A Fun Discovery.

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The overwhelming crush of a big project I've been working on has finally slowed down to a more manageable steady pace, so this week with the awesome weather I've been able to begin working on some new inventory for Tabulous Sundries since I haven't had the chance really to make some stuff for a while.

I've been on a kick about vintage frames (because who doesn't love a good vintage frame?) and when Kyle went out thrifting for his Halloween costume, I told him to keep a look out for any great frames for me to upcycle. He found a couple of good ones, but only one made it home (the other fell apart at the register and he said it was beyond reconstruction. I'm not as sure about that since I wasn't there and didn't see it, but I'll have to give him the benefit of the doubt). It's at least a 2x3 foot frame, with some dated print of an old painting of the Seine that really just was ... not awesome.

Anyway, when I start dissembling my finds so I can properly upcycle them, I like to see if I can find any information about the time period it hails from. Sometimes I'm lucky and there's a copyright date stamped on the back, or maybe a printing date on the artwork or poster so I have a good idea of where it comes from.

This poster for this particular frame was just Scotch-taped to the back, but peeling back the corner showed a lot of dust and crumbs and gross, so I opted to take my find outside to open up, lest the inside held all kinds of ick that I would prefer not to unleash upon my house.

Read: bedbugs.

There weren't any, by the way. But still. Safe > sorry.

Anyway, as I fought the strong breeze to peel off the tape as thoroughly as possible, I noticed some newsprint poking out from the inner corner of the heavier paper that lined the back of the frame. I peeked into the frame, still trying to be cognizant of the potential for little critters to jump out of this thing, when I saw something so familiar I couldn't help but smile and actually mist up a little bit.

But we'll get to that in a minute.

Anyway, the wind tore some of the paper, but by shifting my position and being painstakingly careful, I was able to preserve the whole of the piece of newspaper, and was pretty excited to find a little piece of American history:

I brought the paper inside (obviously) so that I could take a better look at the actual articles without fighting the wind and the early afternoon sun, and I knew pretty much right away that I needed to save this bad boy for when Kyle (the social studies teacher) came home from school. I mean, that Castro ad in and of itself is pretty remarkable, right?

Checking the top of the paper, I found an in-tact print date and publication name -- part of what made me smile when I found it:

Kyle managed to find me something that came from Chicago. In 1960. Which, to be honest, my parents weren't even born yet in 1960. Close, but not quite. So I was pretty stoked to find something from a place I love so much from a time that only my grandparents might remember.

There are articles about some beer distribution guy's income and tax evasion, the weather, a cartoon, and a small bit about some fundraising dinner for a politician (it was $99 a plate, guys, and that was A LOT), and of course, ADVERTISEMENTS.

But what made me smile when I saw it, that made me all nostalgic and slightly verklepmt, was this big ad in the bottom right corner:

Oh, Marshall Field's. I have childhood memories of going to the store on State Street when we visited in the winter (which wasn't every year, but often enough) of seeing the holiday displays in the windows, and of many visits to the historic store to get Frangos (and Frango ice cream, and Frango hot chocolate, and Frango coffee ...) and it being an intrinsic part of being downtown in Chicago, an institution of the city I was raised to love so much.

The last time I was able to go to Marshall Field's was shortly after Kyle and I were engaged. The State Street store looked bare, many things on final sale or clearance. The brand had been bought out by Macy's, and they had to clear out the non-Macy's-compliant merchandise to make space for renovation and conversion.

For me, it was super depressing.

I've been since, now that it's a Macy's, and though, for the most part, it still looks the same, it's sad for me to see the bright red glare of the Macy's logo where the soothing, deep green of the Marshall Field's script used to be. You can still get Frangos at the cafe on one of the upper floors (I think it's the fifth, but don't quote me on that), but even the lack of that familiar scrawl on the top of the box seems to remove part of the majesty of it all.

So I was super excited to see that familiar logo again, a reminder of my own childhood from twenty-five years before I was even born.

Kyle was pretty stoked to see the newspaper when he got home -- he actually took it to school with him to laminate and use when he talks about the '60's in his American History class, so I was right to save it and show him. 

Sometimes I wish we'd find cool stuff like this when we're doing projects on our home, but so far no luck. 

I'll just have to settle for thirft store surprises, for now.