I collect (no giggling at the back) thimbles and have around 200 at the moment all nicely displayed in cases or on shelves around the place.
Not one of them is a duplicate of another and some of them are quite valuable.
I have 3 solid silver ones and 2 18ct gold ones, the remainder are made of all sorts of materials, wood, bone china,leather and so on.
I suppose the set I am most fond of is one I bought in the USA last year, there are six of them depicting:-
The Stars and Stripes
Mount Rushmore
A Bald Eagle
The White House
The Statue of Liberty
Abe Lincoln.
I collect the National Geographic magazine, along with any maps the issues may have contained. There’s too much other NG paraphenalia to collect it all, so I settled on the magazines. From 1914 to the present I have all but about 10 issues( the ones missing are in 14, 15, and 16), along with their maps.
Old maps can be harder to find, because they got lost from the issues. My collecting has slowed down now because finding and buying issues in half-way decent shape has become expensive. I’ll never have a complete set, I’d have to win the lottery, but I’d like to have one from before 1900 and the turn of the century. I do have a map from 1896, cost me $60, which wasn’t too bad as such things go.
Any Dopers have elderly relatives with Geographics in the attic?
Depression-era pressed glass pieces (but only milk white and pink thistle, although somehow I also managed to acquire a bunch of blue.)
Quilts.
ElfQuest stuff (a graphic novel series by Wendy & Richard Pini.)
Like Gyrate, I also accumulate stuff I’m not actively collecting per se: craft supplies, baskets, candlesticks, books, picture frames. Much of my collecting-ness is directly related to my decorating-ness.
NASCAR diecast. Around 2200 so far. And a couple hundred other NASCAR related items.
Skunks. About 300.
Crayola crayons. 5/16 size only. I have at least one of every color ever produced.
Monopoly tokens. 155 so far. Also have 9 versions of the game.
Collector cars. Just one at this time, my 66 GTO.
Wife collects mice and frogs. It sure makes gift buying easier.
'50s TV lamps with seashells, plastic flamingos and palm trees, etc. A recent obsession (damn you, eBay!) – got a notice this morning that I won the auction on for the latest, which is probably about #20. I’d prefer not to count them. I’ve got them arranged on shelves hanging in the upstairs hall, and have rewired them as necessary – they look really cool when they’re all lit up.
Elvis-abilia (in honor of my cat of the same name)
Flamingos (my totem animal, and how I got into the shell lamps).
I collect other peoples’ ear wax. I keep them in a large, locked file, organized by gender, race, physical location (on earth), and attractiveness level of the donor.
No, not really. But I had myself going there for a minute.
I collect pens. Fountain pens for the most part, but I like any pen that has a balance of style, feel, and function.
I have a bad habit of collecting cameras too. It’s more a reluctance to get rid of the ones I have than it is an active collecting. But I do have mostly “significant” cameras that were landmarks in their time: Minox B & C (GREAT conversation starters!); Canon A-1; Canon G1; Nikon F4s; a couple of old Brownie cameras; two Kodak Instamatic cameras (fully operational, except that film is a PITA to find); and a variety of others.
I also collect unique, manufacturer-published car brochures (hard-bound usually) and posters, mostly related to Porsches, but I will pick up the occasional oddity. My coolest (well, I consider it one of the coolest) is a set of dealer parts catalogs (before computers and microfilm catalogs) for 1970-76 DeTomaso Panteras that I got when I worked for my dad at a local dealership a few years ago. They sold Panteras back in the day, and he was going to throw out the old catalogs. Lord only knows why they had held onto them for 20 years. Turns out, I got them just in time as there was a fire that destroyed the place not long after.
I collect books. I have one of the better collections of books on the culture and language of Haiti. I also have a decent collection of books by and about the explorer Sir Richard Francis Burton.
I have had to curb my impulses in the past couple of years as I started to realize how much I was spending.
I collect cook books, teddy bears, Troll dolls, anything Taz, Wolves, dolphins, eagles, Dreamcatchers and candles. My house is a hodpodge of collected stuff! DAMN YOU EBAY!!!
At a family gathering my wife’s aunt was discussing her husband’s McDonald’s collection and her son’s Beatle’s memoribilia collection, both of which are extensive and rather impressive if you’re into that kind of thing. The aunt asked us what we collected and was almost stunned to hear that we don’t collect anything.
The fact that I don’t collect anything has more to do with me being lazy and disorganized and not having the disposable income to devote to such a thing. I’m not against collecting, I just never will. Unless I get wealthy and can quit my jobm then I’ll start buying old cars and trucks.
