New Recommendations for the Collector's Bookshelf by Linda Rosenkrantz on Creators.com

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FDR'S Fala and the Fad for Scotties There has been any number of well-known presidential pooches in modern history, including Richard Nixon's infamous spaniel, Checkers; LBJ's beagles, Him and Her; Gerald Ford's golden retriever, Liberty (much spoofed by Chevy Chase in the early days …Read more. The Yo-Yo Story The yo-yo, like many other things, has been around for so long that we tend to take it completely for granted, not thinking about how it originated or, for that matter, how it got its distinctive name. But now that the yo-yo is becoming something of …Read more. Recollecting and Collecting Mutt and Jeff Even today, more than a century after they entered the realm of popular culture, this comic-strip team's name is part of the common vernacular — put a tall guy and a short guy next to each other and they'll almost inevitably still be called …Read more. For Collectors, the Milkman Cometh You may have noticed that glass milk bottles are gradually reappearing on supermarket shelves, bringing them back into the modern era. But for people of a certain age, there is still no sound quite as nostalgic as the clink of milk bottles jangling …Read more.

New Recommendations for the Collector's Bookshelf

STAR WARS: 1,000 COLLECTIBLES, MEMORABILIA AND STORIES FROM A GALAXY FAR, FAR AWAY by Stephen J. Sansweet with Anne Neumann (Abrams, $35.)

A must have for any "Star Wars" fan and certainly any "Star Wars" collector. From the moment the first film opened in 1977, there was unleashed an almost unprecedented tsunami of merchandise celebrating the epic space fantasy— which has amounted to something like $15 billion. The author of this book, the foremost collector of such material, with more than 75,000 items in his collection, offers a tremendous amount of background material — both historic and anecdotal — of the items depicted. Luxuriously presented, there are the wide variety of action figures and other playthings, clothing from Underoos to full-metal costumes, food-related premiums (Franken Berry, Count Chocula cereal), posters, stickers, glassware and ceramic tankards, furniture, fish tanks and toothpaste.

PLAYING WITH PICTURES: THE ART OF VICTORIAN PHOTOCOLLAGE by Elizabeth Siegel (Yale University Press, $45)

The subject of a fascinating exhibition traveling to the Art Institute of Chicago and New York's Metropolitan, this almost forgotten Victorian version of collaging photographic images against painted backgrounds to form sometimes surreal, sometimes amusing, always skillful objects proves that the human hand manipulating scissors and a pot of paste could be much more ingenious than the mechanical PhotoShopping of today.

OBSOLETE: AN ENCYCLOPEDIA OF ONCE-COMMON THINGS PASSING US BY by Anna Jane Grossman (Abrams Image, $15.95)

I love this book! It may be small with some oddly funky, un-Abramsish illustrations, but this is the best exploration I've seen of some of the things we've recently left behind. And it's not just the obvious objects like car cigarette lighters, boom boxes and telex machines, but more conceptual things as well: aging, anonymity, getting lost, sadness. The whole thing is done with enormous perception, wit and flair, giving a potted history of each subject, along with interviews with such relevant personalities such as Madeline Albright, Larry Flynt and Miss Manners.

Typical is this part of the entry on the loss of "Easy-to-Open Packaging":

"Thanks to the fact that merchandise is sold in containers that increasingly require a box cutter, a kitchen knife, scissors, or pure brute strength in order to be opened, packaging has evolved to the point where it has lost its charm, even for children who often delighted more in a box than its contents."

And, finally, three particularly interesting books on photography:

PHOTOGRAPHS OF THE PAST: PROCESS AND PRESERVATION by Bernard Lavedrine (Getty, $50)

Put out by the Getty Conservation Institute, this is a very useful manual for any collector (or owner) of vintage photographs. Loaded with information on the history and development of early and more modern photographic processes, from the daguerreotype to the digital print, it will become the ultimate source for guidance on preservation of vintage prints. Bonus: gorgeous illustrations.

JOHN GUTMANN: THE PHOTOGRAPHER AT WORK by Sally Stein (University of Arizona in association with Yale University Press, $ 50)

This German-born-and-trained photographer, and longtime resident of San Francisco is gradually getting the recognition he deserves. This book displays the full range of his work, from his years as a photo-reporter shooting dramatic street scenes, with a special empathy for the outsider, as well as sensitive portrait studies. Of special interest is an archive of early anti-Nazi drawings by Gutmann and others in the 1930s. This book places Gutmann in the first rank of contemporary photographers.

PHOTO:BOX, edited by Roberto Koch (Abrams, $38.95)

An extremely handsome box-like presentation of 250 iconic contemporary photographs, organized by subject: reportage, portraits, nudes, fashion, still life and nature, sport, etc. All the usual suspects are represented, from Avedon to Winograd, but there are some nice surprises, like Jane Evelyn Atwood's arresting shot of women prisoners bathing in a Russian prison and Leonard Freed's priests frolicking in the snow in Vatican City.

Linda Rosenkrantz has edited Auction magazine and authored 18 books, most recently "Beyond Ava & Aidan: The Enlightened Guide to Naming your Baby" (St. Martin's Press). Visit her baby names website at http://nameberry.com. She cannot answer letters personally. To find out more about Linda Rosenkrantz and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.