They framed a fortune

Un hobby que les traería reconocimiento y dinero a una pareja, Clint y Alys Litchfield, durante la Gran Depresión. Un artículo de Mechanix Illustrated de la década de los ´50s

An anemic used-car business struggling to stay ahead of the waning depression in 1937 was Clint Litchfield´s main source of income when he and Alys were married. Clint´s side line of framing pictures was, from the profit standpoint, more of a hobby. As for Alys she was an ardent collector of old original color prints, the hand-colored kind, and books published in the days before modern lithography and linotype machines.

The used-car business occupied most of Clint’s time but the stack of rare prints became the basis for an idea “We wondered why we couldn´t mount and frame this antique art and sell it to collectors,” Alys said.

Radio´s Second Childhood

Para los más jóvenes un refrescante recordatorio de la década del 50 en este artículo de Mechanix Illustrated, sobre la radio, Radio´s Second Chidhood. También sobre phonograph y Rudy Vallee, el cantante de décadas pasadas que enamoraba a adolescentes…

Unless you’re an avid collector of antiques –a forgivable exception – you´d probably never think of entertaining your guests with that squeaky old Gramophone that´s gathering dust in the attic.

You wouldn´t part with it for dear life, of course, because it has some sentimental value. But when it comes to “cutting a rug” with your friends, your all-electronic phonograph with “philharmonic tone” and those velvety LP transcriptions, has a definite edge in quality.

Nor would you prefer, as long as you have that sleek new convertible with fingertip steering and power brakes in your garage, to put on goggles and a duster for a rocky ride in an old-fashioned Reo. Unless, of course, you happen to share singer Jimmy Melton´s famous devotion to antique autos.

Those ancient artifacts served your parents and your grandparents well, but as far as you´re concerned, they can rest in peace. You´ll take their streamlined progeny.

Wealth

Wealth, también conocido como The Gospel of Wealth, es un artículo escrito por Andrew Carnegie en 1889, en el cual habla sobre la responsabilidad de hacer filantropía, de los nuevos ricos. Carnegie propuso que la mejor manera de enfrentar la inequidad era redistribuir las ganancias de una manera responsable. Además criticó la forma tradicional de heredar la riqueza, argumentando que lo mejor era una administración cuidadosa. También criticó la extravagancia en los gastos de los ricos, promoviendo en su lugar la administración cuidadosa del capital para reducir la brecha entre pobres y ricos.

The problem of our age is the proper administration of wealth, so that the ties of brotherhood may still bind together the rich and poor in harmonious relationship. The conditions of human life have not only been changed, but revolutionized, within the past few hundred years. In former days there was little difference between the dwelling, dress, food, and environment of the chief and those of his servants. The Indians are to-day where civilized man then was. When visiting the Sioux, I was led to the wigwam of the chief. It was just like the others in external appearance, and even within the difference was trifling between it and those of the poorest of his braves. The contrast between the palace of the millionaire and the cottage of the laborer with us to-day measures the change which has come with civilization.