Rule collectors rejoice! In Source Book for Rule Collectors with Rule Concordance and Value Guide, Philip Stanley has crafted a masterfully comprehensive illustrated reference guide to the history, uses, and values of measuring instruments. Source Book for Rule Collectors includes reprints of the best articles from the past 100 years dealing with rules and measurement; extensive coverage of the materials, construction, graduations and uses of rules; a detailed table of the European measures used before the metric system, for identifying rules by size and county of origin; a thorough cataloging of rule accessories; and a complete bibliography of reprints, articles, books, and publications dealing with measuring instruments. The included Rule Concordance and Value Guide gives complete information for identifying and comparing all rules by all major American makers; estimates for each rule's value based on condition and maker; extensive information on rule value, including condition, selling environment, and charisma. This book is an essential reference. Rule enthusiasts will find the combination a pleasure to read. Mr. Stanley's breadth of knowledge and his regard for the rules he discusses are apparent throughout. For the antique tool dealer, rule collector, and student of the history of technology, this book is essential.

It's all here! Pictured and listed in this massive volume, now in its fourth edition, are fifty-four years' worth of toys produced between Matchbox's founding in 1947, and 2001, including their popular diecast vehicles, playsets, dolls, plastic kits, robots, and ephemera. The international scope of Matchbox toys is illustrated in catalogs and on boxes and labels printed in a dozen languages. Certain toys have been made for sale in specific countries or to promote specific companies or products. In 1982 the international numbering system on miniatures changed. The result of all these variables is a fascinating and infinite variety of Matchbox toys. In the largest volume about Matchbox Toys ever published, 2,447 color photos illustrate nearly all of Matchbox's vast line. Helpful captions and a price guide make this an essential part of every collector's library.

From rare books, valuable sculpture and paintings, the relics of saints, and porcelain and other precious items, through stamps, textiles, military ribbons, and shells, to baseball cards, teddy bears, and mugs, an amazing variety of objects have engaged and even obsessed collectors through the ages. With this captivating book the psychoanalyst Werner Muensterberger provides the first extensive psychological examination of the emotional sources of the never-ending longing for yet another collectible. Muensterberger's roster of driven acquisition-hunters includes the dedicated, the serious, and the infatuated, whose chronic restlessness can be curbed--and then merely temporarily--only by purchasing, discovering, receiving, or even stealing a new "find." In an easy, conversational style, the author discusses the eccentricities of heads of state, literary figures, artists, and psychoanalytic patients, all possessed by a need for magic relief from despair and helplessness--and for the self-healing implied in the phrase "I can't live without it!" The sketches here are diverse indeed: Walter Benjamin, Mario Praz, Catherine the Great, Poggio Bracciolini, Brunelleschi, and Jean de Berry, among others. The central part of the work explores in detail the personal circumstances and life history of three individuals: a contemporary collector, Martin G; the celebrated British book and manuscript collector Sir Thomas Phillipps, who wanted one copy of every book in the world; and the great French novelist Honore de Balzac, a compulsive collector of bric-a-brac who expressed his empathy for the acquisitive passions of his collector protagonist in Cousin Pons. In addition, Muensterberger takes the reader on a charming tour of collecting in the Renaissance and looks at collecting during the Golden Age of Holland, in the seventeenth century. Throughout, we enjoy the author's elegant variations on a complicated theme, stated, much too simply, by John Steinbeck: "I guess the truth is that I simply like junk." Originally published in 1993. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

With opulent fashions the ultimate in style, women of the late Victorian era wore a great deal of silks and satins. Daring combinations of bright colors were in. So were large hats, profusely trimmed. But by the end of the nineteenth century, ladies' tastes in fashion were changing, along with female lifestyles. Larger numbers of women were not only working outside the home, they were also playing tennis and golf, and riding bicycles and horses. All these activities called for a definite change in female fashions. Women came to rely on tailored suits with full skirts and fitted jackets over simple blouses. Riding habits called for a long, draped skirt worn over a pair of trousers.
With the dawn of the twentieth century, professional tailors turned to the comprehensive 1895 "Keystone" guide to create office outfits, riding pants, shirtwaists, and other garments. Filled with more than eighty patterns, the handy resource provided tailors with suggestions for fabric choices as well as instructions for the proper measurement, fitting, cutting, and sewing of such items as a bolero jacket, a shirtwaist with yoke, a single-breasted vest, and riding breeches.
Supplemented with a selection of newly captioned illustrations from "The Delineator" magazine, this volume will be a valuable reference for costume designers and fashion historians, and a fascinating window on the past for nostalgia enthusiasts.