For those who collect rare vintage memorabilia this company should be well known. Several years ago they purchased one of the rarest collections of porcelain collectibles from the late 40's to early 50's. It was dubbed the "Gibbs-Conner" estate find and featured pre-production (prototype) samples of several previously unknown items.
Gibbs-Conner was a small manufacturer of porcelain products located in Cleveland Ohio. Although it was not their main source of income, in the late 40's/early 50's Gibbs-Conner produced several porcelain banks with the likeness of the Cleveland Indians mascot- Chief Wahoo. Their work rivaled that of their main competitor, Stanford Pottery (also based in the Cleveland area), although their workmanship has always been considered a touch below in quality. As far as we can tell, Gibbs-Conner closed their doors for business in the late 50's. The original banks were not produced in large quantities and are still very popular among figural collectors.To ITPC's surprise a collection of rare porcelain items featuring many other teams (other than the Indians) was found in an attic. One of the teams present was the Brooklyn Dodgers. ITPC has been fairly quiet about the actual number of individual pieces, but they have said that only a handful of each example exist. Below is a Brooklyn Bum ashtray that sold for $807.00 a few weeks ago. In the past, I have seen a large cookie jar and coin bank featuring the Dodgers from this find. Go here and here for some additional information about this find.
Below is something I have never seen before. It is a souvenir statue from the 1956 World Series between the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Yankees.
