I love presidential history; the official and the unofficial stuff. I held on to a 70s era paperback I pulled out of an estate cleanout a while back (can't remember the name for the life of me now), it was full of great stuff. Each President had a page or two with all of the official information followed by a couple more with the more oddball, somewhat juicier, stuff: Washington never really had wooden teeth; Adams and Jefferson both dying on the same historically important day; wounded in a duel, Andrew Jackson lived with a bullet in his chest the rest of his life; how many were never formally educated; most have been Episcopalian (hellz yes - give it up for no confession and a slightly longer Lord's Prayer), and on and on.
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| Marx Presidents |
Anyway, I was super pleased to acquire this damn near complete set of Marx Presidents. I'm not exactly sure why, but there's just something intriguing about them - their likeness is truly uncanny. Marx stuff is pretty collectible on the whole, too.
So, I had them out on display on top of my countertop and I'll be damned if some bastard didn't steal my Harry S. Truman. FOR SHAME! Shoplifters are the worst of the worst in my book - and God forbid I ever catch one; it'll be Hadley on Bogs Diamond Shawshank style if I do. But you'd be amazed at how advanced, and affordable, surveillance technology is these days and this happened a while back.
At any rate, a lot of people have mentioned to me, upon seeing my Commander in Chief collection, that they have seen these little fellas at sales and such for years and have always wondered what was up with them. They were first made in the 50s and were not only considered collectible but also an educational tool. The came painted, unpainted, and there were numerous variations. (
here's a site with more info). They're still making them to this day (not actual Marx) to compliment existing collections.
