Do you have a full set of catalog reprints or know anyone who does
Hello Farold. Now Farold, you ask a hard question. WHY do you do this? ;D
Well its like this. No, I don't know anybody that has a whole set of Griswold Catalog Reprints. I'd say nobody has. If somebody had one, I'd know about it. ;)
And as far as who has the most Griswold Catalog Reprints, that would probably be me. But I'll tell you this. If I had get rid of all of them and I could only keep one, it would be the 1895/96 Griswold Catalog. Its not only a 'Griswold Catalog Reprint'. Its a 'Salesmans Catalog' complete with all the descriptions and the prices. ALSO, aluminum cookware was introduced with this catalog.
At one time aluminum was worth more than gold because the extraction process was so expensive and labor intensive. In fact only Royalty like Kings and Queens and Heads of State used aluminum utensils. BUT, around 1891-92 all of that changed forever because a CHEAP extraction process for aluminum was discovered. And so the market went wild for aluminum. And poor people who could not even afford to own a spoon or fork made out of aluminum could now afford an aluminum tea kettle, a dutch oven, a roaster, all made and introduced by Griswold with this catalog. AND, thats only part of the catalog. Its worth owning for just the Aluminum section alone.
I spent a small fortune having these catalogs reprinted. And I have made my tongue sore from licking stamps to go on manila envelopes to send out catalogs. So I have got all my money back and made a little too. SO, my point is I don't care if I sell another one of these catalogs or not. :o