In 1971, I turned ten years old and discovered sports, not necessarily in that order. This was the year of both my first major league baseball game and my first college football game, and it was also the year of the Fight of the Century: Muhammad Ali vs Joe Frazier. The Fight of the Century was how the […]
Archives for July 2014
Silver Party: Wager Cup, not Solo Cup
This past week, I came across an unusual object; she was a lady made of silver, wearing a hollow skirt and holding a small pivoting vessel above her head! She is a wager cup, a popular German party gaiety of the 16th century. In German, a Jungfrauenbecher! The party guest were offered a drink from […]
Peter, the Mint Eagle
One of the many quirky facts associated with the early United States Mint is that the Philadelphia coining facility once had a resident Bald Eagle (aka Peter the Mint Eagle). According to the Coinage Act of 1792, also known as the Mint Act, American gold and silver coins were to be designed with an eagle […]
What makes a guitar worth buying?
There are millions upon millions of guitars floating about. What is that that forces a guitar into your consciousness and makes you say, “I must own this?” (Obviously, budget is one of the constraints, but that’s a slightly less-than-romantic consideration.) Guitars are meant to be played, to be heard, so my first thoughts were aural: […]