Ad posters popular in ‘sofa picture’ size
Terry & Kim Kovel
Advertising signs with bold-colored graphics, interesting product names and pictures of Uncle Sam and other patriotic designs sell for high prices. They sell best in the size sometimes called a "sofa picture" because it's big enough to hang between the ceiling and the top of the sofa.
Many collectors want advertising for the historic content and authentic pictures of costumes, rooms and occupations and as a way to date popular messages and sayings.
The large, cardboard American Family Soap poster offered recently at a Morford auction in upstate New York brought $1,652. It was a bright-yellow "sofa sized" picture of Uncle Sam and Lady Liberty with the slogan, "It is cheaper to buy good soap than new clothes. Every atom cleanses."
American Family Soap was made by James Kirk & Co., which was started in 1839. It was bought in 1930 by Procter & Gamble, which made the American Family brand for the hard water of the Midwest. P&G also included a coupon on the wrapper that could be used for gifts. An old wrapped bar of the soap to display with other country items is sometimes offered for sale online for $10 to $15.
Q: I have a Betty Ballard doll from my childhood, early 1950s. She has blond hair, wears a red knit outfit and white plastic shoes, and stands on a heartshaped stand. Can you tell me about her?
A: The Betty Ballard fashion doll was a promotional item for the Ballard & Ballard Co. of Louisville, Kentucky. The company, also known as Ballard's Obelisk Flour and Ballard Mills, was founded by Samuel Thurston Ballard and Charles T. Ballard in 1880.
Pillsbury bought the company in 1951, and among the products were refrigerated packaged biscuits. Cut-and-sew doll dresses were printed on 10-pound sacks of Ballard Flour. A coupon attached to the sack gave instructions for ordering a fashion doll to wear the clothes.
Betty was 11 inches tall and very much like the Barbie doll. She came in a box with a swimsuit, high-heel slippers, jewelry and nylons, and was available with several hair colors and bathing-suit styles. The dolls were available from about 1960 to '64, when the factory closed. We found one for sale online for $60.
CURRENT PRICES
• Buffalo Pottery platter: Willow, blue & white, landscape, temples, boats, trees, patterns, 10½ inches, $10
• Haeger figurine: woman, nude, arm raised, knee out, long hair, head turned, white, 24 inches, $125
• Arita bowl: white flowers, blue ground, celadon center, lobed, shaped rim, 11½ inches, $595
• Fry Foval vase: trumpet shape, white pulled feathers, blue foot, blue rim, 18 inches, $1,260
Terry Kovel and Kim Kovel, authorities on collectibles, write for the King Features Syndicate. Visit www. kovels.com.