Barn Star Productions announces new December show in Lancaster, Pa.

Barn Star's Frank Gaglio in historic Lancaster, Pa., site of a new December antiques show. Image courtesy Barn Star Productions.
Barn Star's Frank Gaglio in historic Lancaster, Pa., site of a new December antiques show. Image courtesy Barn Star Productions.
Barn Star’s Frank Gaglio in historic Lancaster, Pa., site of a new December antiques show. Image courtesy Barn Star Productions.

RHINEBECK, N.Y. – Barn Star Productions and Frank Gaglio will unveil a new antiques event this year. The Lancaster Antiques and Fine Arts Show will be held in Lancaster, Pa., Dec. 5 and 6, 2009.

Located in the brand new Lancaster County Convention Center, the inaugural show will present a vast array of Americana, folk and fine art, antique toys and banks, fine estate jewelry, ceramics and pottery, American and English silver, samplers and textiles, early iron, brass and lighting. European goods made for the American market, Oriental and hooked rugs and many more categories round out the roster.

Lancaster is one of the oldest inland cities in the United States. German immigrants, known as the “Pennsylvania Dutch,” were the first to settle the area. Their influence is seen around the city’s historic neighborhoods in the small log houses, farmhouses, row houses, market houses, carriage houses, warehouses, and outhouses, as well as stately mansions, factories, churches, schools and commercial buildings. East Vine Street, where the show is located, is considered to be one of the earliest commercially developed sections of the city, with some of the structures dating back nearly 300 years.

Comments show promoter Frank Gaglio, “The history and local flavor of beautiful Lancaster County, Pennsylvania presents a serene and natural landscape painting to many visitors of this area. As an antiques dealer myself exhibiting in many shows around Lancaster, I have always skirted the downtown area taking the recently completed Route 30 Bypass West. When I learned of the new convention center downtown, I couldn’t resist the opportunity to check it out, and was I ever pleasantly surprised.”

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Police: $380,000 stolen from arts group

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) – Police are investigating the theft of $380,000 from an arts group that stages one of Indianapolis’ best-known art fairs and also grants money to local arts groups.

The theft from the Penrod Society amounted to all of the group’s revenue and its reserve funds. Members of the 42-year-old all-volunteer arts society believe the crime was an inside job.

Penrod Society President Jimmy Art says the theft has devastated the group, which stages the Penrod Arts Fair each September on the grounds of the Indianapolis Museum of Art.

Penrod member David McGimpsey says the theft came to light in late November when the lawyer for another volunteer called Penrod officials to inform them his client had taken the money.

Penrod members would not confirm the volunteer’s identity because no criminal charges have been filed.

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Information from: The Indianapolis Star, http://www.indystar.com

Copyright 2009 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

AP-CS-01-01-09 1710EST

Kovels – Antiques & Collecting: Week of Jan. 5, 2009

Pilgrims are painted inside the glass shade on this 24 3/4-inch-high Pairpoint lamp. It sold at Brunk Auctions in Asheville, N.C., for $4,140.
Pilgrims are painted inside the glass shade on this 24 3/4-inch-high Pairpoint lamp. It sold at Brunk Auctions in Asheville, N.C., for $4,140.
Pilgrims are painted inside the glass shade on this 24 3/4-inch-high Pairpoint lamp. It sold at Brunk Auctions in Asheville, N.C., for $4,140.

Electric lamps with glass shades were popular from the 1870s to the 1920s. Unlike a candle flame, a lightbulb could face down and was not too hot for a shade with a closed top, making the use of glass shades possible. And as up-to-date, unusual and attractive objects, glass-shaded lamps became expensive status symbols.

It is said that Louis Comfort Tiffany was the first to make a lamp with the light focused down. The lamp looked like a group of lilies with drooping heads made of iridescent glass. He is best known for his lamps with dome-shaped leaded-glass shades made of colorful pieces of glass.

Another famous lamp maker of the time was the Pairpoint Manufacturing Co. of New Bedford, Mass. The company, founded in 1880, originally made coffin fittings, but it soon became the largest manufacturer of silver-plated wares in the United States. In 1894, it merged with its next-door neighbor, the Mount Washington Glassworks. Pairpoint then made glass, silver plate and lamps. The two most desirable types of Pairpoint lamps today have reverse-painted glass shades or molded glass shades, now called “puffies.”

In the 1930s, the company reorganized and changed its name and products, but remains in operation. The reverse-painted shades were decorated on the inside by artists, who signed their shades. Lamps also carried a trademark that included the word “Pairpoint.” Lamp bases were made of metal or wood, and these also were signed. A Pairpoint lamp with reverse-painted scenes of pilgrims, sailing ships and flowers sold in 2008 for $4,140 at Brunk Auctions in Asheville, N.C. Its rectangular shade is 13 inches wide, and its base is cast metal. Continue reading

Antiques Roadshow’s 13th season starts Jan. 5 on PBS-TV

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CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. (AP) – It’s sort of like sending your attic and yard sale finds to Cinderella’s ball.

The 13th season of Antiques Roadshow starts airing this month on PBS, once again giving everyday people the chance to learn if a particular possession is treasure or trash. But the filming for the folksy treasure hunt happened months ago.

When the reality TV program stopped in Chattanooga, hundreds of ticket holders were waiting at 6 a.m. on a Saturday in July, some with children’s wagons and dollies carrying the two items _ newly dusted antiques, heirlooms or collectibles – they are allowed to bring for appraisals.

The main requirement: Items to be appraised must fit through a standard door.

The sun rose with dozens of the randomly selected ticket-holders in line outside the downtown convention center, rehearsing over and over, Welcome to Antiques Roadshow! and after repeated prompts by the production crew to say it louder for the TV microphones, repetitive screams of Welcome to Chattanooga!

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