Another Drawer (blank label)

  1. Tiger Balm
  2. An art project. Made it in New York City, during my second semester as a student at the Kansas City Art Institute. Or maybe my Junior year. Got a little studio space and a room at the YMCA up near Central Park. The studio space (shared among 20 or so students from all over the country) was down in TriBeCa. A jeweler named Chris helped me, I think. There's locks of someone's hair (red) inside, along with an oil soaked bit of felt. Hoped for a sense memory, I think. It opens up on the other side, using a pocket watch face.
  3. Heads I Win / Tails You Lose (with matching picture of nude female torso "heads" and buttocks "tails"). I'm amazed and delighted to discover that things like this really exist. Like the first time I saw a wooden nickel. I think I was about 9, in Las Vegas. The family was driving through on our way to Claremont, California, where my Dad was doing research on Jack London. Some freaky clown at the Circus, Circus! casino gave me a wooden nickel to use in the kids area. I kept the nickel. Later, traveling through Vegas as a 24 year old I discovered I had a problem not gambling.
  4. John F. Kennedy memorial medallion.
  5. Dirty glass bottle with cork stopper.
  6. A knob from a Vandercook flatbed proofing press (SP-15).
  7. Red ink for a Chinese signature "chop". Real sticky, and gooey.
  8. Brass plumbing part, from a faucet. I didn't know what this was for the longest time, and spent 2 months of my graduate studies at SAIC doing portraits of this (and #15 & #39) in oil.
  9. Matchbox. Miniature box of Marlboros. Got it in Puerto Rico, visiting my grandfather with my family.
  10. Antique top. A cracker jack prize from a long time ago? Back when they were metal...
  11. Go piece. I looked all over Chicago for a Go set, and somehow lost the entire set, except for this piece, before I ever got to play a single game. The pieces were a little too big for my taste, though, so I'm not terribly sad about it. I've got a plastic set now that's probably less valuable, but which suits me much better.
  12. Radiator Key. Used to "bleed" the air from a water or steam heated house or apartment radiator system.
  13. Eiffel Tower memorial pin. Got this the summer my brother and I backpacked around Europe. Our Aunt (cousin, actually) Linda lived near the subway stop that was in the movie "Last Tango in Paris".
  14. Tiny little ebony and metal handle for a steam engine testing kit.
  15. Brass bushing.
  16. Antique kazoo, made from tin.
  17. A nearly circular stone.
  18. Pin memorializing H.M.S. Mauritania.
  19. Fossilized trilobyte.
  20. Fancy paperclip.
  21. Penknife.
  22. Penknife.
  23. Penknife.
  24. Rubber sculpture. First I made this from wood on a hobby lathe, then I made a mold using plaster, and then I cast this in rubber. A complete waste of time.
  25. (a & b) Very small metal cans, for watch parts. Empty.
  26. Skate key.
  27. A red star used to adorn a hat in PRC. Most often seen on a party member's manto (steamed roll) billed cap, similar to the one you've always seen Chairman Mao wearing.
  28. Toy car. This belonged to my mother's mother, Myrtle Williams (Nana Myr). She kept this, a teeter-totter penguin, and a few other small toys on the window sill in the kitchen. When we visited she'd show them to us, and let us play with them in the kitchen. Then they'd go back on the sill!
  29. Letter "A", rubber type.
  30. Brass joint.
  31. Finial. Pot metal.
  32. I don't know what this is.
  33. Glass apothecary stopper.
  34. Small container, meant to go on a pet's collar.
  35. Another plumbing part.
  36. A wheel assembly that was part of a gravity fed measuring device from the turn of the century.
  37. Also from the aforementioned measuring device.
  38. Miniature screwdriver from an "Eyeglass Repair Kit".
  39. A finial from a lamp.
  40. Crappy screwdriver. 10¢ at American Science Surplus.
  41. My grandfather's minature screwdriver.
  42. Brass chop. This has the Chinese interpretation of my name on in it. There's also a small resevoir for ink inside.
  43. Electronics part. An 1/8th inch plug receptacle.
  44. An ink pen attachment from a drafting set. My Dad bought the drafting set in Warsaw.
  45. Tiny alligator clip.
  46. Skeleton Key.
  47. Two small wood rings, on a string.
  48. Ivory.
  49. Prism.
  50. Smiley Face trackball. From my first computer, a Powerbook 170. My brother Will convinced my parents to get it for me, when I was in grad school. I got hooked.
  51. Smoking Monkey novelty. Giselle Simon pinned this to my bedroom door, at the loft on Lake street.
  • updated: July 01, 2003
  • © 2008 mc.clintock.com
Unlabeled Drawer