News & Events
Mid-America
News
Show
Calendar
State Event Calendars
Regular Features
The
Antique Detective
Antique
Detective Q&A
Common Sense Antiques
Editor's Notebook
Refurnished
Thoughts
Traveling with Ken
Good Eye
Discover
Mid-America
Marketplace
Books
for Collectors
Directories
& Classifieds
The
Finder: Unique Shops
Lodgings Directory
Museum Directory
Aviation Museums
Wineries in the Heartland
Classifieds
Archived Features
Heirloom
Recipes
Helpful Hints
for Collectors
Is This An Antique?
Reflecting
History
New Books for Collectors
—
November 2006
Summers’ Guide
to Coca-Cola, 6th edition
by B.J. Summers
Reviewed by Robert Reed
(Antique & Collectible News Service)
 |
Coca-Cola has long been heralded as the “pause that refreshes.” Equally refreshing is the newly revised sixth edition of Summers’ Guide to Coca-Cola.
Included are new chapters covering such things as Coke club collectibles and commemorative. There are 200 new photographs, and a look at 2007 prices on over 1,200 items.
“Coke needs no introduction,” says author B.J. Summers. “It’s as American as both mom’s apple pie and baseball.”
Summers credits much of today’s appeal of Coke memorabilia to the fabled company’s determined efforts to advertise endlessly.
“Fantastic, colorful, wholesome, memory-provoking and, of course, plentiful are just a few words and phrases that describe Coca-Cola advertising,” adds the author.
“For us collectors, to be at a Coke swap meet is to be like a kid in a toy store.”
The entire array is presented in this fine volume including signs, calendars, trays, bottles, cans and glasses. Also included are openers, toys, postcards, games, clothing, carriers, coolers and Santas.
Still other sections extend to blotters, fans, banks, clocks, radios, vending machines, ice picks, ashtrays and even vintage manuals and price guides.
Summers’ Guide to Coca-Cola, hardcover, color illustrated, 304 pages is $29.95 plus shipping
Meissen’s
Blue and White Porcelain
by Nicholas Zumbulyadis
Reviewed by Robert Reed
(Antique & Collectible News Service)
 |
Collectors are in for a treat in Meissen’s Blue and White Porcelain by Nicholas Zumbulyadis. The ware was impressive and now so is the volume.
Meissen porcelain, of course, was among the finest produced in 18th and 19th century Germany. It was noted for its striking patterns in royal blue and its wide range of products from candelabra to the vase.
Zumbulyadis is an accomplished dealer and collector of quality German porcelain. He also holds a Ph.D. in physical chemistry from Columbia University.
“Meissen’s blue and white patterns are without a doubt the most popular patterns in the history of porcelain tableware,” declares the author. “If collectibles can be defined as those treasured objects whose appeal has withstood the test of time then the Blue Onion patter certainly qualifies as the archetypal collectible.”
This new book provides some 360 enriching full-color photographs with detail all manner of Meissen including cups, tureens, pitchers, tankards, washbasins, saucers, bowls, trays and various dishes. Current values and detailed captions are also included.
Overall the fine volume is divided into three generous parts. Part one covers the origins and chemistry in creating high quality European porcelain. Part two discusses two centuries of Meissen under-glaze blue decoration. Part three is devoted to marks, copies and imitations.
The author’s attention to porcelain chemistry might be a bit too technical. But the broad range of the books’ test is absorbing and worthwhile.
Publishers of this volume are also noted for the newly revised and updated Book of Meissen by Robert E. Rontgen and Meissen Firues 1730-1775: The Kaendler Period by Yvone Adams.
Meissen’s Blue and White Porcelain by Nicholas Zumbulyadis, hardcover, 222 pages, is $49.95 plus shipping from Schiffer Publishing, 4880 Lower Valley Rd., Atglen, PA 19310.
©2000-07 Discovery Publications, Inc.