2024 - YOUR BEST "VINTAGE" ACQUISITION

I saw an earlier thread on this topic but can't find it.

I would really like to know your best "pick" this year, with some explanation about why it is important to you. A picture would be good.

While I do not wish to exclude our younger listeners from the conversation, I am not talking here, about Taylor Swift and other 2024-related releases which - desirable as they may be to many - cut not-so-much-ice with us older non-hipsters.

So, what have you got! Show and tell!

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Permalink Reply by Jimbo on December 16, 2024 at 12:38am

Most of these coins are discovered via a metal detectorist. After sitting in the earth for 500 years you’d be amazed how many are quickly destroyed by people cleaning them with spit and tin foil. Collectors don’t want shiny they want patina.

Nice wine by the way. I could never collect such a thing as my Mrs would smell and consume it from 30 paces 🙂.

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Permalink Reply by Eric Keith Longo on December 16, 2024 at 7:11am

+100!

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Permalink Reply by Stepeanut on December 14, 2024 at 10:09pm

I didn’t realise we were doing non-signed items. In that case, my answer would be different.

I’ve picked up a number of very rare 1960s Bob Dylan tickets this year, including some that are undocumented anywhere online. Those are special to me. I feel the mojo in vintage ticket stubs.

But, for the purposes of this thread, I’ll choose another Velvet Underground-related item.

John Cale — Sterling Morrison’s invitation to Cale’s 50th birthday surprise party, held at Cale’s then-home in the West Village, NYC, on Saturday, 7 March 1992 [4 1/2” x 6 3/4”, on textured card]:

The only other example of this invitation I’ve seen is a partial reproduction in Cale’s 1998 autobiography, What’s Welsh for Zen. AFAIK, I have the only copy ever offered for public sale, and it belonged to another Velvet Underground member.

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Permalink Reply by Findbooks on December 15, 2024 at 9:41am

When I think of the tickets I should have archived along the way...ugh.

I only ever kept one - Frank Zappa at the Hammersmith Odeon, 1985.

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Permalink Reply by Eric Keith Longo on December 15, 2024 at 9:51am

I kept every ticket from everything I ever attended, concerts, movies, museums, exhibitions etc. and more than half of them are so faded I don't even know what they are anymore.

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Permalink Reply by Stepeanut on December 15, 2024 at 10:43am

I have most of mine, except for some that were lost in Hurricane Katrina, and those where I was on the guest list. We’re talking around 1,000 gigs over more than 40 years.

I also actively collect vintage tickets for my favourite acts; the earlier the better. I own Dylan tickets dating back to 1963, Bowie tickets as far back as 1969, etc.

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Permalink Reply by Steve Cyrkin, Admin on December 15, 2024 at 8:52pm

I didn't buy any autographs this year, so I posted my favorite vintage buy of any type. The only thing I'm looking for is is a Jim Croce that speaks to me. The day Croce's plane went down is the day the music died for me.

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Permalink Reply by terrier8HOF on December 16, 2024 at 8:39am

good luck finding one, one of the rarest of the rare!

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Permalink Reply by Eric Keith Longo on December 15, 2024 at 9:59am

My best non-signed vintage item this year - a superbly composed vintage original large format gelatin silver photograph of the remains of the Immaculate Conception Roman Catholic Cathedral in Urakami, Nagasaki, taken in light rain at 2 pm on March 3rd, 1952 by photographer Reikor Saro. The photograph shows the remaining southern corner of the cathedral, which was demolished after much consideration just six years later in March 1958. A portion of this wall was relocated to the Nagasaki Hypocenter Park, established three years earlier in 1955. Columns and statues from this building were used in the construction of the new cathedral, which followed the design of the original and was completed in 1959 on the same site. The remaining material is now on display in the Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum. Saro captured this image with a professional Leica III camera, a high-quality Summarit lens, and importantly, the new Kodak XX film. This combination of equipment and film, along with the light rain and overcast day, helped to produce the rich cinematographic tonality of this work. Developed on heavyweight matte stock with a pebble finish, which explains its remarkable preservation, this historically significant print measures 14" x 16" and is in excellent condition with only minor age-related silvering limited to the edges.

The Immaculate Conception Roman Catholic Cathedral, located in Nagasaki City on the island of Kyushu, was completed in 1925 and served the very large number of Christians living in Urakami. From its completion, it remained the largest Christian structure in the Asia-Pacific region until its tragic destruction by the second, and last, atomic bombing in 1945.

On the morning of Wednesday, August 9th, 1945, with The Feast of the Assumption of Mary approaching on the 15th, masses were very well attended. Just after the conclusion of the third service of the day, at 11:02 a.m. local time, the plutonium-fueled atomic bomb “Fat Man” detonated at a height of approximately 1,650 ft. The bomb had been dropped 53 seconds earlier by the Boeing B-29 Superfortress nicknamed “Bockscar,” commanded by Major Charles Sweeney.

The Urakami Cathedral was located just 1,640 ft. from the hypocenter (called “Zero Ground” then) and inside the fireball, which grew to a mile in width in less than a second and reached temperatures of 5,430 to 7,230° F, instantly creating the dramatic, intense thermal disruption seen on the surfaces of these very somber artifacts. Unfortunately, with that amount of heat and explosive energy being released so close by, everyone inside the cathedral was killed, and the entire building was all but totally destroyed by the blast. The whole north of the city was leveled, and 26% of the total population of 263,000 were killed by the end of that day, with over 15% (40,000 people) dying immediately. The destruction of the Urakami Cathedral had a tremendous impact on the Christian community. Playwright Tanaka Chikao wrote Head of Mary: A Nagasaki Fantasia, his greatest work, detailing the efforts, resilience and determination of the Christians in Nagasaki to restore their faith by replacing the statue of the Virgin Mary. The play, set in the cathedral, was first performed in Nagasaki in1959, when the new cathedral was completed on the site of the original.

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And 2 fragments from the Cathedral.

A vitrified cement tile fragment and a mass of melted/molten metal from a ceiling support which was rendered paramagnetic by the "Fat Man" bomb in 3 ways.

1. The instant burst of gamma rays and neutrons at detonation altered the atomic structure of iron, disrupting the alignment of magnetic domains within the iron causing loss of magnetic properties.

2. The Curie point of iron is 1,418° F, at which point the metal starts to lose its ferromagnetic properties becoming paramagnetic, meaning it may no longer retain its full magnetism.

3. The extremely intense shock wave that followed caused physical deformation and structural changes in the iron, further disrupting the magnetic domains and significantly reducing its magnetism.

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Permalink Reply by Findbooks on December 15, 2024 at 1:21pm

Thanks for that, Eric.

I find it fascinating to learn about the interests which motivate a collector.

It's kind of humbling, in a way, because it demonstrates so vividly how individual areas of interest are so personal and that something specific is always going to have an audience.

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Permalink Reply by Findbooks on December 15, 2024 at 1:42pm

Speaking personally, my own highlight this year...unquestionably Laurel & Hardy.

No other performers/entertainers have given me more pleasure over my years - and I have thought about this carefully, excluding people like Lennon/McCartney, Waters/Gilmour, other musicians and even literary figures whom I have found influential in my life.

At the end of the day, Laughter is the Best Medicine - as they used to say in Reader's Digest - and who can compare with these two! To acquire their autographs in a setting with real context and not dedicated to someone else - well that has kept a smile on my face all year.