Questions and Answers

QUESTION:  I have a Howdy Doody child’s rocking chair that I acquired when I was three, back in 1950.  What is it worth? – CS, NJ, E-mail Question

ANSWER:  The Howdy Doody show premiered on NBC on December 27, 1947.  The last episode aired on September 30, 1960.  The show was broadcast in black and white before switching to color on September 12, 1955.  A total of 2,543 episodes were produced.

Bob Smith, a.k.a. Buffalo Bob, hosted the show.  Bob Keeshan (later Captain Kangaroo), Bobby Nicholson, and Lew Anderson played Clarabell The Clown.  Judy Tyler and Linda Marsh portrayed Princess Summerfall Winterspring.  Puppet characters included Flub-a-Dub, Phineas T. Buster, Dilly Dally, and Heidi Doody.  Dayton Allen, Rhoda Mann, and Rufus Rose were the chief puppeteers.

Howdy Doody sponsors included Colgate tooth powder, Ideal, Kellogg’s, Mars Candy, Marx, Nabisco, Ovaltine, Poll-Parrot Shoes, Royal Pudding, Tootsie Rolls, Welsh’s Grape Juice, and Wonder Bread.  Howdy was a money-generating puppet.

TRIVIA QUIZ:  How many freckles are on Howdy Doody’s face?

Hundreds of premiums and licensed products appeared.  Copyright information helps date an object’s origin: (1) 1948-1951 – Bob Smith, (2) 1951-1959 – Kagran Corp., and (3) after 1960 – NBC.

There were apparently two types of rocking chairs—first a wooden chair with a music box located beneath the seat and a Howdy Doody decal on the front of the back and second a vinyl covered chair with chrome rockers.  Howdy Doody collectibles reached their peak value in the early 1990s.  Values have fallen considerably since that time, especially for common material.  During the early 1990s, a wooden rocker with a working music box in fine or better condition would command between $225.00 and$250.00.  Today that same rocker is a tough sell at half these values.

QUESTION:  I have three plaster figures – a boxer with his eyes closed and head turned away as he throws a punch, a boxer ducking the punch, and a referee with his head tilted back.  When properly aligned, the tableau shows the standing boxer throwing a blind punch which passes over the squatting boxer and strikes the referee on the chin.  “1942 © / L. L. Rittgers” is incised near the bottom of the left pants leg of the referee.  There also is a paper label which reads “Copyright by / LAFAYETTE LASO RITTGERS / CHICAGO 37, ILL.”  What is the value of my three-figure set? – LH, E-mail Question

ANSWER:  While I was not able to locate a history of Lafayette Laso Rittgers, I did find bits and pieces of information on several Internet sites.  Lafayette L. Rittgers introduced several “sports” figure sets in the early 1940s.  In 1941, he offered two three-set groups—baseball and wrestling.  The baseball group included a batter in a uniform with an “N” and a pitcher in a uniform with an “A” arguing with an umpire.  The wrestler set consisted of an oversized, standing (8 1/2in high) Baby Huey-type wrestler, an angry referee with his hands on his hip and looking up at the standing wrestler, and an opponent who is knotted into a ball.  Over the next years, variations of these groups were issued.  Rittgers’ first tag read: “Original Humor / Rittgers / Copyright by Lafayette L. Rittgers / Chicago.”

A Hawaiian three-figure beach set was introduced in 1945.  The set consisted of a full-figured woman wearing a turquoise blue one-piece bathing suit and walking her dog flanked by a bowl-shaped tray, a reclining topless Hawaiian girl, and a man sitting on a box lifting his glasses in one hand and holding a sign reading “Help The Blind.”

Rittigers eventually became Suttle and Rittgers, located at 4311 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, Illinois.  One Internet sale listing noted that page 180 of the Chicago Gift Show (August 3-14, 1953) contained an advertisement for Suttle and Rittgers figures.

The baseball set followed by the beach set are the most desirable of the figural groupings.  When sold individually, figures from the wrestling and boxing set average between $100.00 and $150.00 each.  Adding a “set or pair” premium, you three-piece boxing set has a value between $350.00 and $400.00.

QUESTION:  When my grandmother cleaned out her house in Ephrata, PA a few years ago, my one request was the Uncle Wiggily board game we played when I was a kid.  It is in very used condition.  I do not even know if all the pieces are still with it.  I have the game board, a set of white cards, a set of red cards, and 4 metal Uncle Wiggily rabbit pieces.  As far as I am concerned, its value is the memories I have from playing it.  I would like to know when the game was this first introduced and if it has any monetary worth. – EM, Bozeman, MT, E-mail Question

ANSWER:  Howard Roger Garis (April 25, 1873 – November 6, 1962) was a prolific author of children’s books.  Garis and his wife Lilian Garis began their careers at the Newark Evening News.  Garis and his wife supplemented their income by working for the Stratemeyer Syndicate churning out juvenile fiction under a host of pseudonyms.  Howard authored the Tom Swift titles as Victor Appleton, volumes 4 through 28 and volume 41 of the Bobbsey Twins series as Laura Lee Hope, the Motor Boys series as Clarence Young, the Great Marvel series and Baseball Joe books as Lester Chadwick, and several Camp Fire Girl novels as Marion Davidson.

Edward M. Scudder, owner and publisher of the Newark Evening News, asked Garis to create a series of short children’s stories for publication in the News.  The first Uncle Wiggily story appeared on January 30, 1910.  The series was a success.  Garis wrote a story a day, except on Sundays, authoring over 15,000 stories prior to his retirement in 1947.  The stories were gathered into books, illustrated by August Lenox.

Uncle Wiggily encountered good and bad characters in his travels.  Sammie Littletail (a rabbit) and Neddie Stubtail (a bear cub) are friendly animal characters from his neighborhood.  Bad characters included Pipsisewah (a bully rhinoceros-like creature), Skeeziscks (a crow), Wozzy Wolf, Bushy Bear, and Skillery Skallery Alligator.

Milton Bradley introduced the first Uncle Wiggily game in 1916, revising the game in 1923, 1949, and 1955.  In 1967 Parker Brother acquired the rights to the game.  In 1989 Milton Bradley and Parker Brothers issued different versions of the game.  After Hasbro acquired Milton Bradley and Parker Brothers, it continued to issue the Milton Bradley version of the game.  The game features a “racing track” format, the first player to reach the end of the track wins.

Based on the photographs attached to your e-mail, you have a mid-twentieth century version of the game.  You are missing the box that housed the game board and playing pieces.  The box graphics featured Uncle Wiggily walking through the woods with his friends.  It is not clear if the game instructions were printed on the inside of the box lid or printed on a separate piece of paper.

You are correct in assuming that “memory value” is the primary value.  Your board and accompanying playing pieces are worth between $8.00 and $10.00.

There are dozens of Uncle Wriggily collectibles besides books.  My Internet research located an Uncle Wiggily lithograph tin crazy car, a two-handled cup, a sewing pattern set, and dolls for Uncle Wiggily and Nurse Jane.  As with many children’s book characters from the early and mid-twentieth century, memory is fading.  The number of new Uncle Wiggily readers lessens each year.  As a result, values for Uncle Wiggily memorabilia are decreasing rather than increasing.

Learn More:  Roger Garis, Howard’s son, wrote a biography of the Garis family, My Father Was Uncle Wiggily (McGraw Hill, 1966).  Leslie Garis, Howard’s granddaughter, authored The House of Happy Endings (Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 2007), a more revealing memoir.

QUESTION:  I own a white Oxylite sculpture of an open-winged eagle standing on a rock.  The irregular round base measures 5 1/2in by 4 3/4in.  The figure stands 11 1/2in high and is 8 1/4in wide from wing to wing.  It is marked “Made in Italy” and “A. Santini.”  What information can you provide about my sculpture. – DA, Janesville, WI

ANSWER:  A. Santini Sculptures is still in business.  A sales website promo for a Ballerina figures reads: “A. Santini sculptures represent some of the most prestigious museum quality lines of sculpture in the world.  In fact, nothing comes closer to an original hand carved marble sculpture than these A. Santini sculptures from Italy.  These beautiful pieces of art are made of bonded Carrara Marble and Alabaster are finished by hand with remarkable detail, hand painted and signed by the artist with certificates.”

Reading between the lines is one of the many keys critical to surviving in the antiques and collectibles field.  In less glowing terms, these sculptures are mass-produced, molded figures made from a plaster-like paste consisting of crushed alabaster and marble powder.  They are decorative accessories, not works of art.

A. Santini sculptures retail at high-ticket prices.  The initial retail price of your eagle probably was between $275.00 and $350.00.  The “new” price includes the profits of the wholesaler and retailer.  The sculpture lost value the moment it left the store, just like a new car.  It will take decades to establish whether A. Santini pieces develop a strong secondary collecting market.  I strongly suspect they will not.  Meanwhile, pieces should sell between twenty and thirty cents of the initial retail cost.  At the moment, the secondary market value of you sculpture is under $100.00.

TRIVIA QUIZ ANSWER:  48 – one for each of the forty-eight states in the United States at the time the show premiered.

Harry L. Rinker welcomes questions from readers about collectibles, those mass-produced items from the twentieth century.  Selected letters will be answered in this column.  Harry cannot provide personal answers.  Photos and other material submitted cannot be returned.  Send your questions to: Rinker on Collectibles, 5093 Vera Cruz Road, Emmaus, PA 18049.  You also can e-mail your questions to harrylrinker@aol.com. Only e-mails containing a full name and mailing address will be considered.

You can listen and participate in WHATCHA GOT?, Harry’s antiques and collectibles radio call-in show, on Sunday mornings between 8:00 AM and 10:00 AM Eastern Time.  If you cannot find it on a station in your area, WHATCHA GOT? streams live on the Internet at www.gcnlive.com.

SELL, KEEP OR TOSS?: HOW TO DOWNSIZE A HOME, SETTLE AN ESTATE, AND APPRAISE PERSONAL PROPERTY (House of Collectibles, an imprint of Random House Information Group, $16.95), Harry’s latest book, is available at your favorite bookstore and via www.harryrinker.com.