Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[SethP]

I was at a thrift store last week looking through there book selection and a book caught me eye: The Top: Universal Toy Enduring Pastime by D.W. Gould (http://www.amazon.com/Top-Universal-Toy-Enduring-Pastime/dp/0517504162) I picked it up for $6 and from the little i've had time to read seems to be a pretty interesting book. Does anyone else have this or know anything about the author?

I'll have it at madfest if any of you make it up (Eric? Alan? Mark?)

[lincolnrick]

What a great find!  That's possibly one of the best books around on tops.  I found my copy on the web at a used book shop, I paid more than $6.  Considered a classic.
Congratulations!

I'll be at Madfest also, should be fun.

[ta0]

Welcome to the board, Seth!

Yes, Gould's book is excellent. Any spintop lover should have it. You got a very good deal!
From the bibliography at ta0.com:

The Top
Universal Toy - Enduring Pastime

by D.W.Gould

By far, the most comprehensive book on the history of the spinning top.
It proves that tops have been discovered independently by almost every culture in the world.
It has 121 drawings, covering tops from ancient times to the 1960's.

1973 (1st ed.)_ Clarkston, N.Y. _ 274 pg.

[silvertop]

I have no direct confirmation, but my understanding is that Gould's original top collection, or at least some of the tops from the book, etc. are at The Philadelphia Museum of Art?  Rocky's place!  I always meant to contact them and see if I could see them, but never did!

[ta0]

The book itself gives catalog numbers for pieces at the Museum of the University of Pennsylvania for many of the drawings. The book about tops "Visca la Baldufa" from the toy museum of Figueres, Spain, mentions ". . . the interesting and extraordinary collection of spinning tops at the Museum of the University of Pennsylvania."  We definitely need to investigate this.

=========

EDIT: I looked at the website of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology but could not find any reference to tops in its multiple collections   

[ta0]

Below is the answer I finally got from the Penn Museum: they still have the tops in their collection!

==========
.
.
.
The Penn Museum has undergone several name changes, beginning as the Museum of Science in Art, The University Museum, The Museum of Archaeology, and currently the Penn Museum. We are not nor ever have been the Pennsylvania Museum.

The Penn Museum does have spinning tops in its collections, which are geographically / culturally organized.
We have spinning tops in the African, (Native) American, Asian, Egyptian, and Oceania curatorial sections.
We also have spinning tops in the Historic European/American sections, which closed in 1929 because this area/period was outside the museum's scope of study.
.
.
.
Registrar Records
Penn Museum   
===================

Now we need to track down the collection that Professor Wilson was going to bequeath to the Smithsonian . . .

[Hydrona]

I ordered this book today!
Bought it from Abebooks. I always wanted a book about EVERYTHING spin top.
I saw my chance so I did not wait. I'm happy I found it!
This book is going to be on my 'favorite book' shelf 

[Jeremy McCreary]

Gould's book is one of my favorites, too.

It's fun to check Gould's illustrations when someone shows you a "new" design for a top -- especially a non-peg top. Chances are, someone else came up with the same idea decades if not centuried ago. Independent rediscovery seems a recurring theme in the history of top-making. I take this as a form of convergent evolution.

Nothing wrong with that, mind you. Nor is there anything wrong with "covering" old designs in new ways, as you've done literally by painting old peg tops with cool designs. In jazz, putting a new spin on old standards is a well-respected art form.

[Hydrona]

Gould's book is one of my favorites, too.

It's fun to check Gould's illustrations when someone shows you a "new" design for a top -- especially a non-peg top. Chances are, someone else came up with the same idea decades if not centuried ago. Independent rediscovery seems a recurring theme in the history of top-making. I take this as a form of convergent evolution.

Nothing wrong with that, mind you. Nor is there anything wrong with "covering" old designs in new ways, as you've done literally by painting old peg tops with cool designs. In jazz, putting a new spin on old standards is a well-respected art form.

Haha thanks! I just personalize my tops  .
It is indeed interesting to look it up. Can't wait till it arrives!
It's already shipped. Now just wait