Gifts and Collectibles #8of8

Here’s a story of one that got away, almost, after a fashion. In a flea market in Michelstadt, Germany, I had a book in my hands I wanted to buy, but when I laid it down to reach for my wallet, a woman picked it up and would not let me have it back. The book contained photographs taken from the Hindenberg as it flew over major cities of the world. The book, printed in the early 1930’s, contained actual photographs pasted in the book, not printed ones. In the early 1930’s, a cigarette company in Germany published a book on Zeppelins, but without pictures. The idea was to buy the cigarettes, mail in a coupon and they would send you one or more of the 265 pictures needed to finish the book. Some of the pictures are of Zeppelins being built, others were taken from above the US Capitol building, New York City, London, Cairo, Moscow, Rio de Janeiro, Japan, Monaco, and other places all over the world.

A few years later, while we visited in the home of Cousins Klaus and Helga, I told the story of the “book that got away.” While I was telling the story, Klaus got up from the table and soon returned with a copy of the book, I was telling about.

Klaus said that a man in his office had retired, was cleaning out his desk and threw this book in the trash can, and Klaus retrieved it. At Christmas that year, a package arrived in La Quinta from Klaus in Heusenstamm, containing a Xeroxed copy of the book.

We drove to the parking lot on the west side of Mt. Vesuvius, Italy, then walked the rest of the way to the top. This is not a difficult trail, there was a steady stream of tourists of every age clambering to see the crater that is about 2,000 feet in diameter, 1,000 feet deep. No one cared that we picked up a six-by-six-by-twelve inch piece of solid lava, and brought it home. It resides next to a similar piece of lava, with a slightly different color, from Hawaii.

In Chaumont, France, southeast of Paris, I found more of the very heavy Librairie Larousse books that cause our luggage to weigh a “ton.” I bought L’Italie Illustrée, in French, with 35 maps and 784 pictures of Italy, taken in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. There was a two volume set about Germany, that I didn’t buy. Later I wished I had spent the money, as I never found the books about Germany again.