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Mark B. Ledenbach's vintage Halloween collectibles blog.

Vintage 1925 large Halloween Decoration with Witch stirring Honeycomb Cauldron

You seldom see this iteration with the orange honeycomb cauldron. Frankly, I like it much more than I do the typical black ones you see. Another plus is that this doesn't have any repair to the arch, a common point of failure with this design. This is the largest of the three sizes Beistle produced. 

09/16 Update: I am not at all surprised it brought a very strong price of $482!

Halloween Crescent Moon With Flying Witch

This is probably the best design of a set of very-tough-to-find diecuts Beistle issued in the mid-1950s when their creative juices were at very low tide. This set has an unusual feature of silhouettes separately attached to the main diecut. As I write in my newly published third edition on page 158, "More labor is required and the chance for defects increases the risk of returns. This may account for the mere three season run this diecut enjoyed." 

09/16 Update: This sold for an unbelievable and completely unsustainable price of $538. The seller got top, top dollar the likes of which for this diecut probably will not be seen again. 

Thanks Tom and Linda!

I had the occasion to call a married couple of collectors in Ohio two days ago and chat about Halloween. What fun it was! I learned about the existence of another non-mechanical Rosen Pops box and some rare Dennison store display signs. We had fun speaking about the state of our hobby today and some of the reasons underlying the surge in prices we are seeing this season on many items. I don't know of another hobby where there are so many collectors so passionate about the nuances of items produced during "The Golden Age." In any event, the chat with such erudite and enthusiastic collectors made my day. Thanks Tom and Linda! 

Vintage Round Crank Metal Halloween Noisemaker~Flying Witch Paper Face Cover

This is not a vintage item. It appears to me that someone made a color copy of the graphics on a well-known tambourine (probably made by Kirchhof), shrunk them, distressed the paper to make it appear old and glued it on to a non-Halloween ratchet with a plastic handle. The presence of a plastic handle indicates the ratchet was produced in the 1960s. The tambourine from which the image was copied was made in the 1930s. It's too bad that this sold for $35 when it has decorative value - at best. 

"VINTAGE HALLOWEEN JOL1908-1932~GERMANY~CHILD'S JACK-O-LANTERN PORCELAIN TEA SET

I'm surprised this listing lasted as long as it did -and even then it was only a handful of hours. I was preparing to comment that someone should snap this up asap when the listing changed mid-post to indicate that someone had bought it. Kudos! This medium-sized tea cup is a just a tad harder to find than the smallest size, even though both are assigned a Relative Scarcity Index number of "3." The guide price, though, illustrates that difference. If you want to see the finest array of pieces from the various sized tea sets the Germans made early in the last century shown in any reference, pick up a copy of my newly revised and greatly enhanced third edition of Vintage Halloween Collectibles.