The Tom Thumb toy cash register, produced by Western Stamping Co. located at 2203 W. Michigan Avenue in Jackson, Michigan.  From the mid-1940s through the 1960s, it was an iconic metal toy.  Celebrated for its durability the toy cash register featured a functional mechanical bell and pop-up, priced keys often finished in red or green paint.  It was a top 1950s toy, even receiving recognition for its design quality with significant production in the 1950s. 

In 1953, the Toy Guidance Council Inc. of New York recognized the Tom Thumb cash register as outstanding, resulting in high production numbers.  Over 500,000 units yearly at its peak. Nine mechanical keys with cream/red knobs that popped up display tabs showing (e.g.,"$1.00", "GROCERY", "NO SALE"). A  functional bell rang when the metal cash drawer was pushed open.  

These toy cash registers are now sought-after collectors' items frequently found in vintage toy markets, often praised for their realistic mechanical operation. 

 

 

The Andy Warhol Museum 

117 Sandusky Street

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 

Andy Warhol, born Andrew Warhola on August 6, 1928 was the youngest of three sons born to Andrej Warhola and Julia Zavacky Warhola.  His parents immigrated to the United States from the European region that is now Slovakia, settling into the working-class neighborhood of Uptown in Pittsburgh.  Warhol graduated from Carnegie Mellon University with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Pictorial Design in 1949 and soon after moved to New York City to pursue a career as a commercial artist.

Throughout the 1950s, he became one of the most successful illustrators of his time and won numberous awards for his work.  His clients included Tiffany & Co., The New York Times, Bonwit Teller and others.  Much of his commercial work was based on photographs and other source images, a process he would use for the rest of his life.  While he continued to work as a commercial artist throughout his career, in the early '60s Warhol transitioned into the fine art world gaining notoriety in the Pop Art movement. 

Early Pop paintings were based on comics and ads, with his series of Campbells' Soup Cans in 1962 creating a buzz in the art world that launched Warhol as a celebrity.  Other early subjects drew upon Warhol's life-long fascination with Hollywood.  In 1962, he began a large series of celebrity portraits which included Marilyn Monroe, Elvis Presley and Elizabeth Taylor. 

Andy Warhol's Marilyn Monroe portfolio is a series of ten 36" x 36" silkscreen prints created in 1967, five years after the actress' passing.  Each print depicts the same image of Monroe in different, often bright colors.  The portfolio is considered a classic piece of Warhol's work and a challenge to traditional fine art standards. By elevating pop culture icons to fine art, Warhol blurred the lines between the two and revitalized portraiture* in the mid-20th century. 

*Portraiture is the artistic representation of a person or group, aiming to capture physical likeness, personality and mood through painting, photography or sculpture.  Dating back to ancient times, this art form serves to document identity, status and psychology evolving from formal, commissioned paintings to diverse photographic, digital and abstract styles. 

Warhol chose the source image for this painting of actress Elizabeth Taylor (1932-2011) from a publicity photograph of her 1960 film Butterfield 8.  He created this portrait when Taylor was at the height of her stardom.  

Triple Elvis is a 1963 painting by Andy Warhol.  The work depicts three repeated images of singer and actor, Elvis Presley derived from a publicity still for the 1960 Western film, Flaming Star.

Warhol died in New York City on February 22, 1987.  After Warhol's passing The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. was founded to promote the "advancement of visual arts".  The Andy Warhol Museum was announced in 1989 and opened in Pittsburgh in 1994. 

The Andy Warhol Museum Mission and Values

.. to engage and inspire through Warhol's life, art and legacy ..

The life story of Andy Warhol, in all its complexity, is inspirational and guides our work.  Our collection is the heart of our institution and we will succeed through sharing, preserving and interpreting the collection in the most accessible way possible.  The museum is a place to express and explore multiple perspectives, push boundaries and challenge conventions.  The Warhol believes in learning by doing and being a place of experimentation.  The Warhol is committed to advancing diversity, equity and inclusion in every aspect of our work. 

"If you want to know all about Andy Warhol, just look at the surface of my paintings and me, and there I am.  There's nothing behind it."

Andy Warhol 

Circa 1966

Self-Portrait

 

The Clipper Flxible Badge

The Flxible Company celebrated its 100th anniversary in 2024, marking a century since the company built its first bus in 1924.  The main celebration, the Flxible & Converted Bus Centennial Summit was held from August 21-25, 2024 in Loudonville, Ohio featuring a parade of historic buses on August 24.  The event featured over 20 iconic Flxible buses, including a 1924 model from Canada and the 1947 Clipper used by the Goodyear Blimp. The celebration was organized by Flxible Owners International to honor the company.

The Flxible Co. (pronounced "flexible") was an American manufacturer of intercity coaches and transit buses.  Founded in 1913 in Loudonville, Ohio the company initially produced motorcycle sidecars before transitioning to buses in the 1920s.  Flxible was a major competitor to General Motors in the transit bus market and was one of the largest North American manufacturers during its peak.  

In 1919, the company dropped the first "E" in "flexible" and changed its name to The Flxible Company so the name could be trademarked.  Flxible was one of the largest transit-bus manufacturers in North America. 

The three primary, iconic intercity coach models produced by Flxible that defined their mid-century lineup were the Clipper (1937-1950), the VisiCoach (1950-1958) and the StarLiner (1957-1967).  These buses are recognized for their distinct design often featuring high-mounted driving positions and large panoramic windows in later models. 

The Clipper was known for its "Airway" style and early adoption of intercity design.  It featured smaller windows and a distinct front badge placement. 

The VisiCoach was introduced with larger, higher side windows and a flatter roof to improve visibility.

The Starliner was a later more modernized model that often featured a "rooftop eyebrow" window for increased light and a script version of the Flxible logo.

Other notable types produced included the "Airporter" (1946-1950) and the "Flxliner" (1963-1969).

1946 Flxible

"Blast From The Past"

"Born Feb 23 1947"

1947 Flxible Clipper

1947 Flxible Clipper Serial Number 7665

Port Clinton, Ohio

This Flxible was used as a mobile airship mooring mast and support vehicle for the Goodyear Blimp. It is often seen at aviation events previously served in a caravan with Goodyear Blimp operations and  has appeared at events such as the Props and Pistons Festival in Akron, Ohio. It represents 1940s transit and aviation support history often participating in celebrations related to the Flxible bus manufacturing history. 

On December 11, 2018 the newest arrival was a 1947 Flxible Bus.  John Lingafelter completed a multi-year restoration of the 71 year old vehicle.  Goodyear had three buses built by Flxible Corporation in 1946 and 1947 to support airship operation and of the three built, only the 1947 is known to have survived. The 1947 bus retired in 1966, sold and was converted into a private motorhome.  In 2014, John and Paulette Lingafelter purchased the bus to prevent it from being scrapped and began searching for someone who would have an interest in restoring the vehicle.  Later in 2014 the Liberty Aviation Museum learned the bus was available and asked Mr. Lingafelter to undertake the restoration project.  He was a skilled restorer of collectible cars and had a special interest in the Flxible bus.  Using his years of experience, he began the extensive restoration. Panels and components were fabricated and made to function as new.  Wiring and fuel tanks were replaced and numerous electrical gremlins were resolved.  Surprisingly the engine, transmission and other mechanical components required little attention.  The original 6-cylinder gasoline engine manufactured by Reo started easily and ran smoothly.  The 4-speed manual transmission shifted as it should and the brakes worked properly.  

This special Flxible bus is on display at the Liberty Aviation Museum and serves as a mobile ambassador for the museum.  

Located at the Liberty Aviation Museum in Port Clinton, Ohio (3515 East State Road) is the Tin Goose Diner.   The history of the diner is long and storied with the residents of Port Clinton laying claim to their share of the venerable tale.  The Tin Goose diner offers a wide range of food, mostly American cuisine and a casual atmosphere.  Diners are an American icon, serving plain fare at a reasonable price.  The Tin Goose is a wonderful representative of that history.  

1952 Flxible Visicoach

1950 Flxible Visicoach 

1955 Flxible

1954 Flxible Visicoach

1957 Flxible Starliner

 

The Cathedral of Learning 

University of Pittsburgh (main campus)

4200 Fifth Avenue (Oakland neighborhood)

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 

The Gothic Revival skyscraper that the 10th Pitt Chancellor John Gabbert Bowman commissioned in 1921 inspired local industries to donate steel, cement, elevators, glass, plumbing and heating elements.  Thousands of adults today still have the certificates they received as school children upon contributing 10 cents to "buy a brick" for the Cathedral.

In addition to its magnificent four-story Commons Room at ground level which has been called one of the "great architectural fantasies of the twentieth century", the Commons Room despite its heavy use is kept quiet by the use of acoustical tiles. This feature was insisted upon by Chancellor Bowman.  The architect, Klauder, however, objected due to the increased costs of this construction method though he considered the Commons Rooms to be his greatest achievement.

.. Bowman responded, as such, regarding his opinion .. 

"You cannot build a great University with fraud in it."

Joseph Gattoni designed the stonework.  The walls are made of Indiana limestone and the floor is green Vermont slate. The 42-story cathedral houses classrooms, administrative offices, libraries, computer and language labs, a studio theater, study lounges, a print shop and a food court.  Also located in the corridors surrounding the Commons Room are plaques featuring calligraphy designed and hand-cut slate by Edward Catich including one featuring a poem by Lawrence Lee titled "The Cathedral" as well as stained glass windows by Charles Jay Connick.

In 2007, on the 70th anniversary of the Cathedral's dedication, Pitt trustees approved a project to clean and restore the iconic building.  Its interior has since been upgraded and its limestone exterior scrubbed of industrial grime. During the 2007, $4.8 million cleaning of the Cathedral of Learning's Indiana limestone, officials intentionally left one block of stone near the Fifth Avenue entrance uncleaned.  This soot-covered block was preserved as a "memory" of Pittsburgh's industrial, smoky past. The block was kept dark and weathered to serve as a constrast to the newly cleaned, light-colored and revitalized facade. It serves as a nod to the decades of industrial, "Steel City' air quality that once coated the city.  The overall cleaning project which ran from March to September 2007, utilized a combination of water and powder glass (finely milled glass particles) to restore the landmark's original appearance. 

The name, E. Maxine Bruhns is forever connected to the cleaning of the limestone project. Thanks to Bruhns one darkened stone remains to this day.  She and Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation officials requested that one weather-worn block of darkened stone near the Fifth Avenue entrance be preserved as a tribute to Pittsburgh's industrial past.  Bruhns chose the particular block both for its character as well as its location. Workers built a clear cover so the area wouldn't be cleaned and the school newspaper reported that a crew member was assigned to protect it. 

"What I like about the rectangle is on the lower part,the wind cut these wonderful patterns into it and then it gets dirtier up above.  It has real character. As groups come to view the rooms on tours we can meet them out there and say this the way it used to look.  Honestly, because you know Pittsburgh was built by industry .. steel mills .. and we just can't all be squeaky clean and pretend it didn't happen."

"Somebody has to honor those people who made the city.  These grimy stones were a perfect tribute." 

E. Maxine Bruhns

The 535-foot-tall Cathedral is the second-tallest educational building in the world and the second-tallest gothic-styled building in the world after the Woolworth Building in Manhattan. In recent years, families of falcons have nested atop the Cathedral. 

The Cathedral of Learning was added to the National Register of Historic Places  November 3, 1975.  

It was built in 1926 therefore 2026 marks 100 years! Programming includes special events and exclusive 100th-year activities.  

 

Train of Tomorrow

Artist's conception of the Moon Glow observation car from a promotional brochure distributed by General Motors describing the Train of Tomorrow, a demonstrator built by GM and Pullman-Standard

In 1947, General Motors ordered four domes ("Moon Glow" lounge, "sky view" diner, "star Dust" coach and Dream Cloud" sleeper) from Pullman for a new publicity train known as the "Train of Tomorrow".  The idea was meant to showcase the latest in rail travel accommodations following WWII.  After touring cross-country the equipment was purchased by Union Pacific.  Today, "Moon Glow" is the only surviving piece though in need of restoration.  Unfortunately, the other cars were scrapped in the 1960s.

The Train of Tomorrow was an American demonstrator train built as a collaboration between General Motors and Pullman-Standard between 1945 and 1947.  It was the first new train to consist entirely of dome cars ("Astra-Domes").  It is said the idea was conceived by vice president of GM and general manager of (EMD) Electro-Motive Division Cyrus R. Osborn. He retired from GM in 1962 after 45 years of service. 

Cyrus R. Osborn 

1897-1968

After GM built a 45-foot scale model of the train for $101,072 ($1,680.280 in 2025 dollars) and displayed it to 350 officials from 55 different Class I railroads in 1945, the Train of Tomorrow was built by Pullman-Standard between October 1946 and May 1947. 

"Moon Glow"

The last remaining car from the General Motors Train of Tomorrow is in deperate need of preservation.  The immediate need is to raise enough interest and funds to move the car across town (Ogden, UT) to a more secure location and stop its relentless deterioration. Only then can efforts turn to restoration. 

The car included 24 seats in the dome and 44 seats in various lounge areas below.  The car also with its sister cars toured North America to promote diesel-powered streamliner trains.  While the other three cars were scrapped in the 1960s, "Moon Glow" was purchased by Union Pacific and was eventually rescued from a scrapyard and remains the sole survivor. The entire train was designed to showcase futuristic, comfortable and fast travel powered by GM diesel engines with speeds up to 100 mph. 

Speeds up to 100 mph in the 1940s is almost unimaginable, by rail.

 

The Clark Bar is the most famous candy bar originating from Pittsburgh's North Side created in 1917 by Irish immigrant David L. Clark.  It originally sold for five cents and became an extremely popular treat with U.S. soldiers during and after both WWI and WWII.

The Clark Bar became the first successful "combination" candy bar with a crispy, peanut butter-filled chewy taffy-like consistency, coated in milk chocolate.  From 1911 until 1983 the candy bar was produced at a manufacturing facility on Martindale Street. 

The slogan for the Clark bar was, "I want a Clark bar". Though you may have wanted a Clark bar, often times you weren't able to get the confection.  When the manufacturing of the Clark bar left the Pittsburgh area, the only reminder of the city's candy-producing past was the Clark bar sign atop its former production facility.  It has changed ownership several times with production being taken over by the Boyer Candy Company in Altoona, PA after a 2018 discontinuation bringing it back to its Pennsylvania roots.

They say that necessity is the mother of invention and the story of Boyer Candy is a great example.  During the Great Depression, brothers Bill and Bob Boyer needed a way to make more money to support their family so they decided making candy was the way to do it!  It was a family affair from the start, with Bill making fudge and nut raisin clusters in their mother Emily's kitchen.  Mother and sister (also named Emily) would wrap the finished product and Bob would sell their delicious treats door-to-door in their Altoona, Pennsylvania neighborhood. The candy was an immediate success!

As the demand for their candy grew, the Boyer brothers would often try making innovative varieties of candy to sell.  One of those experiments included covering marshmallow with chocolate.  However, they kept finding that the marshmallow remained too soft.  Emily, their sister, offered a solution:  Why not try using cupcake paper to hold everything in place?  Emily's idea worked perfectly and it was on that day the Mallo Cup became the world's first cup candy!

By 1936, their kitchen had grown too small for their Mallo-Cup-making operation and they moved it to a candy-making facility.

Boyer Candy Company Inc. is an historic candy company located in Altoona, PA famous for its Mallo Cup.  It operates an outlet store next to the factory where customers can buy a wide variety of its products including bags of "seconds" at a discount and the Mallow Cup with the iconic cardboard coins still part of the packaging. The cardboard coins is a nostalgic tradition where coins from the packaging can still be saved and redeemed for candy or merchandise.  

The outlet offers a chance to learn about the company's history through videos though factory tours are no longer available.  

The signature chocolate-covered marshmallow creme cup is also available in dark chocolate.  The outlet store offers samples, often a free Mallow Cup.  

Boyer Candy Company

821 17th Street

Altoona, Pennsylvania

"Momma" Boyer, identified as Emily Boyer, was the mother of Bill and Bob Boyer, the founders of the Boyer Candy Company in Altoona, Pennsylvania.  During the great Depression, she assisted her sons by hand-wrapping the homemade candy produced in her kitchen and notably suggested using cupcake papers to form the company's famous Mallo Cup.  This occurred when the brothers struggled to keep marshmallow centers in their chocolate candy from flattening.  Emily Boyer suggested using paper cupcake cups to hold the shape, creating the firsts cup candy in America.  By 1936, the business outgrew her home kitchen, leading to the establishment of their first factory in Altoona. 

 

 Kaufmann's Clock

The Kaufmann's Clock is an historic, four-faced bronze timepiece located at Smithfield Street and Fifth Avenue in downtown Pittsburgh installed in 1913 by the Coldwell Clock Company.  A renowned meeting spot for over a century, it was designated a landmark in 1981, surviving various store ownership changes. Despite the department store shifting from Kaufmann's to Macy's in 2006, the clock remains a permanent fixture on the building. The clock was refurbished by the Pittsburgh Clock Company in 1987 for $30,000.  

This historic clock is a beloved Pittsburgh treasure, symbolizing the city's history and serving as a traditional meeting point for generations.

"Meet Me Under the Clock"

Prior to cell phones, the clock was the quintessential, well-known meeting spot for shoppers, couples and friends in Pittsburgh.  The clock weighs in at 2,500 pounds and has been a famous meeting spot for over a century, known for the phrase "meet me under the clock".  Installed in 1913 to replace an earlier version, it became a cultural icon and a central part of Pittsburgh's identity.  Even after the Kaufmann's department store closed the clock remains a fixture representing the city's heritage and serving as a backdrop for traditions like holiday window displays.  The Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation designated the clock a significant landmark in 1981. 

HISTORIC LANDMARK

KAUFMANN'S DEPT. STORE and CLOCK

BUILT 1898  CHARLES BICKEL  ARCHITECT

ADDITION 1913  JANSSEN & ABBOTT  ARCHITECTS

PITTSBURGH HISTORY &

LANDMARKS FOUNDATION

Charles A. Bickel

Circa 1905

Charles A. Bickel (1852-1921) was a prominent architect who practiced in Pittsburgh.  He was born  to a well-to-do family in Columbus, Ohio who sent him to Europe for six years to prepare him for a career in architecture.  On his return in 1875, he settled in Pittsburgh and apprenticed with an architect.  In 1885, he opened his independent practice which at its height averaged $3,000,000 a year in commercial structures.  He served for a time as architect to the city of Pittsburgh.