By Ryan Mungia — The year is 1958. A family in Westchester—a neighborhood in Los Angeles so close to LAX it appears as if the inbound planes are going to touch down in the neighbor’s backyard—has just left Mass at the Church of Visitation. It is time for another rite, their weekly Sunday drive. On this particular Sunday, they drive a short distance to the Big Donut Drive-In, a favorite haunt. Located in Inglewood, not far from the 405 freeway, the Big Donut is like any other drive-in donut shop, except that...

The Disappearing Art of Porcelain Signs

By Dave Margulius — I liked to collect things even as a child. Things that didn’t cost anything, like different colors of stones. There was something about the advertising that I liked, so in the mid-1970s, I started to pick up porcelain signs. I got heavier and heavier into that, and by the 1980s, I had a fairly substantial collection. As a result of collecting telephone signs, I would run into other advertising specialists, and I started seeing the kind of stuff that other people were buying and looking...

Signs, Tins, and Other Advertising Antiques

By Maribeth Keane — How did I get started collecting advertising antiques? My dad was a lecturer and tutor in graphics and art from the 1960s onwards, and was into vintage automobiles and advertising, like vintage signs, pumps, and globes. So I spent the large portion of my childhood going to auto swap meets and antiques fairs, I think it all started from there. The first thing I collected was old bottles. In one of the books I read as a child, there was an aqua green bottle and I thought it was great and I...