Vintage Holiday Show at Craven Farm

The venue is small but always well attended. This crowd continued to circle the floor for a good long while at the one-day show.

Fabric panels such as this one were once a popular and inexpensive way to have a “Grandma Moses” in one’s home. Nadia Mered of Seattle, Washington, brought the 20" x 24" framed panel and priced it at a reasonable $20, likely a bit more than it would have sold for in its 1940’s time. The scene is bucolic, though one might wonder about the fact that the trees still have leaves in the snow. Perhaps it’s a surprise spring snow as opposed to a winter scene.

First in show! Mr. Bubblelight, a.k.a. Leonard Mostek, positioned in his booth just to the right upon entering the barn, sat enlightening customers with details of his specialty, bubble lights and related holiday lighting items. Here amid his delightful display of lights and candoliers, the round bulbs in a three-light candolier in the forefront looked like aliens alight in a strange land. According to Mostek they are from the 1940’s and were never very popular because the paint can blister. They were $1 each. Standing guard behind them is a scarce circa 1955 nine-light candolier, priced at $125. It is lit with bulbs from 1952 that were coated on the interior with paint and produced only for one year because the bulbs tended to get very hot. These were priced at $2 a bulb. In the center is a fixed tube bubble light tree from 1950 for $125; the lit stars are a separate addition. To the left are a variety of bubble lights—biscuit, 48 flats, Noma tulips, and Paramount biscuits, which Mostek said were a knockoff of better-quality brands. They range from 1946 to 1960 and priced from $4 to $12 each.

Mark Craven can’t get more local, since the show venue is the wedding barn on his Snohomish, Washington, farm property. Craven’s delight is anything holiday related but particularly all things Halloween. These characters looked as if they were possibly plotting to take over the show when no one was looking. The pumpkin-devil-headed fellow rubbing his hands together is a German candy container from the 1920’s or 1930’s and was tagged $695.  Next to him in the roll of comic sidekick is a German accordion paper lantern, also from the 1920’s or 1930’s and priced at $40. The sign for Batger’s crackers displays colorful graphics on a blue background, crisp and clear like the moonlit night the bewitching scene portrays. The circa 1935 sign could be taken home for $25.

These boys in the band brought many oohs and ahs from appreciative patrons taking their turn around the floor. This is part of a set of seven German-made cotton ornaments dressed in red, white, and blue paper costumes. Bob Merck displayed them in a case with other unusual and special ornaments, but these were the standout. They date 1900-10, and Merck said he never had seen a full set before. Even the conductor is present. Merck was asking $1800 for the crew of honeyed hue.

Karen Leigh Hibbard of Karen’s Classics is a local dealer. She is another of the dealers who do shows only. In this case she had an artfully arrayed display of Halloween-oriented offerings. The cards are pre-1914. She said that is the classic age for artwork on such cards, and these bore prices ranging from $24 to $45. In a small box there were some small German die-cut toys, which Hibbard said were in good condition and $23 for the set. The moon-face clapper from the 1930’s was priced at $85. The 1930’s Tootsie Toy miniature truck was $15, and a 1930’s Czech wooden noisemaker, which Hibbard said was tiny but put out good sound, was $45.

Dealers Curtis and Andrea Thorfinson of A Holiday Wonderland are shown contemplating their booth display. Is it just right? Customers must have thought so, because the dealers did well with their sales.

Bev Bruno of The Frog Crossing, Everett, Washington, offered up a hodgepodge of fun. Items shown ranged from the 1800’s to the late 1960’s, good to kitsch—mostly kitsch, according to Bruno, who sells by appointment as well as at shows. Prices for this assemblage ranged from $2 to $125, and many of them sold early in the show.