The advertising art seemed to magically appear – again. Two weeks before, one of my favorite auction houses had propped stacks of the illustrations on racks against a wall. A white guy raising a glass…
Category: Black history
An autobiography by a female slave?
Posted in Black history, Books, Ephemera/Paper/Documents, and slavery
I was checking out the upcoming sale at one of my favorite auction houses when I came across a novel by a female slave. I was familiar with William Wells Brown’s novel “Clotel,” but one…
Georgia face jugs & wood carvings
Posted in Art, Black history, and Carvings
I dragged my sister to an antiques mall just south of my family’s home in Macon, GA, over the holidays to see what was there. I’m always curious about how or whether antiques are different…
Vintage photos of a well-to-do black family
Posted in Black history, and Photos
Were my eyes deceiving me, I wondered as I glanced at the group of photos lying in the bottom half of a small flat box on the auction table. A nicely dressed and coiffed black woman sitting in a…
Jet magazines from the 1960s
Posted in Black history, and Ephemera/Paper/Documents
In its heyday, Jet magazine was black folks’ ticket to their own world. It confounded the notion that they were lazy, had little to say that anyone cared about, and had never made history of any worth. In…
Don’t know bridge, but love its cousin bid whist
Posted in Black history, Culture, and Games
I never “got” bridge. The game was as foreign to me as the language of Mandarin. It always seemed too complicated for a game of cards, for heaven’s sakes. Give me a hand of Spades or…
Negro Leagues pitcher Terris McDuffie
Posted in Black history, and Sports
When I first saw the NY ballplayer’s photo on a tray at auction recently, I was hoping he was a Negro Leaguer. I have a black-and-white group photo of black players in the 1924 Colored World Series, but not…
A 2nd look at red lips
Posted in Black history, collectibles, and pottery
I was nonchalantly perusing the shelves of glassware at one of my favorite auction houses yesterday when something stopped me. There on a middle shelf were five head vases, all with red lips. This grouping…
Beyonce rewrites the ‘red lips’ stereotype
Posted in Beauty Products, Black history, Ephemera/Paper/Documents, and Greeting cards
I was watching television one night recently when on screen popped Beyonce in a L’Oreal Paris commercial. Her lips were fire-red, and the lipstick seemed to be applied thickly, as if smeared on. Did her lips…
No friends among bidders
Posted in Black history, and Etiquette
I heard a regular bidder say recently that there are no friends at auction. In other words, it was every man or woman for himself or herself. If you saw something you wanted and another…