Dear Friends,
Thanks to all of you kind people for the positive comments, always appreciated!
Mikee - always thought that was a great tune by Peter, Paul and Mary. they surely don't write 'em like that anymore.
Glad I grew up at a time when there was so much musical diversity out there to be enjoyed. Magic dragons, Purple Haze -soul, folk, oldies, blues, rock n' roll, fusion and classical music, without a doubt something for everyone.
Much like music, our hobby is built around many divergent interests, too. When I started collecting helmets and daggers I'd never dreamed about collecting German porcelain animals, not in a million years! I always admired the refined clean looks of Allach porcelain but never considered owning any of them. Even after I ended up with a couple of pieces, I'd pass them on to collect my hunting and forestry daggers, heh..
Somewhere along the line my interests grew in 20th century German sculptors, especially pre-1945, Tierbildhauer, or animal sculptors. The more I read on the subject, the more appealing and interesting the whole thing became. Many of the best German animal artists were active in the late 19th and early twentieth centuries, during the reign of the Kaisers. After WWI some of those men and women went on to be employed by, and/or, by the Nazis, which was only logical under the circumstances. Even though the brownshirts thoroughly screened and evaluated these artists, I doubt that very many became ardent Nazi supporters or cared much for politics, rather, they seemed to persue their own interests, strictly art for art's sake.
No matter what you collect, enjoy that to the fullest - share info with your friends if you can, always try to help, be courteous and be as tough and relentless as a pitbull if you make a mistake ... we've all fell and stumbled. The computer age has made collecting so much easier for those with just a modicum of internet-skill, it's very easy to find good things and get excellent help these days. It will assuredly help keep the faux pas' to a bare minimum and more rubles in your pocket, to collect more, that is ...
Wishing everyone the very best in collecting !
Bill
