Collecting

I’m a bit of a collector. First it was jugs or pitchers, depending on which side of the pond you’re on. Then it was salt and pepper shakers, but I began to think that was too ordinary. So I switched to chickens. Chickens big time. And then vintage typewriters from the late nineteenth century into the early twentieth. Medieval swords and weaponry, though this was more for the props I’d bring to my book events than mere home decor.

And now it’s TV lamps.

What are TV lamps? Well, way back in the 1960s when I was a little kid, we had a TV lamp sitting on our TV console. No, you didn’t just have a free-standing TV yet. They came in consoles, like big pieces of furniture. Some people even had the whole entertainment suite in one piece, with TV in the front, and when you opened the top you had a record player and radio. Very modern.

But way back when TVs were invented, it was believed you’d go blind staring at the screen, which was, after all, a big tube of light in a darkened room. And so the TV lamp was invented. Probably by people manufacturing TV lamps. It was believed by having this ambient light on directly above your TV, it would somehow mitigate the harm that staring at a TV screen in the dark would do. It’s been debunked for decades.

But the lamps interest me as a piece of mid-century fun. Take a look at the first one I acquired (above). How fun is this? A sailing ship with a green light behind it. Cool. Not so the one we had back in the 60s (right). For years I couldn’t figure out what it was. Was it a peacock? Some kind of bird? Finally, I realized it was supposed to be a hand fan, cream white with gold edging. It’s really one of the uglier ones my parents could have picked.

These are a few I have my eye on, and you must admit, they are pretty fun. Some are far more expensive than others. Really, they are little sculptures with a function long ago forgotten.

I’m rather fond of the owl and the cats.