By Ben Marks — Earlier this year, when we reported on DJ Ginsberg’s and Marilyn Wagner’s mammoth collection of movie-ad print blocks and printing plates, scores of these stellar pieces of cinema history from the early 1930s to early 1980s caught our eye. There were ads for Bogart and Bergman in “Casablanca,” Elvis Presley in “King Creole,” Sean Connery in “Dr. No,” and Judy Garland in “The Wizard of Oz.” If the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences had a category for Best Print-Advertising Archive,...

Prop Master: How a "Star Wars" Superfan Scoured the Earth for Space Debris

By Lisa Hix — Brandon Alinger has a movie-prop collection that would make any Gen-Xers' head explode: He owns an authentic "Ghostbuster" ghost trap with the slide-out cartridge, a "Star Wars" rebel pilot helmet, and the lightsaber that Luke Skywalker carried in "Return of the Jedi." Alinger’s ownership of all these holy grails of 1980s cinema makes sense when you realize that for the last 10 years, the 34-year-old has made a career of buying and selling movie props as the chief operations officer at Prop...

Before Steampunk: Star Wars’ 1800s Roots

By Steve Erenberg — More than 30 years ago, my wife, Helene, and I started collecting. She loved tribal masks—African, Oceanic, Indonesian, etc.—while I focused on medical, scientific, and industrial artifacts. "George Lucas’s designers must have found inspiration in these smoke helmets.” I've spent my career as a creative director, painter, and sculptor, so I always approached collecting as an artist. Over the years, without even realizing it, our collections began to influence each other until they merged...

From Ruby Slippers to Kermit the Frog: Pop Culture Artifacts at the Smithsonian

By Maribeth Keane and Ben Marks — I’ve been at the Smithsonian for 28 years—I never thought I’d stay that long! The first job I had was as a producer and annotator of recordings. We used to have a very active program of archival recordings that we’d release. I came here to work on a set of American popular songs. I remained with the Division of Performing Arts until it was cast asunder and absorbed by the Museum of American History. Then I did public programs, and then I became curator of the Entertainment History...

Collecting James Bond, Doctor Who, and The Beatles

By Jessica Lewis — Ever since I was a child, I wanted to work in the auction business, specifically in the entertainment part. I liked the idea of handling, owning, and being a part of objects that were lynchpins in the history of music, film, or television. To accomplish my goal, I studied film, got an art-history degree, and earned an M.A. in fine-art valuation. I started out as a general auctioneer working with all kinds of antiques before moving into the entertainment field. I like film posters, but I...

The Force of Collecting Star Wars Cards

By Maribeth Keane — In this interview, Paul Holstein talks about collecting Star Wars cards, from finding obscure cards to completing and grading full sets. I was 10 when the movie came out and I went to the store and bought a couple of packs of Star Wars cards. But I ended up trashing all the cards I had when I was a kid, and in my collection today I have none of the cards that I had then. They all went to the garbage, but later on down the road, seven or eight years ago, in my early 30s, I started...