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For the people who wanted to know where I got the Umbrella and Dress....... Ebay.
My personal processing in Lightroom and PS CS3.
Textures:
Textures by Ash
Nichole Van
One Free
OOAK neroli Custom Blythe doll "Parade of love"
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Arkham City Mr. Freeze now available!
For those who were waiting for these to be listed on eBay rather than doing a private transaction. Limited stock! There is under 50x of these, grab one while you can.
In 1959, Ribble Motor Services of Preston caused a stir when they introduced a prototype Weymann (CH34/16Ft) bodied Leyland PDR1/1 Atlantean double-deck coach, registered MCK 812 fleet number 1251.. This would form the ''Gay Hostess'' class of Leyland Atlanteans double-deck coaches, with 50 Chapman reclining seats, and a toilet at the rear of the lower-deck. They were powered by the Leyland 0.680 engine to give a top speed of 65mph. The word gay meant happy in the fifties, all the Gay Hostess Atlanteans would carry a Hostess or Steward who would serve light refreshments and cigarettes. MCK 812 would be the first PSV to use the new M1 motorway when it opened at 9:30am on Monday 2nd November 1959. Production Gay Hostess Atlanteans would enter service in 1960 and 1961, 15 entered service with Ribble, and 22 with its Blackpool subsididiary W.C. Standerwick, eventually all 38 Atlanteans were in the Standerwick fleet.
The prototype ECW Bristol VRL No.50 entered service in December 1968, with the production examples entering service between 1970-1972. The Gay Hostess Atlanteans were withdrawn having covered high mileages. City Sightseeing of London who became Ensign Bus purchased ex Ribble Gay Hostess NRN 607 fleet number 1258 new in June 1960, and painted into this striking Union Jack livery for use on sightseeing services around London. In 1972 production of the second spin off film of the popular ITV sitcom On the Buses commenced this was Mutiny On the Buses. The three spin off films were produced by Hammer/EMI using the same cast as the television series, but the name of the bus company was changed to Town & District, the television series used the name Luxton & District Traction Company which London Weekend Television who produced On the Buses for ITV had registered the name, so nobody could use it, LWT did not get any money from the films, so would not allow the film makers to use the Luxton & District Traction Company name. In the Mutiny On the Buses film, Town & District decide to run a service to Winsor Safari Park, using a double-deck coach, NRN 607 was hired from City Sightseeing for use in the film. This view shows NRN 607 in central London in the summer of 1972, I won the slide on eBay with full copyright, photographer Cliff Essex.
Ribble Vehicle Preservation Trust (RVPT) own former Standerwick Gay Hostess No.26.
Trivia about On the Buses: It was created and written by Ronald Chesney and Ronald Wolfe and produced by London Weekend Television (LWT) between 1969 and 1973, 74 episodes in total. LWT was formed in August 1968 and was the weekend franchise holder for the London area, ATV had the weekend franchise in London, but was awarded the 7 day franchise for the Midlands. Associated Rediffusion and ABC both holders of franchise in the London area were forced to join together to form Thames Television who took on the Monday to Friday franchised in London, this happened at the same time as LWT were formed. Thames would take over the former ABC studio complex at Teddington, while LWT took over the former Rediffusion studio complex at Wembley.
The Eastern National depot at Wood Green was used as the bus depot for the television series. Eastern National also proved the buses used, Bristol FLF Lodekka double-deck buses. Reg Varney who played bus driver Stan Butler passed his PSV test with Eastern National so he could really drive the buses. Bob Grant who played Jack Harper the conductor had worked as a bus driver before going into acting. Stephen Lewis who played inspector Cyril Blake (Blakey) came up with the catch phases ''I ate you Butler'' and ''Get that bus out'' himself. Before the first episode was made, Reg, Bob and Stephen spent two weeks at the Wood Green depot watching the people that they would be portraying, Reg once said even down to how a bus driver climbed in and out of the cab of the bus.
Gay Hostess technical details
Chassis: Leyland PDR1/1 Atlantean
Engine: 11.1-litre Leyland 0.680 diesel engine producing 150bhp
Gearbox: 'Self Changing Gears' 4-speed semi-automatic
Suspension: front air, and rear leaf springs
Bodywork: Weymann CH34/16Ft
EXPLORE #261 2013.11.2
eBay Inc. is an American multinational internet consumer-to-consumer corporation, headquartered in San Jose, California. It was founded in 1995, and became a notable success story of the dot-com bubble; it is now a multi-billion dollar business with operations localized in over thirty countries.
can't believe I forgot to upload these pics when my ebay vintage button case arrived - it was a sales display piece, the buttons are all still in their different sales boxes with the old prices pencilled on - just gorgeous and the whole case and all its contents were just £21!
Double Terminated Aquamarine crystal on Schorl from Wotala mine Afghanistan. Black tourmaline is also free of damage.
What can you get for £25 these days?
Nicely broken in canvas bag, 3 old flash guns to use as slaves, extension tube set, Nikon F70 35mm camera, Nikon 35-70mm, Sigma 50-200mm and Sigma 70-300mm macro lens.
I collect old Nikons and always look out for ones that have a usable lens attached.
Biggest bargain, Sigma 70-300mm for a whopping £3.97
mémoire2cité - Sols absorbants, formes arrondies et couleurs vives, les aires de jeux standardisées font désormais partie du paysage urbain. Toujours les mêmes toboggans sécurisés, châteaux forts en bois et animaux à ressort. Ces non-lieux qu’on finit par ne plus voir ont une histoire, parallèle à celle des différentes visions portées sur l’enfant et l’éducation. En retournant jouer au xixe siècle, sur les premiers playgrounds des États-Unis, on assiste à la construction d’une nation – et à des jeux de société qui changent notre vision sur les balançoires du capitalisme. Ce texte est paru dans le numéro 4 de la revue Jef Klak « Ch’val de Course », printemps-été 2017. La version ici publiée en ligne est une version légèrement remaniée à l’occasion de sa republication dans le magazine Palais no 27 1, paru en juin 2018. la video içi www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uwj1wh5k5PY The concept for adventure playgrounds originated in postwar Europe, after a playground designer found that children had more fun with the trash and rubble left behind by bombings -inventing their own toys and playing with them- than on the conventional equipment of swings and slides. Narrator John Snagge was a well-known voice talent in the UK, working as a newsreader for BBC Radio - jefklak.org/le-gouvernement-des-playgrounds/ - www.collectorsweekly.com/articles/chasing-the-vanishing-p... or children, playgrounds are where magic happens. And if you count yourself among Baby Boomers or Gen Xers, you probably have fond memories of high steel jungle gyms and even higher metal slides that squeaked and groaned as you slid down them. The cheerful variety of animals and vehicles on springs gave you plenty of rides to choose from, while a spiral slide, often made of striped panels, was a repeated thrill. When you dismounted from a teeter-totter, you had to be careful not to send your partner crashing to the ground or get hit in the head by your own seat. The tougher, faster kids always pushed the brightly colored merry-go-round, trying to make riders as dizzy as possible. In the same way, you’d dare your sibling or best friend to push you even higher on the swing so your toes could touch the sky. The most exciting playgrounds would take the form of a pirate ship, a giant robot, or a space rocket.
“My husband would look at these big metal things and go, ‘Oh my God, those are the Slides of Death!'” - insh.world/history/playground-equipment-of-yesterday-that...
Today, these objects of happy summers past have nearly disappeared, replaced by newer equipment that’s lower to the ground and made of plastic, painted metal, and sometimes rot-resistant woods like cedar or redwood. The transformation began in 1973, when the U.S. Congress established the Consumer Product Safety Commission, which began tracking playground injuries at hospital emergency rooms. The study led to the publication of the first Handbook for Public Playground Safety in 1981, which signaled the beginning of the end for much of the playground equipment in use. (See the latest PPS handbook here.) Then, the American Society for Testing and Materials created a subcommittee of designers and playground-equipment manufacturers to set safety standards for the whole industry. When they published their guidelines in 1993, they suggested most existing playground surfaces, which were usually asphalt, dirt, or grass, needed to be replaced with pits of wood or rubber mulch or sand, prompting many schools and parks to rip their old playgrounds out entirely.
Top: A Space Age rocket-themed playground set by Miracle Playground Equipment, introduced circa 1968, photographed in Burlington, Colorado, in 2009. Above: Two seesaws and a snail-shaped climber, circa 1970s, photographed in Vandergrift, Pennsylvania, in 2007. (Photos by Brenda Biondo)
Top: A Space Age rocket-themed playground set by Miracle Playground Equipment, introduced circa 1968, photographed in Burlington, Colorado, in 2009. Above: Two seesaws and a snail-shaped climber, circa 1970s, photographed in Vandergrift, Pennsylvania, in 2007. (Photos by Brenda Biondo)
That said, removing and replacing playground equipment takes money, so a certain amount of vintage playground equipment survived into the next millennium—but it’s vanishing fast. Fortunately, Brenda Biondo, a freelance journalist turned photographer, felt inspired to document these playscapes before they’ve all been melted down. Her photographs capture the sculptural beauty and creativity of the vintage apparatuses, as well as that feeling of nostalgia you get when you see a piece of your childhood. After a decade of hunting down old playgrounds, Biondo published a coffee-table book, 2014’s Once Upon a Playground: A Celebration of Classic American Playgrounds, 1920-1975, which includes both her photographs of vintage equipment and pages of old playground catalogs that sold it.
Starting this November, Biondo’s playground photos will hit the road as part of a four-year ExhibitsUSA traveling show, which will also include vintage playground postcards and catalog pages from Biondo’s collection. The show will make stops in smaller museums and history centers around the United States, passing through Temple, Texas; Lincoln, Nebraska; Kansas City, Missouri; and Greenville, South Carolina. Biondo talked to us on the phone from her home in small-town Colorado, where she lives with her husband and children.
This 1975 Miracle catalog page reads, "This famous Lifetime Whirl has delighted three generations of children and still is a safe, playground favorite. Although it has gone through many improvements many of the original models are still spinning on playgrounds from coast to coast." (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)This 1975 Miracle catalog page reads, “This famous Lifetime Whirl has delighted three generations of children and still is a safe, playground favorite. Although it has gone through many improvements many of the original models are still spinning on playgrounds from coast to coast.” (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)Collectors Weekly: What inspired you to photograph playgrounds?Biondo: In 2004, I happened to be at my local park with my 1-year-old daughter, who was playing in the sandbox. I had just switched careers, from freelance journalism to photography, and I was looking for a starter project. I looked around the playground and thought, “Where is all the equipment that I remember growing up on?” They had new plastic contraptions, but nothing like the big metal slides I grew up with. After that, I started driving around to other playgrounds to see if any of this old equipment still existed. I found very little of it and realized it was disappearing quickly. That got to me.I felt like somebody should be documenting this equipment, because it was such a big part—and a very good part—of so many people’s childhoods. I couldn’t find anybody else who was documenting it, and I didn’t see any evidence that the Smithsonian was collecting it. As far as I could tell, it was just getting ripped up and sent to the scrap heap. At first, I started traveling around Colorado where I live, visiting playgrounds. Eventually, I took longer trips around the Southwest, and then I started looking for playgrounds whenever I was in any other parts of the country, like around California and the East Coast. It was a long-term project—shot over the course of a decade. And every year that I was shooting, it got harder and harder to find those pieces of old equipment.
This merry-go-round, photographed in Cañon City, Colorado, in 2006, is very similar to the Lifetime Whirl above. In the background are a rideable jalopy and animals, including four attached to a teeter-totter. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
This merry-go-round, photographed in Cañon City, Colorado, in 2006, is very similar to the Lifetime Whirl above. In the background are a rideable jalopy and animals, including four attached to a teeter-totter. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
Collectors Weekly: How did you find them?
Biondo: I would just drive around. I started hunting down local elementary schools and main-street playgrounds as well as neighborhood playgrounds. If I had a weekend, I would say, “OK, I’m going to drive from my home three hours east to the Kansas border, stay overnight and drive back.” Along the way, I would stop at every little town that I’d pass. They usually had one tiny main-street playground and one elementary school. I never knew what I was going to find. In a poorer area, a town often doesn’t have much money to replace playground equipment, whereas more affluent areas usually have updated their playgrounds by now. It was a bit of a crap shoot. Sometimes, I’d drive for hours and not really find anything—or I’d find one old playground after the other, because I happened to be in an area where equipment hadn’t been replaced.
I couldn’t get to every state, so I had to shoot where I was. I think there certainly are still old playgrounds out there, especially in small towns. But there’s fewer and fewer of them every year. My book has something like 170 photographs. I would guess that half the equipment pictured is already gone. Sometimes, I’d go back to a playground with a nice piece of equipment a year later to reshoot it, maybe in different lighting or a different season, and so often it had been removed. That pressured me to get out as often as I could because if I waited a few weeks, that piece might not be there anymore.
A 1911 postcard shows girls playing on an outdoor gymnasium at Mayo Park in Rochester, Minnesota.
a 1911 postcard shows girls playing on an outdoor gymnasium at Mayo Park in Rochester, Minnesota.
Collectors Weekly: What did you learn about playground history?
Biondo: I didn’t know American playgrounds started as part of the social reform or progressive movement of the early 1900s. Reformers hoped to keep poor inner-city immigrant kids safe and out of trouble. Back then, city children were playing in the streets with nothing to do, and when cars became more popular, kids started to get hit by motorists. Child activists started building playgrounds in big cities like Boston, Chicago, and New York as a way to help and protect these kids. These reformers felt they could build model citizens by teaching cooperation and manners through playgrounds. These early main-street parks would also have playground leaders who orchestrated activities such as games and songs.
“I started driving to playgrounds to see if any old equipment still existed. I found very little of it and realized it was disappearing quickly.”
In the late 1800s, Germans developed what they called “sand gardens,” which are just piles of sand where kids can come dig and build things. There were few of those in the United States as well. But by the early 1900s, the emphasis of playgrounds was on the apparatuses, things kids could climb on or swing on.
Soon after I started researching playground history, I happened to stumble on an eBay auction for a 1926 catalog that the playground manufacturers used to send to schools. At that point, I wasn’t thinking of doing a book, but I thought I could do something with it. I won the catalog; I paid, like, $12 for it. And it was so interesting because I could see this vintage equipment when it was brand new and considered modern and advanced. The manufacturers boasted about how safe it was and how it was good for building both muscles and imaginations.
After that, I would always search on eBay for playground catalogs, and I ended up with about three dozen catalogs from different manufacturers. My oldest is 1916, and my newest is from 1975. So I would take a photograph of some type of merry-go-round, and then I might find that same merry-go-round in a 1930 catalog. Often in the book, I pair my picture with the page from the catalog showing when it was first manufactured. I discovered a couple dozen manufacturers, which tended to be located in the bigger industrial areas with steel manufacturing, like Trenton, New Jersey, and Kokomo and Litchfield, Indiana. Pueblo, Colorado, even had a playground manufacturer. Burke and GameTime were big 20th century companies, and actually are among few still in existence.
The cover of a 1926 catalog for EverWear Manufacturing Company. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
The cover of a 1926 catalog for EverWear Manufacturing Company. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
Collectors Weekly: I recently came across an old metal slide whose steps had the name of the manufacturer, American, forged in openwork letters.
Biondo: I love those. One of the last pages in the book shows treads from six different slides, and they each had the name of their manufacturer in them, including Porter, American, and Burke. One time when I was traveling, I did a quick side trip to a small town with an elementary school. In the parking lot was this old metal slide with the American step treads, lying on its side. You could tell it had just been ripped off out of the concrete, which was still attached to the bottom, and was waiting for the steel recyclers to come and take it away.
I thought, “Oh my gosh, just put it on eBay! Somebody is going to want that. Don’t melt it down.” But nobody thinks about this stuff getting thrown away when it should be preserved. If you go on eBay, you can find a lot of those small animals on springs that little kids ride, because they’re small enough to be shipped. Once I saw someone selling one of those huge rocket ships, which had been dismantled, on eBay, but I don’t know if anybody ever bid on it. It’s rare to see the big stuff, because it is so expensive to ship. It’s like, “What kind of truck do you need to haul this thing away?” I don’t know of anyone who’s collecting those pieces, but I hope somebody is.
A metal slide in Victor, Colorado, had step treads with the name "American" in them. Photographed in 2008. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
A metal slide in Victor, Colorado, had step treads with the name “American” in them. Photographed in 2008. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
Collectors Weekly: It seems like an opportunity for both starting a collection or repurposing the material.
Biondo: I photographed many of the apparatuses as if they were sculptures because they have really cool designs and colors. Even when they’re worn down, the exposed layers of paint can be beautiful. Hardly anybody stops to look at it that way. People drive by and think, “Oh, there’s an old, rusty, rundown playground.” But if you take the time to look closely at this stuff, it’s really interesting. Just by looking at these pieces, you can picture all the kids who played on them.
Collectors Weekly: Aren’t people nostalgic for their childhood playgrounds?
Biondo: While I was taking the pictures, I visited Boulder, Colorado, which is a very affluent community. I was sure there would be no old playground equipment there. When I was driving around, all of a sudden, I looked over and saw this huge rocket ship. It turns out that one of the original NASA astronauts, Scott Carpenter, grew up in Boulder, and this playground was built in the ’60s to honor their hometown boy. Because of that, the citizens of Boulder never wanted to take down the rocket ship. One of the first exhibitions of this photography project happened in Boulder, and at the opening, I sold four prints of that rocket ship. People would come up to me at the exhibition, and they’d go, “Oh my gosh, I grew up playing on this when I was a little kid! Now, my kids are playing on it, and I’m so excited that I can get a picture of it and hang it in their bedroom.” So people have a strong nostalgic attachment to this equipment. It’s sad that most of it’s not going to be around for much longer.
A 1968 Miracle Playground Equipment catalog features the huge rocket-ship play set seen at the top of this story. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
A 1968 Miracle Playground Equipment catalog features the huge rocket-ship playset seen at the top of this story. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
Collectors Weekly: Besides slides and animals on springs, what were some other pieces that were common in older playgrounds?
Biondo: I didn’t come across as many old swings as I expected. I thought they would be all over the place, but I guess they’re gone now because they were so easy to replace. I tended to find merry-go-rounds more frequently—you know, the one where you’d run around pushing them and then jump on. When my kids were younger, they’d go out playground hunting with me, and the merry-go-rounds were their favorite things. They’re just so fun. The other thing you don’t find often is the seesaw or teeter-totter, and that was my favorite.The Karymor Stationary Jingle Ring Outfit appeared in the 1931 playground catalog put out by Pueblo, Colorado's R.F. Lamar and Co. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
The Karymor Stationary Jingle Ring Outfit appeared in the 1931 playground catalog put out by Pueblo, Colorado’s R.F. Lamar and Co. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
Before I started this project, I didn’t know there was such a variety of equipment. I figured I’d see seesaws, swings, slides, and merry-go-rounds. But I had no idea there were such things as revolving swings, which would be attached to a spinning pole via outstretched metal arms. Many mid-century pieces had themes from pop culture like “The Wizard of Oz,” “Cinderella,” “Denis the Menace,” cowboys and Indians, and Saturday-morning cartoons. During the Space Age, you started to see pieces of equipment shaped like rocket ships and satellites, because in the ’60s, Americans were so excited about space exploration. What was going on in the broader culture often got reflected in playground equipment.
Pursuing the catalogs was eye-opening. I live about an hour and a half south of Denver, so I often looked for playgrounds around the city. There, I’d find these contraptions where were shaped like umbrella skeletons, but then they had these rings hanging off the spindles. I’ve never seen them outside of Colorado. Then I bought a 1930s catalog from the manufacturer in Pueblo, Colorado, which is only 45 minutes from me, and it featured this apparatus. Later, I met people in Denver who’d say, “Oh, yeah, I remember that thing as a kid. It’s kind of like monkey bars where you had to try and get from ring to ring swinging and hanging by your arms.” There was so much variety, and even so many variations on the basics.I have a cool catalog from 1926 from the manufacturer Mitchell, which doesn’t exist anymore. I looked at one of the contraptions they advertised and I was like, “Oh my God, this looks like a torture device!” It was their own proprietary apparatus and maybe it didn’t prove to be very popular. I had never seen something like that on a playground. There probably weren’t very many of them installed.
This strange Climbing Swing from the 1926 Mitchell Manufacturing Company catalog looks a bit like a torture device. Brenda Biondo says she's never found one in the wild. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
This Climbing Swing from the 1926 Mitchell Manufacturing Company catalog looks a bit like a torture device. Biondo’s never found one in the wild. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
Collectors Weekly: After a while, were you able to date pieces just by looking at them?
Biondo: From looking at the catalogs, I certainly got a better idea of when things were built. But there were a handful things I couldn’t find in the catalogs. You can guess the age by knowing the design, as well as by looking at the amount of wear and the height of the piece. Usually, the taller it was, the older it was. One of the oldest slides I photographed was probably from the ’30s. I climbed to the top to shoot it as if the viewer were going to go down the slide. Up there, the place where you’d sit before sliding had been used for so many years by so many kids that I could see an outline of all the butts worn into the metal. You can imagine all the children who must have gone down that slide to wear the metal down like that.
This 1930s-era slide, found in Sargents, Colorado, in 2007, developed a butt-shaped imprint. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
This 1930s-era slide, found in Sargents, Colorado, in 2007, developed a butt-shaped imprint. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
Collectors Weekly: How did Modernism influence playground design?
Biondo: In 1953, the Museum of Modern Art in New York held a competition for playground design. Modern Art was just getting popular, and the idea of incorporating the theories of Modernist design into utilitarian objects was in the air, and was translated into playgrounds for several years. I have a 1967 catalog that features very abstract playground equipment made from sinuous blobs of poured concrete. And you’ve probably seen some of it, but there’s not too much of that around. That’s another example of how broader cultural trends were reflected in playgrounds.
When most people think of playgrounds, they say, “Oh, that’s a kiddie subject. There’s not much to it.” But when you start looking into them, you realize playgrounds are a fascinating piece of American culture—they go back a hundred years and played a part in most Americans’ lives. These playground pieces are icons of our childhood.
Collectors Weekly:What was the impact of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, which launched in 1973?
Biondo: Things started to change after that, which is why I limited to book to apparatuses made before 1975. New playgrounds were starting to be build out of plastic and fiberglass. I looked up the statistics, and according to the little research I’ve done—contrary to what you’d expect—there’s not much difference in the number of injuries on older equipment versus injuries on equipment today. A “New York Times” article from 2011 called “Can a Playground Be Too Safe?” explains that studies show when playground equipment was really high and just had asphalt underneath it and not seven layers of mulch, thekids knew they had to be careful because they didn’t want to fall. Nowadays, when everything is lower and there’s so much mulch, kids are just used to jumping down and falling and catching themselves. So kids learned to assess risk by playing on the older equipment. They also learned to challenge themselves because it is a little scary to go up to the top of the thing.
This old postcard of Shawnee Park in Kansas City, Kansas, circa 1912, shows how tall slides could get.
This old postcard of Shawnee Park in Kansas City, Kansas, circa 1912, shows how tall slides could get.
At my local park where you have new equipment, the monkey bars aren’t that high and there’s mulch below it, but a child fell and broke their arm last year. When I was talking to the principal at the school where they had just torn out that old American slide, I asked her, “Why did you replace the equipment?” She said, “We felt the parents in the community were expecting to have a little bit newer and nicer equipment. And this stuff had been here for so long.” And I said, “Have you seen a difference in injury rates since you put up your newer equipment?” She replied, “I’ve been a principal here several years, and we never had a serious broken-bone injury on the playground until four months ago on the new equipment.”
There were some nasty accidents in the ‘60s and ’70s, where kids got their arms or their heads caught in the contraptions. Those issues definitely needed to be assessed. What’s interesting is the Consumer Product Safety Commission never issued requirements, just suggested guidelines. But manufacturers felt that if their equipment didn’t meet those guidelines, they’d be vulnerable to liability. Everybody went to the extreme, making everything super safe so they wouldn’t risk getting sued.A 1970s-era climbing-bar apparatus, photographed in Rocky Ford, Colorado, in 2006. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
A 1970s-era climbing-bar apparatus, photographed in Rocky Ford, Colorado, in 2006. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
In the last decade, people have been looking at playground-equipment design and trying to make it more challenging and more encouraging of imaginative play, but without making it more likely someone’s going to get injured. And adults, I think, are realizing kids are spending more time indoors on devices so they want to do everything they can to encourage kids to still get outside, run around, and climb on things.
Collectors Weekly: You don’t need a playground to hurt yourself. When I was a kid, I fell off a farm post and broke my arm.Biondo: Oh, yeah, kids have been falling out trees forever—they always want to climb stuff. Playground politics are always evolving. Even in the 1920s, the catalogs talked about how safe their equipment was, and they were selling these 30-foot slides. Sometimes, I’d be out with my family on a vacation, and we’d make a little side tour to look for an old playground to shoot. My husband would look at these big metal things and go, “Oh my God, those are the Slides of Death!” because they were so huge and rickety. But back then, these were very safe pieces of equipment compared to what kids had been playing on before.
A page from the 1971 GameTime catalog offering rideable Saddle Mates. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
A page from the 1971 GameTime catalog offering rideable Saddle Mates. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
Collectors Weekly: Growing up in the 1980s, I always hated the new fiberglass slides because I’d end up with all these tiny glass shards in my butt.
Biondo: Yeah, I remember that, too. It’s always something. It is fun to talk to people about playgrounds because it reminds them of all the fun stuff they did as kids. When people see pictures of these metal slides, they tell me, “Oh my gosh, I remember getting such a bad burn from a metal slide one summer!” The metal would get so hot in the sun, and kids would take pieces of wax paper with them to sit on so they’d go flying down the slide. I have some old postcards that show playgrounds from the early ’20s. The wood seesaws not only were huge, but they had no handles so you had hold on to the sides of the board where you sat. I’m looking at that like, “Oh my God!” It’s all relative.
playground_postcard_milwaukee
Kids ride the rocking-boat seesaw at a Milwaukee, Wisconsin, park in this postcard postmarked 1910.
(To see more of Brenda Biondo’s playground photos and vintage catalog pages, pick up a copy of her book, “Once Upon a Playground: A Celebration of Classic American Playground, 1920-1975.” To find an exhibition of Biondo’s playground project, or to bring it to your town, visit the ExhibitsUSA page. To learn more about creative mid-century playgrounds around the globe, also pick up, “The Playground Project” by Xavier Salle and Vincent Romagny.) insh.world/history/playground-equipment-of-yesterday-that...
Black OPS Imperial Gunship & Shadow Trooper Hardsuit
Tons of playful functions jam-packed into this model, includes:
- Shadow trooper Hardsuit minifig with a mega 6 barrel blaster
- 2 firing weapon mechanisms: front turret & roof missiles
- 5 cannon missiles
- 14 retractable air to air flick missiles
- Escape pod/craft with arms station (removable)
- Swivel armory (removable)
- Storage compartments & cargo space
- Fits 14 Brick lights (sold separately)
- made to Real life specs + extra decorative details
Specs:
- Pieces 1100+ (more than lego's original 7676)
- Body size 11.5" L x 4.5" W x 6.5" H
- Wing span 13.5" L
- Weighs approx. 2 lbs
Gunship Lego set Available in my
Webstore and ebay store
LIVE action YouTube video
Brick Lights How-To photos will post on my website YouTube video
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OOAK neroli Custom Blythe doll "Psychedelic flower"
cgi.ebay.com/OOAK-neroli-Custom-Blythe-doll-Psychedelic-f...
www.ebay.co.uk/itm/MAN-Wrightbus-2008-12-Metre-high-capac...
Many Thanks to Devon and cornwall Bus Spotter for the head up on this one!
Please watch the following link as there is possibly a few more listings from Target Travel in the near future....
www.ebay.co.uk/usr/target_travel_1988?_trksid=p2047675.l2559
Two of my Ebay purchases came today lol. I found another seller who was selling some DSi Gashapon, and while it’s definitely 1:4 scale instead of 1:6 I’m excited by tiny consoles. I’m probably going to customize the hell out of the black one cuz I have an identical one already.
And I found this cheap Modern Circle Melody who had been rooted with eyelashes and suffered green ear due to the owner putting in metal earrings. But considering how long I’ve been looking for Melody it’s nice having a second one to customise and play with a bit more….
LE Wedding Cinderella, boxed but with the front covers opened. The doll is behind a clear plastic window, that wraps around the sides.
On my second attempt to get the the Limited Edition Wedding Cinderella 17'' Doll from eBay, I finally got her! I got her with the help of a fellow collector. She is #450 of 500, and was originally sold by the Japan Disney Store. There is a Japanese sticker on the bottom of the box. She was shipped double boxed, and very well packed. She arrived in perfect condition.
She is very beautiful, and has a serene expression, rather than the grumpy pout of the LE Ballgown Cinderella doll. Her lips have a slight smile, which is part of why she has a more pleasant expression than the other doll, who shares the same face mold. She is glancing in the opposite direction of the Ballgown Cinderella, and her skin has a matte surface, rather than the shiny pearly surface of the Ballgown doll. Her pale yellow wedding gown has many differently sized and colored rhinestones enhancing the printed floral pattern. There are also several small jeweled plastic butterflies in the skirt, hidden amongst the flowers. The decorations continue throughout the back of the dress. There are also faux pearl buttons on her sleeves and on the back of her bodice. Her skirt is very full with a long train, and is in three differently colored layers. Under her skirts is a 3/4 length single layer tulle petticoat. Attached to her hair is an oversized pale yellow sheer chiffon veil. She has golden earrings and a jeweled golden tiara. Her wedding ring is a floral design with five golden beads; it is pinned to her hand. She has the old style legs, with fixed ankles. She is wearing simple ivory heels, with no decorations.
I will be posting a full set of detailed photos of this doll. She will be shown boxed, during deboxing, and fully deboxed, both by herself and with other Disney Store dolls.
Cinderella Limited Edition Royal Wedding Doll - Live Action Film - 17''
US Disney Store
$500.00
Item No. 6003040901179P
Released and Sold Out online March 13, 2015 (US and Europe)
Released and Sold Out online April 3, 2015 (50 units sold in Japan)
Purchased second hand April 17, 2015
Received April 21, 2015
#450 of 500
Butterfly
The Disney Store presents the Disney Film Collection Limited Edition Cinderella Wedding Doll. Inspired by her royal wedding in the new Disney live action film, this heirloom bride is a stunning vision to behold in her bejeweled ivory gown.
Magic in the details...
Please Note: Purchase of this item is limited to 1 per Guest.
• Numbered Limited Edition of 500
• Certificate of Authenticity
• Bridal gown of shimmering pale gold organza layered over ivory satin
• Gown embellished with delicate floral artwork, multicolored rhinestones, and sculptured, jeweled butterflies with iridescent wings
• Pearl buttons enhance the back of the gown and sleeves
• Flowing, full-length chiffon veil
• Golden tiara with intricately sculptured and jeweled pearlescent flowers
• Pearl toned wedding ring
• Delicate floral earrings
• Molded ivory shoes
• Display stand included
• Meticulously designed and crafted by Disney Store Artists to ensure every detail was captured
• Arrives in a dramatic full-length window presentation box with fold open ''doors'' and magnetic closure
• Inspired by Disney's live-action movie Cinderella
• Part of the Disney Film Collection
The bare necessities
• Intended for adult collectors - Not a child's toy
• Plastic / polyester
• 17'' H
• Imported
Safety
WARNING: CHOKING HAZARD - Small Parts. Not for children under 3 years.
Some of you may have noticed that, unfortunately, owing to the fact that a certain person based in Kent who sells truck photos on eBay commercially has been lifting my images from this album and selling them I have had to remove 2300 photos that didn't have a watermark. I have now run around 1700 through Lightroom and added a watermark with the intention of bulk uploading them again. Rather than watermark the existing (hidden) files in Flickr one at a time it will be easier to do it this way. I definitely won’t be adding individual tags with the make and model of each vehicle I will just add generic transport tags. Each photo is named after the vehicle and reg in any case. For anyone new to these images there is a chapter and verse explanation below. It is staggering how many times I get asked questions that a quick scan would answer or just as likely I can’t possibly answer – I didn’t take them but just to clarify-I do own the copyright- and I do pursue copyright theft.
This is a collection of scanned prints from a collection of photographs taken by the late Jim Taylor A number of years ago I was offered a large number of photographs taken by Jim Taylor, a transport photographer based in Huddersfield. The collection, 30,000 prints, 20,000 negatives – and copyright! – had been offered to me and one of the national transport magazines previously by a friend of Jim's, on behalf of Jim's wife. I initially turned them down, already having over 30,000 of my own prints filed away and taking space up. Several months later the prints were still for sale – at what was, apparently, the going rate. It was a lot of money and I deliberated for quite a while before deciding to buy them. I did however buy them directly from Jim’s wife and she delivered them personally – just to quash the occasional rumour from people who can’t mind their own business. Although some prints were sold elsewhere, particularly the popular big fleet stuff, I should have the negatives, unfortunately they came to me in a random mix, 1200 to a box, without any sort of indexing and as such it would be impossible to match negatives to prints, or, to even find a print of any particular vehicle. I have only ever looked at a handful myself unless I am scanning them. The prints are generally in excellent condition and I initially stored them in a bedroom without ever looking at any of them. In 2006 I built an extension and they had to be well protected from dust and moved a few times. Ultimately my former 6x7 box room office has become their (and my own work’s) permanent home.
I hope to avoid posting images that Jim had not taken his self, however should I inadvertently infringe another photographers copyright, please inform me by email and I will resolve the issue immediately. There are copyright issues with some of the photographs that were sold to me. A Flickr member from Scotland drew my attention to some of his own work amongst the first uploads of Jim’s work. I had a quick look through some of the 30 boxes of prints and decided that for the time being the safest thing for me to do was withdraw the majority of the earlier uploaded scans and deal with the problem – which I did. whilst the vast majority of the prints are Jims, there is a problem defining copyright of some of them, this is something that the seller did not make clear at the time. I am reasonably confident that I have since been successful in identifying Jims own work. His early work consists of many thousands of lustre 6x4 prints which are difficult to scan well, later work is almost entirely 7x5 glossy, much easier to scan. Not all of the prints are pin sharp but I can generally print successfully to A4 from a scan.
You may notice photographs being duplicated in this Album, unfortunately there are multiple copies of many prints (for swapping) and as I have to have a system of archiving and backing up I can only guess - using memory - if I have scanned a print before. The bigger fleets have so many similar vehicles and registration numbers that it is impossible to get it right all of the time. It is easier to scan and process a print than check my files - on three different PC’s - for duplicates. There has not been, nor will there ever be, any intention to knowingly breach anyone else's copyright. I have presented the Jim Taylor collection as exactly that-The Jim Taylor Collection- his work not mine, my own work is quite obviously mine.
Unfortunately, many truck spotters have swapped and traded their work without copyright marking it as theirs. These people never anticipated the ease with which images would be shared online in the future. I would guess that having swapped and traded photos for many years that it is almost impossible to control their future use. Anyone wanting to control the future use of their work would have been well advised to copyright mark their work (as many did) and would be well advised not to post them on photo sharing sites without a watermark as the whole point of these sites is to share the image, it is very easy for those that wish, to lift any image, despite security settings, indeed, Flickr itself, warns you that this is the case. It was this abuse and theft of my material that led me to watermark all of my later uploads. I may yet withdraw non-watermarked photos, I haven’t decided yet. (I did in the end)
To anyone reading the above it will be quite obvious that I can’t provide information regarding specific photos or potential future uploads – I didn’t take them! There are many vehicles that were well known to me as Jim only lived down the road from me (although I didn’t know him), however scanning, titling, tagging and uploading is laborious and time consuming enough, I do however provide a fair amount of information with my own transport (and other) photos. I am aware that there are requests from other Flickr users that are unanswered, I stumble across them months or years after they were posted, this isn’t deliberate. Some weekends one or two “enthusiasts” can add many hundreds of photos as favourites, this pushes requests that are in the comments section ten or twenty pages out of sight and I miss them. I also have notifications switched off, I receive around 50 emails a day through work and I don’t want even more from Flickr. Other requests, like many other things, I just plain forget – no excuses! Uploads of Jim’s photos will be infrequent as it is a boring pastime and I would much rather work on my own output.
This is a small snap shot I bought on Ebay. Load of 49 Plymouths on an Automobile Shippers' Dual Motors trailer. These trailers remained in use until the late 60's. 33-footer, note no door cut outs.
I've been slapped with an "Item Not Received" Case on Ebay for 3 of my Superstar Barbie dolls.
UK Buyer. Instead of messaging me first to ask if there was any sort of delay, they immediately open up a case which has now taken my Paypal account balance to -387.00 Until the case is closed, which will most likely close in favor of the buyer as they always do.
So now I have auctions ending this Friday that - if I don't make over the amount this has put me under, I'm not going to be left with anything to even SHIP the items to their buyers!!
The whole reason I have listed my current batch of dolls is to raise funds to cover a surgery my cat is going to need!! Now I am set back on that too!!
Now I understand reimbursing the buyer their money if they didn't get their dolls. But why the fuck should I have to reimburse Ebay!? Why should I be out both the money AND The dolls that I spent HOURS preparing for sale!!
www.ebay.co.uk/itm/2003-Mercedes-Sprinter-413-UVG-16-Seat...
Please watch the following link as there is possibly a few more listings from Target Travel in the near future....
www.ebay.co.uk/usr/target_travel_1988?_trksid=p2047675.l2559