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19th Century Issues of The Forum Added to the magawiki and eBay

I just received what was nearly a full year of The Forum from 1895 and listed the issues into the magawiki today (and onto eBay tonight). The issues arrived in better than expected condition, so I’ve gone back and bought another few couple dozen-plus which will also be added here for the end of the month.

Of note throughout 1895 were articles written by future Presidents Theodore Roosevelt (in 3 issues) and Woodrow Wilson, a Hull House related article by Jane Addams, a piece about tariffs by Andrew Carnegie, articles by William Dean Howells, Anatole France, several articles about the new Income Tax laws (most of which ask if Socialism is here), plus one I’m going to have to be sure to read before I sell it–which I imagine would mean this week–about the idea of reviving the Olympics.

I’d read the first paragraph of the Olympic Games article and it mentioned how after 1,500 years the possibility existed of reviving the Olympic Games in 1900. The revival actually occurred about a year after this article was published in the May 1895 issue of The Forum with the 1896 Summer Olympics in Athens Greece. So the timetable seems to have been sped up some!

As with practically all new entries to the magawiki the issues are also being listed simultaneously for the first time on eBay … fresh stock! 4 of them are already for sale as I type this as Buy it Now items, the other 7 will be listed at auction later tonight with auctions closing next Tuesday, January 16.

Here’s a direct link to all issues of The Forum that I currently have for sale on eBay. (Auction items will appear by 10:30 pm EST tonight).

Coming next, some issues of The North American Review, approximately 1908-1933.

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Over 60 listings added to new magawiki throughout October

The timing worked out pretty well I think as I’d completed importing all of the old files into this new version of the magawiki right at the end of September, and so for October I was able to see how many pages I could add in a random month. I did my best to work at my normal pace throughout the month knowing ahead of time that the page yield would pretty much show how active the site is likely to be on a month to month basis.

And so at the close of October there were a total of 69 new pages added, a handful of which were blog posts like this one, but at least 65 of which were pure magawiki entries–pages compiling the table of contents of old magazine back issues. That’s not too bad. Obviously we’ll begin to get a clearer picture as future months pass by, but I have a feeling we’ll be in that 60-70 range somewhat consistently for awhile.

Just a reminder that pages on this site are intended to be informative–not sales pages. Many of the magazine contents listings found here were compiled as long as 3-4 years ago, and thus while an item was at one time available for sale the greater majority have very likely sold over time.

That said, your best bet for finding currently available items are those in the most recent archives (in this case October 2009). Though an even better bet is clicking through the eBay ad at the right or up above as they will bring you directly to my eBay Store where all prepared items are available for immediate purchase.

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Latest magawiki listings point you towards potentially available titles

In a happily unintended consequence of the layout of this site I just noticed that now that I’m only adding new entries to the site the Archives section has become an area for visitors to potentially discover in stock for sale items inside my eBay Store.

Trust me, the top question I’m asked by visitors to the magawiki is if a listed title is for sale. Now that’s not the main intention of the magawiki, it’s not a store, but a reference hub for collectors. Old titles sell but the contents pages are always archived here. However, if you click on October 2009 (the most current month in the Archives as I write this) and then head over to my eBay Store from there, you’ll see that all but one of the listed titles are currently listed for sale.

That’s because I really do create these listings as I list the items for sale, and so, the more recent a magawiki entry the more likely it is that you can actually buy the title from me.

(Now if I could only brainstorm a way to automate this)

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Dr. Lomazow Offers His OOP Magazine Collector’s Reference Manual for $40

Plainly stated, if you have anything to do with vintage magazines, collect them, sell them, etc., you need this book.

From Dr. Lomazow’s Magazine History site:

Its pretty much become the standard reference for magazine collecting and I’ve sold or given away a few thousand copies. Its listed on the web for upwards of $100 but I will now be happy to sell it for $40

Now, I’m not sure how you approach him about picking up a copy, but I’m honestly pretty shocked that I don’t see several requests in the comments area.

American Periodicals: A Collector’s Manual and Reference Guide is just that–it’s no price guide, but it is a timeless reference guide to the magazines themselves including origins and very often highspots and highlights from throughout a title’s history.

Best of all, Dr. Lomazow has published a free online addendum to this volume. Have a look, the layout of this 29 page supplement is about the same as the book, it’ll give you a good idea of what you’ll be getting for your $40. To give you an idea of the actual value of this book, well, I make a good portion of my living selling old magazines and this book is not two feet from my right hand right now–it’s removed and referenced more than any other title within arm’s reach.

Don’t miss out head over to Magazine History: A Collector’s Blog as soon as you can, I have a feeling there’s likely a limited quantity involved. Good luck!

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Annoucing the New and Improved Magawiki

Well, I must admit I’m getting pretty tired of typing “new and improved,” but there’s really no other way to describe it. I’d like to say I was patiently biding my time in waiting to move the old existing site, which has been up since early 2007, from it’s ugly old home at magwiki.things-and-other-stuff.com to this spiffy location, but truth be told it took so long because the old MediaWiki site architecture had just beaten me down. It took me awhile to create new listings on the original site, so long in fact that I eventually stopped doing it.

But beyond looks, this new magawiki has got performance going for it as well. I gave up after 1,200 of so listing over there. Or maybe it was 1,500. I don’t remember, but it’d been about 6 months since I’d put up anything new. This new site, well, it wasn’t even an idea just one week prior to my typing these words–and it contains all existing files plus another dozen to twenty listings I’d created since importing all 2,900 or so of those original ones.

If you want to see the true spark for this revamped version of the site you’ll find it in this write-up I did for the Robert Donat movie “The Magic Box” on the Examiner.com. It’s less of a review and more of a rumination about inspiration in classic movies. When I mentioned being productive, this site was the end result. And that was dated September 7, today is September 13.

It looks better, it’s much more complete, it’s faster, it’s better organized, okay, but then if you’re new just what is it?

Well, quite honestly that’s all on the home page but to boil it down as far as it goes the magawiki is a tool. It contains page after page of indexes and contents to old magazine back issues offering details only gleaned from paging through the entire issue. The tool is hopefully an early step towards achieving knowledge, though it’s also quite capable of making you money when either buying or selling old magazines as well. If you know what to look for.

The video below is currently on the home page and other pages inside the magawiki. I expect it will be replaced or moved around eventually, so I want to place it here in the blog section, right at post #1, so you’ll always know where to find it.