School days, school days
Dear old Golden Rule days
‘Reading and ‘riting and ‘rithmetic
Taught to the tune of the hick’ry stick
You were my queen in calico
I was your bashful, barefoot beau
And you wrote on my slate, “I Love You So”
When we were a couple o’ kids

A nice pair of antique cast iron and wood school desks. Each has a shelf for books, a hole for an inkwell, a pen groove and the seats fold. Both are in pretty good shape and are roughly 28 inches deep, 21 1/2 inches wide and a maximum of 26 inches tall.

We’re selling them separately.

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We interrupt our normal It Could Be Yours messaging to say Thank You.

Sometime today this little blog will pass 500,000 all time page views (over half in the last year alone). For some blogs that’s not a big deal, but we’re pretty stoked.

So Thank You for checking in with us.

Thanks to our local supporters who come to the store, who sometimes we amuse, and without whom we wouldn’t be doing this. Thanks especially for your tolerance for sometimes awkward verbiage, misplaced commas and for indulging the occasional rant.

Thanks to you folks who’ve found us through Google or other search engines. Thanks for sometimes buying stuff from us. For those of you researching the stuff you already have: I hope you find what you’re looking for, whether it’s hidden wealth, sentimental value or a way to kill five minutes at work.

Thanks especially to everyone who’s helped us get here:

Thank you Claire, Evy, Nancy, Ruth, Laura, Mary, Gayle, Jess and April for all your hard work at all the stages where you’ve helped and are continuing to contribute.

Thank you to our family members, for your understanding when vocation creeps into the realm of avocation and for accepting the nights and weekends spent working on this instead of with you.

Thanks especially to all the other Warehouse and Store volunteers. From helping sort incoming items, to helping families, to working in the store, to knowing a guy who might want a piano; without your efforts we would be able to do anything here.  You are truly the glue that keeps this place together and the wheels on the ground.

Finally thank you all in advance for continuing to check in, for helping, for shopping, and for commenting in the future. Thank you for sharing posts you like with your friends and for indulging our off-key days.

It’s been a long and interesting journey and there are miles to go yet.

Onward to Mayhem!

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Telephone tables are sign number 437 that things have changed and kids have it too easy.

“Back in my day we had to have special furniture for our phones. It wasn’t some easy thing where you carried around more computing power in your pocket than the Strategic Air Command and could do internet searches for even the simplest stuff, like how to breathe. No, we had to remember phone numbers or look it up in a book. Ever hear of a book kid? It’s not some E-lek-tronik doo-dad, no sirree, its analog and uses paper and you had to know how to spell to use it. Bah you kids!

Wanna play Words With Friends?”

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This old mahogany game table is in good shape. The only notable flaw is that one of the feet has been broken off, but it was re-glued and appears to be firmly attached (see pictures below).

When fully opened this table is about 30 inches square and 28 1/ inches tall. When folded in half for storage (or for a game of cards for two) it is about 15 inches by 30 inches and 29 1/2 inches tall.

Rupert knew he was special, not just because his mother told his so, but because the light of the world emanated from his hind-end.

Approximately 20 inches tall by 14 inches wide and features a plastic giraffe 3/4 mounted on a brushed copper plate with savannah scene.  The photo doesn’t do it justice as it’s not quite as red as the picture above,  yet not as pale as the picture below and the strange effect of the light is best viewed in person.

The Watercloset Gallery will be open from 10 am to 4 pm.

This is a Fenton, hobnail, milk glass, crimped-edge epergne. That’s a very high falutin’ name for a centerpiece, but that seems to be what they’re called.

It is 8 1/2 inches in diameter and 6 1/2 inches tall. There are four pieces, namely the base and three flower-like “horns”. All the pieces are in perfect condition and it may have never been used at all.

We just received 12 cool prints produced* for the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial (2003 to 2006). Luckily they stand up well on their design merits and don’t show prominent dates. This means they aren’t outdated like so many other commemorative pieces (think of gallery opening posters, or music festival posters: Immediate obsolescence).

Eleven of the posters are framed in a 13 1/4 inch wide by just under 26 inch tall frame. These are in great condition although one poster is unframed. There are two duplicate prints, one each of the Clatsop (which are slightly different tones) and of Fort Clatsop (one framed, one is not framed and it is a little wrinkly).

UDPDATE: They’ve been flying out of here! The prints we still have available at this time (4:30 pm on 1/26/2012)  are the the two copies of “The Clatsop”, “Ecloa” and the unframed “Fort Clatsop”. The last two remaining prints (2:45 pm on 1/27) are “The Clatsop”, all the others have been sold.

*According to the publication of the Society for Environmental Graphic Design (Volume 1, Number 19, 2005):

NOBLE ERICKSON INC., Denver, CO, working with a team of partners including the National Park Service, the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial Association and Washington State Parks, created artwork for interpretive panels, posters, and collector memorabilia to unify signature sites throughout the recently dedicated Lewis and Clark National & State Historical Parks.

Valentines Day is coming and what better way to say to that not quite special someone “You’re so something but it’s not special” than to get them this thing?

This vaguely heart-shaped dish is made of glass pieces and held together with large amounts of lead. The coded message is that you’re subtly saying “I don’t give a rat’s derriere about your central nervous system” at the same time.

Perfect!

It is about 7 inches by 6 inches and weighs nearly 1 1/2 pounds.

I look at this leather upholstered bar stool and think, “If this were at my drafting table I could sketch cities, build Important Edifices or design untold futures.”

Instead I have an old cast iron and oak stool that’s just a bit too short, the mark of a plonker, a dilettante, someone who’s not, note the capital s- Serious.

But I’ve had that old stool too long to casually toss it aside for a flashy new brunette.  I spent a lot of night sitting on it with only a purloined milk-crate for a footrest and a wall to lean against and it suits me pretty well.

This new bar stool is about 48 inches tall with a seat height of 30 inches. It is 23 inches deep and 21 3/4 inches wide, unfortunately we have only one.

If you don’t have a drafting table it’d class up a home bar much better than tossing an olive in your PBR and calling it a martini.

George regularly said his prayers as a child.

He forgot to say them for a long time in his later youth and adult years.

Then on one June afternoon in 1875 he found himself wishing he had kept it up.

This little ceramic figurine is about 4 1/2 inches tall.