If you're over the age of 9 and believe in 'talking boards', please contact me. I have a bridge in some lovely swampland that I'd like to sell you.

Fabulous, thanks Miko. Looks like a very fun area of collectibles, although when we were kids we made do with the side of a box and a glass! There are still Spiritualist churches around the traps - my favourite offered a 4pm Sunday "clairvoyance and flowers" service that I regrettably never got around to attending.

This one (from 1920) has an interesting combination of images at the bottom:

≡ Click to see image ≡

Huh, yeah, look at that. The swastika used to show up in a lot of art worldwide, often as a symbol of luck or a good omen - which is why the Nazis appropriated it (though they inverted it).

Wikipedia has some good on this. I didn't know about the basket-weaving theory:

The ubiquity of the swastika symbol is easily explained by its being a very simple shape that will arise independently in any basket-weaving society. The swastika is a repeating design, created by the edges of the reeds in a square basket-weave.

Also:

The swastika symbol was popular as a good luck or religious/spiritual symbol in the United States, prior to its association with Nazi Germany. The symbol remains visible on numerous historic buildings, including sites that are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It also appeared on tiles, lampposts, metal valves, tools, surfboards, stock certificates, brand names, place names, medals, commercial tokens, postcards, souvenirs, rugs and clothing. A swastika can be seen at the main entrance of the Swan and Dolphin Hotel located at Walt Disney World and owned and operated by Starwood Hotels under the Sheraton brand

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This is awesome. I want to get a ton of them and hang them on my wall!

I find it odd that some people in Britain regard these things as 'serious' occult items - you don't see them in toy shops.