Postcards from the Edge of Allentown

Margery would live here

Well, we have returned from prosaic Allentown.  So much better than Perth Amboy, but the same love of Jersey Barriers.

What Can I say but the Allentown Book and Paper Show lived up to its promise.  The Agricultural building was everything that we were promised, and more.

First, we stopped by a booth staffed by my friend "Squid" mother.  Squid and I go way back. 

Way, way back. 

Way back to January 1983 when we met one and other in the Journalism Semester program at American University.  That's how she got the name "Squid".  We were all sent out to do a story on something happening in D.C. (and who would ever imagine that Reagan era could be called the good old days) and she covered an exhibit opening at the Smithsonian on the Giant Squid.  The name stuck. 

I last saw Mrs. Squid at Squid's wedding 34 years ago in Allentown, so it was a warm reunion.

Then we were off to find fun stuff.

If you have never gone to a book and paper show they can either be fabulous experiences when you find something good for cheap (Original copies of "Drummer magazine from the 70's for THREE dollars apiece), or they can quickly turn into vicious elbow fights, where collectors of postcards jostle for position. 

I collect my 2nd hometown and/or the "Millionaire's Row" era of mega-mansions along Cleveland's famed stretch of Euclid Avenue that once had a higher per capita tax base than Fifth Avenue in New York.  The husband collects postcards of his hometown. Like me, he is "Bi-Collectible".  Unlike me who loves collecting period era gay porn, he is into stereopticon's from the Victoria Era. 

All was going really well until we came upon Mrs. Topogrosso and her motorized wheelchair which was lugging her up and down the aisles with her metal shopping cart in tow.  In the metal shopping cart were all of her postcard binders, and crumpled paper bags.  Because if you need assistance getting around, then you need to haul an additional 300 pounds of paper, too, right?

We encountered her on row one where she hogged the middle of aisles calling out to other shoppers to "hand me the second box on the right," which some unwitting idiot, me in this case, who was trying to be polite would do only to be told "This is too heavy for me to balance, hand me the third box from the left."  Doing so, because again, I was trying to be a good sport, she wheezed "No, I wanted the third box on the left of the second shelf." 

I returned the box and started to leave when Mrs. Topogrosso ordered an elderly woman. who was about to take the chair I was sitting in so she could look through the Alabama cards in their box, to vacate said chair.  "You know, I am disabled and if you sit there I can't see whats in that box in the rear row..."

Two rows later the husband and I were burrowing into some really good boxes when again we heard the whine of an electric chair and a rattle of a cart when Mrs. Topogrosso met up with us again. 

"EXCUSE ME!  I'm DISABLED and I can't reach for boxes, so I need someone to hand me the Kewpie Doll postcards."  This time I didn't even flinch, because the cards were nowhere near me (I was in "states and cities", her's were in "topicals and artists" when she wheezed loudly  "I NEED THE MAN IN THE GREEN SHIRT TO MOVE BECAUSE I AM DISABLED AND I NEED TO SIT AT THE TABLE."

I didn't even look up because my shirt was chartreuse, not green.

A woman got up to leave, finding her sense of smell offended by the rank of unbathed flesh, and she offered the woman her place.

"I CAN'T SIT THERE BECAUSE I AM DISABLED AND I NEED TO HAVE EXTRA SPACE FOR MY CART."

The woman left and again, she barked an order for me to move and again, I ignored her.

"I NEED YOU TO MOVE BECAUSE I AM DISABLED..." two more men got up and left, leaving her plenty of room for her and her cart, "...and the man in the green shirt needs to move."  Now the dealer entered the fray. 

"I can move these chairs and..."

"NO!  I need to sit where that man is seated because that's where I always sit when I come to your booth."

Ah, finally, the real reason. 

It's not so much that she was disabled and pulling something akin to what Ricky and Lucy lugged around in the Long, Long Trailer.  It was because she wanted her way.  Like some drunk who claims the same bar stool every afternoon at the same bar while they get soused, she just wanted to sit where she always sat.

I picked up my ten cards - a steal at $24, as some rare enough that I could sell them for more - and got out her way. 

Three booths later the Husband leans in and says "she's creeping on you."

This time it wasn't the booth we were at, but the one behind us and off went the foghorn of "EXCUSE ME!  I'm DISABLED and I need....and I need the woman in the black top to move so I can get my wheelchair up and ..."

A woman cleared her throat and said clearly "Margery, you know my name.  And for all that I am concerned, you can wait your turn like everyone else.  Every show it's the same thing and..."  The gist of the verbal smackdown was that Margery evidently does this at every paper show, the woman said that pouting doesn't work for a three-year-old and it's going to work for her, here or at any show on the east coast.  Also, Margery could shit in her Depends for all this woman cared.

We heard the whirl of an electric motor as Margery continued down the row.

Later on, I encountered the woman, who was neatly dressed, had a Louis Brooks bobbed head of silver hair peppered with a few strands of black, and her reading glasses hanging from her neck in a wonderful beaded chain, who took on Margery and I asked what the deal was.

"It's not you." She put on her glasses and grabbed for another chunk of cards from the box. "It really is her. When I first started coming to these shows," she said while looking over the top of her reading glasses while flipping through postcards of 1939 World's Fair, "I used to bend over backward to try and be helpful, I felt bad for her.  But after six or seven years of her wanting that box and no, this box, and no, and never looking through them, I just had enough.  She uses people and her disability for attention.  All of us here, and at the New York City Clubs have had enough." 

What about New York?  "I mean it takes a lot to get banned in New York, right?"

"She always has that damned cart in tow and she keeps food in it.  The vendors don't like you eating Marshmallow Fluff from a jar while you finger the merchandise - I'll take these three.  Can you do ten instead of fifteen?  Twelve?  Sold - and it's unsanitary.  They would like to sell cards to pay for the booth rent. and not have her sticky sausage fingers all over their goods." 

She told me her name was Nell and she paid the vendor who bagged her cards in a vintage unused popcorn bag. 

"Are you going to York," Nell asked. "Margery goes on Saturday, so you'll want to go on Friday to avoid her."

She asked what I collected in postcards and I told her.  "I collect World's Fair, 1933 and 1939.  My sister is around here and she collects Oberlin, Ohio because that's where she went to school."

What does Margery collect, I wondered?

"Pure Misery: postcards with cats.  Anything with a cat.  Real photo, offset, linen, chrome, and 3D." Nell smiled and chuckled.  She went on to tell me that Margery really threw a fit a couple years ago at Brimfield according to one of the dealers because another person had his box that had 3D cat postcards and was going through them.  She barked out that she might want ones the man had taken out of the box. "I think he was doing it to vex her."

"She asked for Kewpie Doll cards at one booth."

"Then she's already been at the booth and knows that there are no cat cards that she wants. It's her second pass, and Rose O'Neill is her back up category."

How does she get around?

"Her husband.  He' sitting outside chain smoking.  His name is Darl and I'm amazed he hasn't left her behind at one of these shows and run off to Baja to get away from her.  He used to come in the show halls with her, but he stopped years ago because of her behavior."

For a moment, I envision that Margery and Darl Topogrosso have a relationship almost like Mr. Joyboy and his mother, Mrs. Joyboy, but instead of mother and son, its husband and wife.  I get a bit queasy.

"OH! There's a booth on the third row, and I think he has Ohio.  My sister Sally always has good luck with him.  Hopefully, we'll see one and other in York next month."  I thanked her and we went our seperate ways.

I found said booth, and while I didn't anything I didn't already have, I did find a category named "MISERY" and great fun going through that. Two-headed calf's, horses caught in floods, caskets that had floated to the top of the shores of reservoirs built over cemeteries.  Then I found the most brilliant card ever.  One to memorialize my encounters with Margery Topogrosso.  Not from Ohio, but of the "Home For The Friendless."  Bought it.

Evidently the York, Pennsylvania, show is even bigger than Allentown.  Forward and forewarned, I am going on that Friday, not Saturday. 

After all, I would HATE IT if Margery had to order me from the chair I was sitting in because it was in her "spot".