Marbles, insulators and bottle caps: the ties that bind

Get your kid into collecting stuff and you've made a friend for life.
A question of genetics

By David Elkins

When my father was a kid, he collected marbles. When I was six or seven, he passed his collection along to me. It was housed in a blue curved metal box with rounded corners, which had long, long ago contained hard candies. Inside were perhaps 200 marbles of all sizes and descriptions including four giant clear glass beauties with elaborate swirling threads in a dazzling rainbow of colours. Our daughter began playing with the marbles as soon as we were sure she wouldn't swallow them and they became something that we shared. When she set up her own household, the marbles went with her.

The point of that small family history is simply that marbles � a collection of marbles � has been a reliable family link for three generations. Kids, like so many of us, love collecting things and, like the marbles, it's one activity where parents and offspring can share a single passion.

MEDICAL MELDING
A Hamilton cardiologist recalls the day, five summers ago, he and his 10-year-old came across an antique 19th-century microscope and a box of slides in a rural antique shop. "It was in almost pristine condition. You just slid the glass mounts in and entered another world. Flower petals, insects, blood samples plated a hundred years ago or more. Jamie was entranced right from the get-go," he remembers. Since then they've added considerably to their collection which has burgeoned to include a host of medical instruments including five masterfully built brass scales.

INSULAR TOGETHERNESS
A Laval, QC, surgeon and his daughter share a passion � they collect old glass insulators of the kind that were once common on wooden electrical poles. Though they're most commonly green or clear glass, they come in a wide variety of colours, from blues, mauves, pinks and deep purple to reds and yellows. Prices can range from a dollar or two into the hundreds, for the coloured antique samples favoured by collectors. "We've got most of ours for nothing," notes the surgeon with pride. "We've sometimes just spotted one in a field on an old pole that's been replaced and 'voila' not only a trophy for our collection, a story too."

CAPPING FRIENDSHIP
A Dartmouth, NS, psychiatrist along with her son and daughter, now in their teens, are equally delighted when they make a 'find.' They collect bottles and bottle caps. Her son explains, "When I was about eight I got into saving bottle caps from soft drink bottles. You'd be surprised how many different ones there are. Hundreds. They're easy to collect and whenever mom went on a conference, she'd tell her friends about it and they'd send me caps a from all over the States, Europe, Russia, even India." He has over 2,000 neatly mounted in plastic sheets normally used for photo transparencies. On a camping trip two years ago the family stumbled on an old garbage dump in the forest and uncovered several old bottles. They now have over 100 in their collection with no plans for stopping.