Collector's Guide to Cast Metal Booke

By Gerald P. McBride

Book Overview

An illustrated, full-color value guide covering a wide range of bookend types and styles, with a detailed look at the three main processes used to create cast-metal bookends, a tour through the history of manufacturers who pioneered this art form, a special chapter on cast metal bookracks, sample pages from actual company catalogs, and more than 40 photographs of company identification marks and trademarks. Plus, an extensive identification and buyers' guide examines original and copy pieces side by side and helps to separate the treasures from the trash. This will serve as an important reference resource for years to come, and a timely one now as bookends are quickly becoming one of the hottest new collectibles in today's market.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0764300407
• ISBN13: 9780764300400
• Release Date: July 1997
• Publisher: Schiffer Publishing
• Length: 192 Pages
• Weight: 1.76 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 8.4" x 10.9"

Customer Reviews

Excellent information for collectors

Very educational. Lots of excellent information on how to identify various types of antique bookends. For example the author has lots of side by side comparisons of the same bookends made of different metals and finishes. There are also reprints of several old catalogs featuring their bookend product lines. It includes book value of the various bookends--unfortunately, the book was published in 1997. There also is a lot of information on logo identification. This book is a must for anyone who wishes to buy, sell or collect bookends. On the downside, in my own opinion, this book is not a user friendly reference book. It is not organized by subject, but rather by how they are casted. As a result, I pick up this book if I can't find what I'm looking for in Kuritzky & De Costa's Collector's Encyclopedia of Bookends. The book is printed on high quality paper, but is soft bound and I am concerned that sometime in the not so distant future, the pages will start breaking loose from the binding. On the other hand, this book has already paid for itself many times over in teaching me to recognize exactly what I am buying and providing a window into the character of sellers in regard to whether or not they are educated and truthful in presenting their product or if they're just making up stuff to lure some sucker into a bad deal.

Excellent source, poor index

A very good guidebook, with lots of great information, less good as a look-up reference. The vintage catalog reprints are extremely helpful to the collector. The organization is a bit odd, with bookends arranged according to casting type. That would be fine if the index was detailed enough to let you quickly find a particular piece. Instead, you get a subject (e.g., "Indians") followed by a long list of page numbers that you have to search through, a cumbersome, slow process that gets old in a hurry. But nevertheless this is a book the collector needs to own.