Return of bygone magic: Colfax Historical Society re-prints old advertisements

The shelves of the Colfax Historical Society overflow with bottles that contained mineral water, furniture from one of its greatest benefactors, Karlyne Anspach’s, personal collection and an original Close to Nature canvas house stretched across a wooden frame. A walk through the exhibit room, however, leaves the tourist wondering about the daily lives of the average Colfax citizen in days past. What storefronts filled the downtown? How did the Colfaxian of yesteryear engage with material culture? What does that tell us about Colfax’s connection to the broader economy during years when America was quickly industrializing?

A recent find at a flea market is helping to fill the gaps.

Aaron Bartholmey, a seventh and eighth-grade math and algebra teacher at Colfax-Mingo High School has avidly trekked through jumbled booths of flea markets and dusty shelves of antique stores for years.

“It started when I tagged along with my grandpa to different flea markets,” Batholmey said. “That was always something he would do.”

As a child, Batholmey hunted for advertising pencils: thin twigs of wood and lead with the emblems of companies printed on the grip.

“It was something cheap for me to pick up when I was tagging along with grandpa.”

Bartholmey now has more than 60,000 pencils in his collection and belongs to the American Pencil Collectors Society.

When he was traversing the stalls of one of the half-dozen markets he attends each antiquing season in Cedar Falls, he stumbled upon a booth of palm-sized glass slides with transparent advertisements printed on its surfaces. These slides would have fit into early projectors, often called magic lanterns, and forecast across movie theater screens before the film started rolling.

“The dealers had a couple sitting up that said ‘Colfax’ on them,” Bartholmey said. “I went over and started digging through them and pulled out a few more from under the table. Most of them didn’t say ‘Colfax,’ but I pulled out my phone and started searching the names on them.”

A quick inquiry of Mr. Google revealed many of the miniature panes had a Colfax connection and advertised everything from overalls at H.E. Gould & Co. to the Valeria Savings Bank.

“Pretty soon, I had a stack of 15 of them.”

The dealers, a couple who had picked up the pieces at an auction in Illinois, mentioned they had more Colfax slides in their collection.

“I brought them home and showed them off to my friends at the historical society,” said Bartholmey, who was elected to the Colfax Historical Society board this year. “They were like, ‘Oh, you should really get the rest of them.’ They were just kind of in awe of them.”

He spent the rest of the spring and summer searching for the dealer. In September, he reencountered the couple and purchased 15 more magic lantern slides, the remainder of their Colfax collection.

Bartholmey keeps the glass advertisements in two sturdy, rectangular cardboard boxes. The slides nestle in pillows of tissue enforced with thick, grey packing paper. Unwrapping the treasures emits a satisfying crinkle and rustle, like rummaging through packages on Christmas morning. A thin matchstick frame painted black surrounds cardstock stamped with the cherry red emblem of the now-defunct Des Moines Slide Company, and the glass advertisements themselves sit within this setting.

Since Bartholmey didn’t have a magic lantern projector, he viewed the slides in detail by opening a blank text document on his computer and using the bright white screen to backlight the transparent image.

“There are some that are pretty recognizable. I have one from Weirick’s, which is the drugstore downtown that just changed names a few years ago to Benzer Pharmacy,” Bartholmey said. “There are some where, depending on how much you know about local history, they have a name that comes up a lot. I’ve got one from one of the grocers whose name was Luther.”

Bartholmey has compared businesses advertised on the slides to a Colfax city directory he found online. The 1914 directory matches the advertisements, and Bartholmey speculates the slides rotated through a projector at Colfax’s Star Theatre before film screenings. His favorite slides include images of Hotel Colfax, the Spanish mission style stucco structure that now houses Adult and Teen Challenge of the Midlands, and the Folk Victorian style Mason House that graced the lot where Georgioz Pizza now squats.

“I about fell over when I saw those.”

The images equally impressed other members of the Colfax Historical Society. Shawn Cogley, the society’s current president, approached Bartholmey and asked if he’d be willing to help create a booklet containing an image of each slide.

“I thought that was a good idea, but that’s kind of boring,” said Bartholmey. “They’re going to look at the book and put it on the shelf. I wanted something we could actually do with them.”

After a brainstorm session, Bartholmey decided to print the images onto notecards and calendars. Board members of the historical society suggested Bartholmey choose advertisements with names recognizable to older community members to create a pack of six notecards. For the calendar, Bartholmey chose slides whose images most easily transferred from glass to paper.

Karen Russell, treasurer of the historical society, indicated both the notecards and the calendars are available for purchase in the historical society’s gift shop, Colfax City Hall, Benzer Pharmacy and Colfax Main Street.

Because Bartholmey owns more slides than space on the notecards and calendar allowed, he hopes to continue these printings in coming years.

The printing of the slides chronicles what Bartholmey calls a “glimpse into history. It’s kind of just a real snapshot of life back then. There’s one slide that talks about buying a suit for $5 and how the capital of the bank is $50,000. I’m kind of just fascinated by the story.”

Contact Phoebe Marie Brannock at 641-792-3121 ext. 6547 or pbrannock@newtondailynews.com