Dull Tool Dim Bulb

19th Century Cast Iron Eagle Original Surface Folk Art Collection Jim Linderman

Antique Cast Iron Eagle 19th Century. Likely from Chicago area. I can not find another example of the form here. 33 pounds with a 22 inch wingspan.
Books by Jim Linderman available HERE

Early Gullah Sweetgrass Basket Low Country African-American Folk Art Material Culture

One of the most culturally rich areas of the country is the low coastal area of South Carolina, where descendants of slaves still retain a bit of their roots and skills. One tradition surviving is the sweetgrass baskets still being made by African-American craftpersons who sell their wares along the roads (and increasingly in Charleston shops and boutiques.) It is unusual to find an early sweetgrass basket these days, as collectors prize old examples to contrast with their newer pieces. Note the wear and patina of the lid, the base and the inside of the basket. This piece could date to the 1930's or earlier. When found, the basket was filled with spools of thread, so it was used as a sewing basket.
Collection Jim Linderman

Vintage Women who Fly Photograph Postcard RPPC Images collection Jim Linderman

Vintage Women who Fly Photograph Postcard RPPC Images collection Jim Linderman
BOOKS AND EBOOKS ON ART AND PHOTOGRAPHY AVAILABLE HERE

Young Donald Trump and Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III of Alabama Wall Off the World

Young Donald Trump and Jefferson Beauregard Sessions the Third of Alabama Wall Off the rest of the World
Original Snapshot collection Dull Tool Dim Bulb

Modern Parable Hand Drawn penny postcard c. 1925

Modern Parable Hand Drawn penny postcard c. 1925 Collection Jim Linderman

Pages from Handmade Rubber Stamp book of Dale West Ames, Iowa

Pages from Dale West's Handmade Book of Rubber Stamp Art. Late 19th / Early 20th Century Ames, Iowa.
Collection Jim Linderman

Love During Wartime (Korean War Edition)

#4 in the Love During Wartime series is a hand drawn envelope cachet from a woman to her husband in the air force. 1954 2" x 2" ink on paper Collection Jim Linderman

A Folk Art Whirligig SO FAST it Needs a Spoiler Stabilizer!

This baby is ready for the wind tunnel! Plus, it has "black and white cookie" wheels to keep it on the road. All designed like a miniature production model of clay. Still, this is a big 'un. Couple feet long! Also the only "modern" whirligig I've ever had. I date it to around the introduction of Dodge Chargers, though the profile is a bit chunky by comparison. Fearful passenger too!
20th Century Whirligig. Wood, Metal, Plastic Collection Jim Linderman

The Noah's Ark of New Hampshire RPPC

I guess we could also call this "Ness moves his Mess." Real photo postcard shows E. W. Ness moving 34 kinds of farm animals through town on a sled. Why? MY guess is that the locals had created a nativity scene downtown, and Ness agreed to provide the critters. Human Nativity Scenes used to be fairly common.

Collection Jim Linderman Dull Tool Dim Bulb.
Books and affordable Ebooks by the author available HERE.

Real African-American Performing Minstrel Troupe The Georgia Strollers original photograph collection Jim Linderman

Yes, there were REAL black "minstrel" shows, and here is snapshot proof. These performers didn't need to blacken their faces. How were they received? I am sure they put on a regal show. "Twelve Talented Negro Singers and Dancers"

For a time, Texas piano player and vocalist Curtis Jones toured with the group. Jones recorded some one hundred sides for the Bluebird, Okeh and Vocalion labels. Curtis had a long career and was eventually associated with Jazz Gillum and Alex Moore. His most popular number was "Lonesome Bedroom Blues" which hit...but I prefer his Highway 51 Blues and Reefer Hound Blues.

As for the other members of the act, we seem to be out of luck. I am sure there are a few local reviews in regional papers... but I find none. Until others get in touch, I guess we file this certainly magnificent group under "information needed."
Original snapshot circa 1925 - 1935 Collection Jim Linderman

Primitive Diving Helmet Handmade early 20th Century Folk Art

Primitive Diving Helmet Handmade early 20th Century Folk Art. Michigan origin.
Collection Jim Linderman

Nellie Bellmore Female Trapeze Artist 1895 Circus Cabinet Card Pair by Frank Wendt

Nellie Bellmore Female Trapeze Artist 1895 Circus Cabinet Card Pair by Frank Wendt. Wendt was understudy to famed "circus freak" photographer Charles Eisenmann. He took over the studio when Eisenmann moved on.

Two Nellie Bellmore Frank Wendt Cabinet Cards Collection Jim Linderman

Putt Putt Traffic Cop Vintage snapshot 1955 Miniature Golf

Putt Putt Traffic Cop Vintage snapshot dated on reverse 1955 Miniature Golf.
Collection Jim Linderman / Dull Tool Dim Bulb

Here Comes TOKEY WEDGE !!! The Diminutive Hard-boiled Dick from Novel Books (Chicago) Vintage Sleaze Paperbacks

Here comes Tokey, buzzing out of the pages of pulp history from the back cover of TORRID TWINS, just one of the capers solved with his tiny fists and subtly implied detective dong pounding. Tokey's secret weapon other than his quick wit was his manhood. You want sex and hardboiled action in your reading? Put down that limp "best reading" from the New York Times Book Review and grab yourself a big deep toke...of TOKEY!

A man's man and a women's dream, Tokey raced around the twirling paperback racks when the top presidential philanderer of all time, Jack Kennedy was in the White House. Did Jack care if his "arranged" girlfriend Judith Exner was usually in bed with mobster Sam Giancana and reported back to the wise guy after every presidential performance? HELL NO! Because Jack was a MAN'S man, just like Tokey Wedge. Screw that, and screw THAT, organized crime. No wonder (and no coincidence) Tokey gets involved with some anti-Castro gun runners in BROAD BAIT...just like big Sam!

So Tokey had a buzzcutt instead of Kennedy's Nantucket tousle...when you are racing to action in your midget muscle-car, there is no time to brush anything out of your eyes. Here comes Tokey, nostrils flared...nay SMOKING. Never mind that Tokey was actually no taller than 5' 4"...he was big where it mattered. One book adds an inch to his frame...but does not specify if he had bought some lifts.

Jack Lynn wrote the Tokey Wedge novels. Who was Jack Lynn? WHO CARES! This isn't about some fussy, anonymous, elite font prissy with an underwood, it's about Tokey Wedge. The paperback community speculates who Jack was and you are more then welcome to browse around to speculate while REAL men just read the novels (from Novel Press) a sleazy Chicago outfit with questionable organized crime ties but outstandingly bad fiction!

There were at least twenty one books by Jack and all of them had a serious problem with inaccurate perspective and unrealistic rendering on the covers. So the real question is not who wrote this stuff, but who the hell did the art? Check out the Torrid Twins Tokey is running down. Not only are they twins, their burning breasts have exactly the same flame pattern! Tokey had a thing for twins...witness Mary and Beth in another split zygote thriller "Double Seduction" which is no problem for Tokey. He loves them and leaves them...looking exactly the same. And yet AGAIN...there are twins in the later Desire in Duplicate...in which a $5000 a night hooker charges that much because she is...a twin! So the price is really $2500 each. Does Tokey get a discount? You have to ASK?

Other Jack Lynn books are listed below, but not all feature the diminutive dick Tokey. In fact, one of them introduces a far taller character, a Danny Thomas look-a-like who actually towers over the dames who moan his name!

Tokey Wedge fears nothing as he solves the case of Nympho Lodge. In another, Tokey struggles with a trio of "women loving women" In Wild Women. AS you can see, another cover with burning dames for Tokey to struggle through.

Clearly Tokey's biggest challenge was Ten Shockingest (sic) Seductions, in which he has do do just that...seduce them all to determine which were guilty of murder and which were guilty of lesbianism. There is only one man for the job...look down.

It's TOKEY.

Vintage Folk Art Tramp Art Miniature Dresser made of Matchsticks and Glitter

Vintage Folk Art Tramp Art Miniature Dresser made of Matchsticks and Glitter. Circa 1960?
Click and Scroll for free preview of books by the author of Dull Tool Dim Bulb. Ebook versions instant downloads are less than $10, Paperback and hardcover also available.
Collection Jim Linderman

Antique Redware Folk Art Pottery Figure of a Lamb 19th century Pennsylvania ?

A redware glazed lamb, likely 19th century. The piece has characteristics of Pennsylvania and Shenandoah Valley Virginia figural redware toys like those of Samuel Bell. A large group of similar figures (and glaze) are found HERE. Age and maker unknown.
Redware Lamb collection Jim Linderman

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Jim Linderman

"...Linderman is widely regarded as one of the foremost figures in a field of vernacular art collectors working beyond the margins of most institutional axioms and impulses, in what is essentially it's own self-taught art form."
Ursula Magazine Hauser & Wirth 2019

"Linderman produces the most sublime books on dreamy, arcane subjects, sexy stuff, too, all with rare one-of-a-kind images." Craig Yoe 2017

"...disclosing an underground history of American popular culture one oddball tale at a time"
John Strausbaugh in The New York Times

"...one of the blog writers to watch for"
ARTSlant

"...wonderful, extraordinary, fascinating, remarkable and profound" Fans in a Flashbulb International Center of Photography Museum 2016

"Brilliantly Astute, Acerbic and Aesthetic Jim Linderman"
The Museum of Everything 2014

"Dull Tool Dim Bulb is always worth a visit" THINGS Magazine 2016

"...grumpy..." The Austin Chronicle 2014

"Perpetually ahead of the collecting curve...a one man Taschen. An authentically curious individual...diligently archiving the forgotten curiosities of American History"

Emma Higgins in Art Hack May 2012

"Jim Linderman likes Art, Antiques and Photography and his collection of Vernacular Photography, Folk Art, Ephemera and Curiosities is a wonderful place..."
LifeElsewhere with Norman B. 2014

"...collected over the years by Jim Linderman, a character who seems the perfect subject for a Harvey Pekar comic. Linderman treats collecting like a calling, and his finds have a resulting air of authority, stunning in their capture of bygone picturesque moments."
Derek Taylor Dusted

"The pictures, discarded artifacts of ecstatic Americana, come from the stash of Jim Linderman, who in his introduction recalls advice he’s plainly taken to heart: “Collect the heck” out of whatever you find interesting."
Drew Jubera Paste Magazine

"His interest in art is rivaled only by his interest in music, and one expression informs the other. He pursues objects with thoroughness and an innate sense of curiosity..."
Tanya Heinrich Folk Art Magazine

"Linderman acknowledges the obscure at the same time that he elevates it.... His collections tell vast stories in sotto voce, allowing curios and objects shadowed by mainstream culture and ideology to converse and be heard. What we hear is an enormous American sub-culture speaking in forbidden, marginalized languages: stuff discovered boxed in the attic out of embarrassment or zealotry, smutty ash trays crowing next to religious pamphlets, each claiming a part of the complex, sometimes contradictory, always conflicted American imagination, a chaos of memories that will one day vanish."
Joe Bonomo Author of Conversations With Greil Marcus, Jerry Lewis Lost and Found and No Such Thing As Was

"...he's one of the world's greatest pickers."
Brian Wallis in The New York Times

"Documenting--one clipping at a time--the scrapbook of a leg and garter aficionado that was dumpster-dived in Virginia in the 60s" "...an outstanding image-archaeologist who has compiled a shelf-ful of worthy and unique photographic histories."
William Smith Hang Fire Books

"Linderman has a knack for discovering untold stories and introducing them to a wider audience"
Joey Lin Anonymous Works

"Jim Linderman...makes us all look a little puny"
Could it be Madness-this?

"...insatiable collector of ephemera and ringleader behind an incredible circus of blogs — including the treasure trove dull tool dim bulb"
The Cynephile

"Yo no sé ustedes pero creo que es uno de los mejores sitios que he visitado en mucho tiemp"
Color Me in Blog

"...there's something beyond the endless photos and postcards and weird propaganda from another time that he lovingly documents - I think it's the collection as a whole, the portrait of a person fascinated with culture and communication. I have met people like this before, and in reading Dull Tool Dim Bulb I feel I have been lucky enough to meet one more. This site is a goldmine in terms of links..."
The Hyggelic Life October 2009

"Linderman is always on the lookout for the new and exciting"
Chuck and Jan Rosenak Contemporary American Folk Art

"...an amazing collection..."
Revel in New York October 2009

"Jim Linderman has a nice little colllection of interesting books and blogs...But every so often he just loses it."
American Digest March 2010

"FOR MOST OF HIS LIFE, COLLECTOR JIM LINDERMAN has searched high and low for authentic things--unique and special objects that define the artistic culture of the American experience. From folk art to popular culture, from pulp fiction to Delta Blues-- Jim is a walking authority on so many things American they are too numerous to mention. One thing is certain-- his collecting interests are for things that have fallen through the cracks, those things lost and forgotten--the box of material under the table at the flea market booth. If it wasn't for dedicated collectors like Jim Linderman-- so many important objects about our culture would have surely been lost to time and indifference."

"Jim Linderman maintains a most interesting blog about the most amazing things from his collection—a site he calls “Dull Tool Dim Bulb,” the only curse words his father ever uttered. I love it, and read it everyday."
"...an excellent writer and I devour your blog daily. I am impressed at your deep knowledge of things within your niche..."
John Foster Accidental Mysteries

"I am grateful to Jim Linderman for first alerting me to the existence of the 1930s Spiritualist hymn "Jesus is My Air-o-plane."
William Fagaly New Orleans Museum of Art, Author Tools of her Ministry: The art of Sister Gertrude Morgan

"Linderman describes a long gone world...(he) claims not to be a writer but he is most certainly an excellent researcher..."
BOOKSTEVE

"Jim Linderman, King of the Internet Ephemeral Arts"
Spaniel Rage

"Jim is a fantastic historian...show him some love"
Astrid Daley Fringe Pop / Sin-A-Rama

"Almost an experimental narrative"
Idiopath

"He came to us with hundreds of jaw-dropping baptism photos that he'd been collecting for 25 years," Ledbetter explains. "By the time he found us, he'd already done half a lifetime's works, and he trusted us to handle it properly." Lance Ledbetter in Creative Loafing 10/13/11

Fair Use

Though the images, which I have myself largely scanned from my personal collection of photographs and ephemera, some are subject to © by the artist, syndicate that distributed them or otherwise the individual artists. The use here is regardless covered by the U.S. fair use laws because:
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Although most of the images here are original photography and objects owned by the author and in the author's personal collection, we cannot absolutely guarantee the exact copyright status of the items or offer written assurance that every or any aspect of this work is completely cleared for all usages. Responsibility for making an independent legal assessment of an item and securing any necessary permissions ultimately rests with persons desiring to use the item.

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