and child-rearing, and their strained relationship shows. Audrey – often ill, always worried – fears for Jack’s mental stability: “He is really terribly unbalanced. I almost wonder if he is entirely sane. I do hope he writes suitable letters to you and the children.”

Jack, the kind of man who would and did capitalize the phrase “Dark Forces of Evil,” had his own ideas about suitable letter-writing; but the qualities that made him a trial to his family make him a gift to historians: to his 11-year-old daughter, he explains his enthusiasm for R.J. Scrutton’s fascist-adjacent United Christian Petition Movement and Cardinal Hinsley’s Sword of the Spirit. “I have been busy,” he writes, “getting to know some new friends and helping them with their work. They are the people behind a new movement called ‘Parliament Christian,’ and which is determined to turn this country of ours into the beginning of the Kingdom of Heaven on earth. They know, as I know, that that is the only hope we have of beating Hitler.” Later: “I am quoting from this January’s issue of the Imperial Policy Group’s monthly “Memorandum of Information,” which has very important inside sources of information all over the world, and which I receive regularly.” Jack would also turn his eye to the Social Credit movement, the 1941 Committee, the Common Wealth Party, and faith healing via the “Cosmic Force, the Power of God.”

Meanwhile, Audrey’s letters are full of the physical and emotional realities of daily life on the home front. On the subject of war, she censors herself rigorously for her children: “When we go to the Shelter now…[w]e just sit outside and knit, or sew, or read, or talk while the children play in the sand. It’s really quite pleasant…If things ever should get bad now, even if we had gas, we would be pretty safe inside with our masks on…You know we are all right whatever your newspapers say.”

But to her friends, she confesses: ” As I write the planes are droning overhead, the anti-aircraft guns are booming and from Southampton – some 20 miles distant – come sounds of hell. The sky in that direction is red from the fires caused by bombs. Even now & then my bed shakes with the far away bombs. This is not for the children’s ears.”

As the war continues, divorce and custody struggles come to the forefront: Audrey contemplates allowing the children to remain in Baltimore indefinitely, in a stable home. To her husband: “You do not take into account the mess marriage made of my professional life.” To her friend: “I have not ever been able to tell you how things are…I have not wanted to say unkind things about Jack. Without doing so I could not give you a true picture.” Jack, feeling no such restraint, sends his daughter copies of private letters written to him in confidence by their mother. The archive includes just one piece written by the Baltimore guardians: a forceful and exasperated draft letter, demanding that the two behave responsibly.

As the archive draws to a close in 1945-46, Audrey’s outlook is grim: “As far as conditions in London are concerned, they are worse than during the war…Unless you fetch your bread early in the morning, there’s none left….The plight of Europe is too terrible to contemplate.” But “I, Jack, am out for adventure and a new life – almost certainly as English instructor to the Chinese Navy.”

A unique and precious archive, as captivating as an epistolary novel, with two narrators competing for credibility against the backdrop of a world-changing war.

$3,500

Photograph album of the women of the United Airlines 1945-46 training class, both at work and at play. Album includes both formal photos of the assembled class and snapshots of the trainees in and around airplanes and hangars, with the majority of photographs devoted to the “United gals” off duty: on a holiday weekend in Reno; on the beach in Santa Cruz; drinking, socializing and dancing with flight crew and others. Most photos captioned, with names or vivid descriptions (“3 wild dames,” “One riot of a Sunday over at Rosie’s and Larry’s – cooking dinner for 3 sailors,” “This is the life – with a capital L.”) A record of the enthusiasm and freedom of young working women in the immediate post-war era.

$800

A petite and charming album of photographs of young women in swimsuits, posing on boats, in the water, and on the shore — most likely the Tennessee River or Chickamauga Lake, with a dam visible in the background of several images (probably the Chickamauga Dam, completed by 1940.) The first photograph is a group shot of eight “TVA models lunching on cruiser,” per the caption; TVA is presumably the Tennessee Valley Authority. The models were local to Chattanooga, as was the photographer, whose other work appears in several magazines of the period. Though the TVA did employ photographers to document and publicize their work through its Office of Information, this album’s subject matter bears little resemblance to the officially promoted agency work of the period. The album’s notes, along with Wood’s studio stamp on the verso of several photos, offer the only indication of a likely purpose or audience for these striking images. None of the women pictured appears to have gone on to much fame (most are identified by name; one modeled for a local department store) and their smiling pin-up poses project more friendly enthusiasm than sultry allure: their efforts to visibly have a good time are perfectly balanced between the professional and the amateur. In one photo, a model stands on the prow of a boat, cheerfully aiming a bow and arrow while wearing a feathered headdress, velour swimsuit, and stacked-heel sandals; another wears a star-spangled and striped two-piece, cape streaming behind her. An uncommonly unified album of quintessentially 1940s pin-up photography.

$750

Vibrant archive of marketing, presentation, mailing, advertising, and sales materials for a wide assortment of (primarily) candy and other confections from McCormick’s Limited and affiliated bakeries – consisting mainly of a colorful collection of 175 original photographs of various McCormick products.

The company was established in the 19th century as the McCormick Biscuit and Candy Company, and by the years represented in this collection, was owned by George Weston Limited (producer of Wonder Bread for the Canadian market). Concerned with promotion and publicity from its early years, McCormick’s was a provider of biscuits to the Dionne Quintuplets, a recipient of their youthful endorsements, and a donor of sizable royalties to their trust fund. In an included four-page spread from September 1967’s THE MERCHANDISER, the company proudly notes this connection while advertising its own advertising prowess through the decades: “The brochures are attractive and mouth-watering.”

Included brochures verify this claim; pictured products range from familiar vintage confections like cherry cordials and Walnut Shorties (“WALNUTS make the difference”!) to discontinued exotica like Ceylon Mallows, Pie Face &” Fat Emma” candy bars (a Minneapolis invention of the 1920s, all but disappeared by the 1970s, now extinct); Golden Humbugs, Canada Lozenges, and Sea Kings/Roi de la Mer. McCormick also produced accessories, edible and otherwise, through the Imperial Cone Company, represented here by an illustrated leaflet with photos and dimensions of Torch Cones, Buddy Waffles, Sweetheart Straws, etc.

The small selection of dated items range from 1953 to 1982, though most materials are undated; the majority of the archive consists of product photographs in vibrant, glowing color, for use in promotional materials, catalogs and store displays. Most of these prints date from the 1960s through the early 1970s, with several showcasing 1967 Canadian Centennial packaging. Shut down in the 2000s, the abandoned McCormick factory has become a tantalizing attraction to urban explorers.

Though a Canadian company, there is something of the quintessentially mythic innocent post-war American childhood captured in these indelible primary-color images. Simultaneously a engaging record of this important culinary company and an undeniably nostalgic document.

$2,750

Nabisco salesman’s binder, showcasing the Nabisco brand to grocery retailers. With color images of individual products, several pages illustrating material for retailers (shelf-talkers, store decoration kits, “SWEET SALES SIZZLER” umbrella stands), and sample photographs of the offered display materials as assembled in stores. Of the 160-plus products pictured, some are familiar names still in production, but others have vanished over the decades. Some — like the aerosol can of shelf-stable shrimp cocktail — may have departed due to changing tastes, but others — like the Bacon-Flavored Thins and Chicken in a Biskit Crackers — were perhaps only ahead of their time. Collected materials can be dated with some precision, as product cards are included for both Snack Mates (introduced in 1965) and Veri-Thin Pretzels (whose name changed in 1968). Vivid 1960s marketing, dripping in nostalgia.

$750

Hand-made and -decorated album of photographs and art, dating from the mid to late 1980s and commemorating the artist’s time in the Soviet Air Force. Photos show the artist with his fellow servicemembers, formally posing in uniform and in a variety of casual settings: lounging shirtless on supply trucks, playing at acrobatics and martial arts, smoking, dancing, with children, putting a fur hat on a friendly dog. The elaborate rear endpaper painting reads “Yerevan,” most likely the artist’s home.

Photos alternate with spectacular drawings and paintings: many in a comic-book, pop-punk style, showing military scenes (target practice, bellowing drill sergeants, a mess hall with one soldier playing a frying pan like a banjo) with humorous captions; others have the style of magazine ads, depicting pretty girls, fighter jets, and references to wine and popular songs. In the Soviet Union, as in many countries from the Eastern bloc, serving the army was mandatory for young men. Most joined the army after finishing high school, and would usually be sent for a training to the other side of the country, as far as possible from home, to avoid dissertation and the spreading military secrets, but also to toughen up the young men and encourage a multicultural exchange in such a large and diverse country. Although conditions were rough and training sometimes severe, many of the young men returned home with nostalgic memories of their friends, who returned to distant parts of the country after their service was finished.  

Made with great care and flair, generally cheerful in its representation of clandestine activities (while still taking occasional jabs at the Soviet state), a spectacular artifact of the later years of the Cold War — offering valuable insight in the army life before the founding of an independent Armenia, and showing the influence of western pop culture aesthetics even in remote areas of the Soviet Union. Must be seen.

$5,500

“As an artist you have only one of two choices. Either burn it or put a stamp on it.”

Archive of zines and related correspondence to and from Anne D. Bernstein, founder and editor of humor zine RHUBARB. Bernstein, an animation writer and illustrator, later became a contributing editor for Nickelodeon and is perhaps best known for her work on MTV’s “Daria.”

Bernstein’s correspondents include Mike Gunderloy of Factsheet Five; Jennifer Finney Boylan, then of the American Bystander; critic Marvin Kitman; historian Paul Buhle; underground cartoonist Joyce Farmer; poet Stephen Ronan, National Lampoon writer Joey Green, and others. The bulk of the letters, which range from postcard-size to several pages in length, are devoted to addressing the question Bernstein asked of her readership: what is radical humor?

Paul Buhle, noted historian of radicalism and labor movements, had previously written a manifesto of the “Humor International” and followed it up with 1982’s Radical Humor Festival, an ambitious enterprise that drew Art Spiegelman and Jules Pfeiffer, but was not repeated.  An early letter to Bernstein takes some some umbrage at her “self-indulgent misuse of the name” — meaning Rhubarb’s “Radical Humor Union Network” subtitle — “and of me.” Buhle was disappointed that the second issue failed to “collect the news of said movement” and was presumably a more lighthearted and irresponsible production than he had expected. (Radical humor is apparently nothing to joke about.)

Bernstein insisted that any definition of her zine’s focus would be collectively established with her readership, and enthusiastically solicited and printed selections from their responses.  Later correspondence from Buhle, of which there is a great deal, takes a more familiar and conversational tone, full of trivia, suggestions and friendly disagreements, and Rhubarb kept its original tagline until issue 5, which carried the banner “Rhubarb: ‘The newsletter that has yet to define itself.’”

One of the more fascinating and revealing portions centers around the feud between Bob Black and Caitlin Manning of Processed World magazine. As is customary with Berkeley anarchists, the hostility began with a bad review, escalated to circulation of scurrilous leaflets, and reached a nadir of public harassment and threatening telephone calls. Manning’s telling of these and other quarrels is detailed in the full-zine-length “PUBLIC WARNING Against BOB BLACK,” together with various xeroxed supporting evidence. Black’s alleged exposure of pseudonymous zinesters’ legal identities is a major point of discussion, and the argument over the malicious intent and potential chilling effects of such exposure previews in miniature the furor over doxxing in the coming internet age.

Several of the letter-writers and zine creators represented here, like Bernstein herself, would rise to some prominence as writers and artists in later years; some, like Buhle, were already established academics; and some were devoted and obsessive cranks with no filter and no sense of proportion. (Some were all three.) But at the time of composition, their passionate energies were entirely directed towards communicating with, feuding with, and performing for each other: peers and comrades in a space that drew no lines or hierarchies separating fans, readers, critics, and creators. A revealing, entertaining, and representative collection of zine culture in the 1980s.

$2,750