Material Culture Minute: Picking on Martha's Vineyard

Last weekend, my parents and I ventured to Martha's Vineyard. MV is certainly worth a visit. Between its multicolored nineteenth-century religious revival meeting cottages and its spectacular coastline, any visitor would find something to do there.

On the final day of our trip, I requested that we stop in the antique shop down the road from our B&B. My hopes sank as I walked through the mostly unremarkable (and over-priced) assemblage of vintage and modern wares...

...until I found a corner of paper objects. Knowing my dad (who tends to stay out of such establishments) was waiting patiently in the car for my mom and me to return, I quickly started browsing the unorganized layers.

Among the postcards, maps, photographs, and advertisements, at the bottom of one pile, a brightly-colored hand-painted scene caught my eye:


I pulled it out and flipped it over, delighted to see nineteenth-century writing on the reverse:


I turned the mechanical toy over again to test the one of two mechanical pieces still in operating order:





Who could resist a moving draw planer at a mere $10? Now if only I could restore the cello player to his former glory.