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| "PROTECT SONG-BIRDS" 1944, Jacob Bates Abbott |
I collect vintage posters from the 1930's-1940's. It really frustrates me that there is so little easily accessible information about the posters I love from this era. It baffles me that it is so difficult to find images for these gems online, so I intend to create a web presence for posters that I fancy and hopefully provide some relevant information about them. Maybe someone will stumble across this and appreciate the perspective and share their knowledge. My focus will be on posters that I own or acquire, but I will likely share other posters of interest from time to time as well.
I learned to appreciate wildlife, safety and conservation posters from my Dad, Sid. Sid is a consummate trader / wheeler dealer. He has bought and sold antiques, collectibles and old stuff for most of his life. Some of my earliest childhood memories are traveling across the great plains on interstates 80 (repeatedly) with my Mom, Dad and little brother in an old ford pickup stuffed full of antiques bound for Wyoming or Pennsylvania. My Dad grew up on our family's ancestral farm in northern Lycoming County, PA and he met my Mom when he was stationed at F.E. Warren air force base in Cheyenne, WY. By the time my Brother and I came along in the early 70's my Dad was fully exploiting the excess of old, oak ice boxes to be found in Wyoming that served eastern tastes for antique furniture while gathering up wagon wheels in Pennsylvania to quench the western thirst for cowboy nostalgia. Anyway, over the years the one thing that my Dad managed to collect (in addition to trading relentlessly) are Pennsylvania Game Commission posters.
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| "Don't Be A Game Hog" 1944, Jacob Bates Abbott |
I started to collect posters with Dad about 10 years ago. Dad's health doesn't really allow him to collect any longer, but most of the posters we have are from his knocking on doors, scrounging, bartering and just plain asking everyone he comes across if they have any doe (hunting) licenses or old Game Commission Posters. As you can guess, most people had no idea what he was talking about and some of the looks he received were priceless. But he never seemed to care about that, and he amassed one of the best poster collections in private hands. It seems appropriate to start with a couple of really nice posters that would have been in use in 1945 - the year my Dad was born.
