July 2017
by Lin Romberg
Shawnee Tales
  Arizona is experiencing record breaking temperatures - even being a DRY heat, anything above 115 is hotter than H----  It was actually showing 121 in my backyard on the shaded patio and 124 outside temp at the nearby mall.  Any pottery that is shipping to extreme heat has to be brought in and acclimated to radical temperature change in the air conditioning!!! Normally we have low humidity - today it is 116 with 55 percent humidity - very uncomfortable for us.

  There have been a couple of great finds this past month -  talk about hand painted decorations - this Smiley jar came with a fly on his head and multiples of hand painted flowers -  not even mentioned at time of sale so a nice surprise for the buyer when he unpacked it - beautiful jar! Calif is as hot as Arizona so the buyer had to wait HOURS to open the box.  Unsuspecting sellers don't know what we collectors cherish!!!!  Amazes me how consistent the decoration is with the orange and green paints!!!  Seventy years later crazy people like us need all these variations!!!!!!

  Another lucky buyer just found this shamrock Smiley with a butterfly - his luck is beyond anything I have seen but he travels near and far to hunt cookie jars!!!  Earlier this month he found a Smiley with hair sitting in a mall booth - few of us are so lucky.
  "You know I looked when I got my first Hairy it was 2/19/17 then my 3Bee in 5/16/17. The second Hairy last week 6/16/17 now My out standing Butterfly with original sticker on front 6/22/17 all 4 jars around same day in 4 months Plus I got great deal. I went to house where I looked at the last few hundred  jars hoping for one. Then he said he had a pig with something on head just did not remember which mall or what on head?. He does three malls in area So after his house I took the  town he did two booths in where I found him. While I was at his house lots of great jars only a few I did not have he said he would do better. His prices were high at house but I had to just hope."
  Prices on Ebay are unbelievably low on the Granny Ann's and Bo Peeps - so hard to resist even duplicates as I paid $250-275 on many and even more on rarer ones - for those of you thinking about adding any of these - NOW IS THE TIME!!!

  I was dusting jars this week and saw a gold yellow bib Smiley with really faint rosy cheeks and knew I had an extra lid or two - after playing with them and trying to place the rosier cheeked one learned something.  Have always known there were two inner neck shapes that prevent them from being interchanged BUT realized the version that is less triangular (almost oval instead of triangular from front to back opening) is almost twice as heavy as the other version - am assuming the heavier version is the earlier version mold as those lids are not as nice quality wise.  The majority of other Smiley bib colors are more likley to fit each other!!!!  Winnies are all difficult to interchange.
  One thing to remember - a lot of the extras are on the yellow bib jars -  the ones with hair,  bugs, flies, hand painted flowers.  A couple I was lucky enough to find early in my collecting days are shown below.  One has painted nostrils - the other smile lines!
  Someone on Facebook posted pictures of her miniature collection - fabulous display - would love readers to contribute pictures they have of various items - readers love it when we share these displays and it gives us a wider variety.  This includes YOU.

Until next month   Happy collecting.

Lin              Linromb@aol.com
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