In the Media | Newspaper, The Oregonian
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The Oregonian is an Oregon state based newspaper, which featured an article on Portland, Oregon’s bi-annual Christine Palmer Antique Show (now named, Palmer Wirf Antique Show). The Whistle Gallery team frequent these antique shows with their booth of antique whistles on display and for purchase to whistle collectors new and old, or those seeking safety whistles or perhaps for jewelry. The Oregonian also featured The Whistle Gallery and their booth in a 2013 article (updated, 2019) and their SPOTLIGHT articles. See below!
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The Oregonian
Article: Antique and collectible show is more than a whistle stop — but it’s that, too
Author: Mike Francis
Published: March 2, 2013
Updated: January 10, 2019
Online Article: https://www.oregonlive.com/portland/2013/03/antique_and_collectible_show_i.html
The Oregonian: Antique and collectible show is more than a whistle stop — but it’s that, too
Updated: Jan. 10, 2019, 8:28 a.m. | Published: Mar. 02, 2013, 7:45 p.m.
photo redacted
A collectibles show is an opportunity for vendors to buy, as well as sell.
By Mike Francis | The Oregonian/OregonLive
A Flintstones trash can. A vintage sheath and dagger, with a bone handle. A seven-foot weathervane topped with a rusting Col. Sanders, cane extended. A Smith-Corona typewriter.
This year’s version of Christine Palmer & Associates America’s Largest Antique & Collectible Show
sprawls through two halls at the Portland Expo Center. The show, which continues Sunday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., with adult admission at $7, gathers more turquoise, brass, Bakelite, velour, tin, cardboard, felt and neon under two roofs than you can shake a flapper’s beaded glove at.
A die-cast Batmobile in original packaging. A set of poker chips with swastikas. A long-sleeved burgundy sweater with a patch reading “Old Sitka Trap Club.” A City of New York Board of Education Peace Officer badge.
If you can’t find what you’re looking for — and stumble across plenty that you weren’t — your eyes must be closed. Obsessives, bargain hunters and the curious strolled, scooted and dragged chihuahuas through the expo center, where all manner of antiques and collectibles are assembled. It’s a Smithsonian-yard sale mashup beached for the weekend in north Portland.
Stuffed Santa Clauses mounted on snowshoes. A hanger full of feather boas. A vintage postcard showing the players in Klinkhart’s Troupe of Midgets Circus. A Winchester, lever-action Model 1866 rifle, which sports a price tag of $9,800.
Leonard and Debbie McDowell of Salem are curators of an extensive collection of vintage whistles. They operate as TheWhistleGallery.com.
Something demands that you stop at the little booth in the D Hall, where a hand-lettered card says “Forget coins, marbles, stamps, comics. Whistles. The emerging collectable.” It is mounted on an easel with customized display of more whistles than you imagined there could be. They are neatly hung from hooks next to tiny signs that say “Siren,” “Scouts,” “Hudson,” “Bosun,” “Beaufort,” “Dog,” and other things.
The booth belongs to Leonard and Debbie McDowell of Salem. They are proprietors of a website called TheWhistleGallery.com. The site — and a conversation with the McDowells — makes it clear that whistles are a subject of serious academic interest, as well as items to buy and sell.
Consider the website’s Feb. 26 blog entry, which is headed “Whistle chains.” “An area quite neglected in the whistle world is whistle chains,” it begins. “Our absolute favorites are Dowler chains from the 1880s with heavy links made of pure nickle silver.”
The McDowells are wearing matching t-shirts that say The Whistle Gallery on the front and are decorated with pictures of vintage whistles. Len McDowell, 57, doesn’t need much encouragement to explain the purpose and provenance of his stock.
An 1880’s-era round whistle.
“This is a featured whistle,” he explains. What’s it called? A round whistle. How old is it? About 1880. What’s it made of? Silver-plated brass. How much are you selling it for? It’s not for sale.
The whistle is one of a bagful that are available to be shown, but not sold. If you want a whistle, you’ll have to find one in your price range. The McDowells have one rack marked $20 and under. But you could be like the man who bought two whistles for $500 earlier in the day. He told the McDowells he wasn’t a collector. He just wanted to display them on his dresser.
Len McDowell borrows his wife’s iPad and scrolls through pictures of their collection. A skeleton whistle. A Polish police whistle. A whistle with an embedded compass from Occupied Japan. A whistle with a cigar cutter. An Argentine police whistle that he describes as hideous, but its leering face makes it a popular item.
Len McDowell is an electrician with Bergelectric Corp. He used to collect rare plants, but eventually gave them up in favor of whistles. Whistles don’t die.
It was kind of an accidental passion for the McDowells. When their kids were young and being dragged to collectibles and antique shows, Debbie McDowell spotted a Cracker Jack whistle like the ones she remembered from her own childhood. They bought it.
Now the kids are grown and gone, but the whistle collection has grown. It was tough, in the years when they hunted for them in cluttered expositions like this one. But the internet has changed the game. Their collection exploded from about 25 to 1,000 over the last few years.
“A lot of people walk up and say ‘Who’d a thunk it,'” Len McDowell said. But whistle collecting “is taking off worldwide,” he said.
And if whistles don’t suit you, then walk on.
A wooden carving of the Last Supper. A bubbling Corona Beer light fixture, with faux bottle caps and lime wedges. A cardboard print of William Shatner from Star Trek’s “Trouble with Tribbles” episode. A La Cross Transit Co. token. – Mike Francis