Folk Art Risque Sliding Novelty Erotic Carving Large!

Folk Art Risque Sliding Novelty Erotic Carving Large!  Circa 1930.
Collection Jim Linderman

Real Photo Postcard of a Man Getting Hit with a Rock Trick RPPC

A gimmick real photo postcard.  UFO in the sky?  I think a photo trick.  Either that, or he's not going to be standing very much longer. Collection Jim Linderman
BOOKS AND AFFORDABLE INSTANT EBOOKS BY THE AUTHOR HERE

One Trick Pony Snapshot Photograph

A one trick pony.  Original anonymous snapshot circa 1935 Collection Jim Linderman

Bike Tricks in the Dark Bicycle At the Circus in Black and White #25

#25 in the Dull Tool Dim Bulb Series "At the Circus in Black and White" isn't really at the circus, but certainly this pair of balancing artists did their share of work at them. Floating!

Set of Four Snapshots circa 1930 Collection Jim Linderman

Dull Tool Dim Bulb BOOKS Here

Untitled (Balance) Vernacular Snapshot Photograph

Untitled Anonymous Snapshot circa 1935? Collection Jim Linderman

New York City Trashvertising Drop Cards Sidewalk Spam Fake Dollar Bills and Vanessa Del Rio

There is nothing funnier than a fake wallet on a string. You know...old wallet, five bucks sticking out...busy sidewalk. Two kids on the end of the string behind the fence giggling as they wait for a portly gentleman to bend down for it. Construction workers used to do it on 6th Avenue and howl.

Today it would be more cruel than funny, as the latest studies have found a majority of us can't reach down anymore. Portly has become just plain fat. Today a good percent of the population wouldn't even see it.

If it wasn't juvenile and in bad taste, I would tell you a glued-down quarter is funny too.

The WORST ADVERTISING IN HISTORY used to plague New York City Streets in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Tiny leaflets folded to look like a twenty dollar bill with an ad on the back for a strip club, dial-a porn or some other shady, sleazy, cruddy business. Junior mobsters were hired to dump the litter as they walked down city streets, often at dawn, which allowed the tricky things to blow around a bit before commuters hit the streets.

I saw a few of the amateur thugs drop them as I walked my dog...creepy punks a step below the guys who would hang glue-slap posters for lousy dance clubs anywhere their paste brushes could reach. Sidewalk Spammers.

The one above happens to be an ad for dirty film called "Foxtrot" which starred Vanessa Del Rio. I used to have the pleasure of watching Vanessa swim and sun every day at the rooftop pool atop the Holiday Inn on West 57th Street between 9th and 10th Avenue. It was for hotel guests, but for a buck CBS employees (and a few favored folk) could use it and I sure did. Spending your lunch hour with a super-tan Vanessa Del Rio in a bikini was a whole lot more fun than eating a slice of pizza at my desk. I often got back a few minutes late. I am putting Vanessa's name in the title here in case she has a service scanning the web for mentions of her...why shouldn't Vanessa have a nice, sunny memory too?

Anyway, I remember seeing hundreds of these crooked, low-down miniature trick circulars strewn all over around Times Square, and will confess to having fallen for them a few times. As I recall, the city was trying to outlaw the practice through anti-litter laws and the department of sanitation...sure enough, an article ran in the NY Times in 1991 which coined the word "trashvertising" or "trash cash" and discussed efforts to ban them without violating any fugwad's "right to free speech."

Imagine my surprise (and disgust) to find they are still being produced. "Drop Cards" they are called and you will find purveyors on the web today. Slime.

"Drop-Card" miniature advertising leaflet, 1982 Collection Jim Linderman

Tweet

Vinyl LP Records Which Weren't There! Silent Records from In-Fidelity Joke Gag Disc Record

No one reads those digital "jokes" or "greeting cards" sent by email. At least I don't...if you want to thank someone, write them a letter and put a stamp on it.

I suspect Hallmark Card Stores will be closing around the same time as Barnes and Noble...some time around the middle of next year. Boom times for empty mall stores!

The "IN-FIDELITY" record label specialized in empty records! Record jackets with a blank vinyl disc inside imprinted with a hilarious gag inscribed on the disc!

"Bwah, Bwah" (sliding trombone "Nelson" like descending notes)

You can send an empty digital file too..."enclosed is a mp3 of my band in the garage...please have a listen when you can" and just forget to attach it.

Brochure advertising High "In-Fidelity" Albums circa 1960 Collection Jim Linderman

See Dull Tool Dim Bulb BOOKS HERE
Tweet

Punchboard Scam Easy Money (Keyhole of PROFIT) Girlie Glasses

Twice the fun in every drink you pour! Why? The amazing Key Club (a division of Bear Sales) has figured out a way to serve your guests a fully dressed show girl on the outside, but when they peer through the "keyhole" glass, they see her "hidden talents" through the swill!

Now it wasn't enough for the Bear company to shill the glasses...they also ran a punch card scam! A gambit as old as time, yet as contemporary as Bad Bernie Madoff! Punch one, pay one cent. The next "contestant" punches two, he pays two cents. Each scam nets the card holder a minor fortune AND his own complete set of show girl glasses, yet only one "winner" gets the prize...a lousy set of see-through drinking glasses.

I wrote about "punchboards" before. This is the first time I have seen the scam illustrated in a flyer. Somebody had a "Hidden Talent" all right...a talent for scamming rubes with the promise of ice cubes. One thing these show girls are showing is how easy it is to use the promise of a curvy dame to line your pockets. Click to Engorge...every "secret" is revealed!

Now most of these scams had been busted and found out by the 1950s, but guess who persisted in shilling them right into the 1960s according to Punchboard.com? One Jack Ruby. You might have heard of him.

One-sheet come-on for a punch card scam. Circa 1960. Collection Victor Minx

DULL TOOL DIM BULB BOOKS HERE

Dad Drops a Quarter The Sideshow Bottle Stand Trick 1966

Dad may be good at "knockin' them back" but he isn't going to stand this one up. Can it be done? Yes, and you will often see signs at the booth reading "one win per person per season" to keep that BMX mini-bike hanging on the wall in back. But will YOU do it? Nope. Dad has the wrong thing going here, and I don't just mean his white socks. The pole should be as vertical as possible, not horizontal, and you must "push" the bottle up, not pull it. Complicated? Yes. It will take you a solid afternoon to work it out at home. How many of those who come upon it have done their homework? None. Especially not Dad.

Original Vernacular Photograph, Dated August 1966 Collection Jim Linderman
Tweet

The World's Most Wonderful Horses Frank Wendt and The Wondrous World of Wendt Carnival, Show and Sideshow Horse Photograph Cabinet Cards

These pictures were taken during the the agrarian United States on the cusp of Industrial Society. The horse played a role in both, and it is no wonder it also played a role in the traveling circus.


Horses with long tales can swat flies easier, but the mane seems purely decorative. Depending on genetics, many horses can grow spectacular heads of hair, but normal wear, tear and snags usually keeps the mane at a manageable length. Show horses are often allowed to grow it longer. They will even have it braided and let loose before the show in an attempt to create perfect waves, but even their splendid "dos" pale compared to a wild horse, of which I recently heard there was some 30,000 roaming in the states today. A number increasing through abandonment...it is expensive to maintain a horse, often costing far more than the horse is worth.


Horse were also taught tricks. Fake tricks, but then all tricks are fake. When you see an educated horse clomping off a count, or solving complex mathematical problems, it is usually because the trainer has tipped Trigger off. It is a fairly easy trick to teach your horse to go get their food bucket. Even a dog can do it without training. Teaching your horse to shake his head yes or no is easy as well, and we're not even into Mr. Ed territory here yet. But for the math genius horse who knocks off numbers like an accountant? Usually he has been taught to respond to cues from the boss, not to operate a calculator in his head.


First up is Mascot the Talking Horse. Looks like Mascot could shake hands and push a lever in addition to talking. What? You don't hear anything? Neither do I. Mascot was active in Connecticut, and the Syracuse University also holds one of these cards in their collection. Note the photo of the Professor making out with Mascot...the backdrop depicts hoards of painted customers watching in awe.


Next is Chief. The reverse of his card can tell you all you wish to know about the Shetland with the tail of steel. At right is Edward Daley, Chief's chief groomer. If you wish to avoid reading the small print, Chief travels first class in his own little baggage car.


The next horse has no name indicated, but someone has taken the time to point out his particulars. Eighteen feel and nine inches of tail!


Elsie Sutliff is the trainer, not the horse. The Syracuse University Library holds another Wendt image of Elsie, and in their copy a large dog is standing on the back of the horse, so Elsie must have trained several animals. (A "Dog and Pony" show.)


Happy Jack was "The original and world famous Lone Pacer" according to the barely visable text embedded in the image. Also shown is trainer Frank Schneider and Charles Fose the owner. A Lone Pacer is an archaic term for a lead horse which sets the pace, I believe...at any rate, the time shown (2:03) is for a mile. Happy Jack is also reported to have run the mile at 2:13 in Louisville, Kentucky in 1897.


There were several horses named Linus, and in fact one reason was so the folks in one part of the country would think they were seeing THE Linus, when the real Linus was appearing somewhere else! Suffice to say, "carny" folk aren't usually thought of as being the most honest cards in the deck. At least the two Linus horses follow here and both are the real deal. The website "Messy Beast" has the whole story, and numerous examples, including several photos of these same horses. A whole herd named Linus!


Linus and Linus II were both Long Haired Oregon horses. Through genetics and a little hocus-pocus, it seems the Linus long hair was a trait passed down among generations of Linus breeders.


Most of the horses shown here have extensive notes, personal history and such either printed or noted on the reverse.

All Photographs Frank Wendt circa 1890-1910


All Original Photographs from the Jim Linderman Collection.

Excerpt above by Jim Linderman from the forthcoming book
"The Wondrous World of Wendt" and copyrighted!
Not to reproduced without writing.

See ALL the Dull Tool Dim Bulb Books CATALOG HERE

See also The Wondrous World of Wendt (In Progress) HERE

Deconstructing the Hindu Magic Book from Japan Book Arts

Dissection performed on the Hindu Magic Book reveals secrets.

Hindu Magic Book from Japan c. 1950 Collection Jim Linderman