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Mark B. Ledenbach's vintage Halloween collectibles blog.

RARE Vintage DENNISON Halloween Party Invitation Pop UP Witch Card

This pop-up invitation first appeared in Dennison’s 1917 Bogie Book with a stock number of H30. Given the date of the event, the party-thrower was an early adopter, shopping for the newest Dennison products. These weren’t cheap at the time compared to other products, so it is fair to assume the party-thrower may have been well-to-do. It’ll be fun to see what this fetches.

Vintage Halloween SCARCE DUAL SIDED PUMPKIN HEAD GARLAND BANNER 24" EARLY

Dennison produced small garlands for two seasons starting in 1926. They were sold as enveloped sets called String-Em-Outs. I know of only two designs. This listing shows 6 JOLs. A complete string consists of 27 identically dual-sided connected JOLs. The real treasure with the String-Em-Outs are the envelopes. Feast your eyes on the two in the collection on page 263.

Vintage Halloween Bat 1920’s Dennison

This non-embossed bat was produced by Dennison. A slightly more colorful iteration first appeared in their 1920 Bogie Book with a stock number of H62. I suspect this one was produced in 1919 or 1920. What I do know is that either variant seldom comes available, especially in this near-mint condition. I appreciate this seller’s no-nonsense listing style. It is something Jack Webb would love with his “Just the facts, Ma’am” demeanor. (Am I dating myself?) I would love it if more sellers would adopt this efficient style.

08/15 Update: This diecut fetched $104.

Vintage Devil Halloween Party Invitation

This is actually a diecut. Dennison produced this only for the 1926 and 1927 seasons. They assigned it a stock number of H444 and weirdly classified it as a “large cardboard cut-out,” while also reporting its height as 5”. This design is exceedingly rare and typically trades in the $250-300 range. Sadly, the condition of this example is so bad it will surely struggle to reach 10-15% of that level.

Dennison Vintage Halloween Spook Ghost Seals sticker holiday H 468 box

Based on the stock number, this box of seals was probably released in 1915. It is a rare design - one that I had not seen before. I decided not to be a bidder as I have a bias against products that don’t have at least half of their stated contents. This arbitrary cut-off may be dumb, for it is possible I won’t see this again. However, other factors weighed against a bid. The seller didn’t provide many photos and puzzlingly said the box was “full and unopened.” The seller later added a needed clarification. So, the central question for me is this: Was the ending price of $405 justified for a box with 4 of 25 seals? I say no, but at least two of the bidders disagree.

Dennison, Vintage Halloween, 1920’s Boxed set of 6 Owl Diecuts

One of my favorite market segments is the boxed Dennison products. I began collecting these early and that fervor remains unabated. There has been a noticeable and sustained uptick in interest (and therefore, prices…) for Dennison boxed items, especially for those items produced with their Art Deco look issued from 1928-1932. I had two Dennison boxed items in my recent auction. Both were strong performers. This box of owl cut-outs is a stolid design, yet is doing quite well with over six days to go as of this typing.

Vintage Halloween Dennison's Bogie Book, 1925 Suggestions for Halloween Booklet

This post is less about this particular Bogie Book listing than about Dennison Bogie Books in general. Dennison was clever in that they tried to speak directly to end consumers by giving them decorating ideas, maximizing the utility of the crepe, seals, cut-outs, illuminated silhouettes, etc. that Dennison was so fecund in sending to market. Once a consumer’s head was filled to bursting with ways to enhance their planned event, Dennison would allow individuals to send in their own orders directly to the firm. Of course, if a consumer wished to browse a retail establishment, Dennison had stand-alone “brick and mortars” and also supplied their wares to generalized stationers.
The Bogie Books helped this strategy along AND Dennison made money on them, selling them for a nickel or dime depending on the year. Today, when Bogie Books come available, their typical condition is what you see with this listing - truly used. These nearly annual publications were a wealth of information for those long-ago consumers and for today’s collectors an invaluable source of knowledge of what Dennison made available over the years.
Dennison’s business strategy didn’t emerge fully formed. Their first Bogie Book, in 1909, seemed a tentative effort - so tentative, in fact, that they didn’t see the commercial possibilities of these publications for three years. (There seems to be only a single copy of the 1909 Bogie Book extant. You can see it on page 135.) From 1912 through 1917, a Bogie appeared each year. 1918 was a miss almost certainly due to WWI. From 1919 through 1926 the annual publications were titled Bogie Books. After that, Dennison couldn’t seem to settle on a title blithely flitting from one to another.
Not all Bogie’s are created equal. In terms of very specific information on what was being produced with what stock numbers, the best ones are from 1914-1922.
The rarest copies before the 1920 edition are, in order, 1909, 1913, 1912, 1914, 1916, 1915. (I have yet to find a 1913 edition for the collection.)
There are even masochists like myself that torment themselves with a quest to collect the envelopes in which the Bogies were mailed to consumers. I have assembled almost a complete collection after many years.