LiveAuctionTalk com Highlights Vampire Killing Kits in its Weekly Free Article
Released on = November 17, 2006, 7:00 am
Press Release Author = Rosemary McKittrick
Industry = Internet & Online
Press Release Summary = Rosemary McKittrick's column offers reliable information and prices for art, antiques and collectibles. Visit the site and sign up for a free weekly subscription.
Press Release Body = Nov. 17, 2006--In the murky lands beyond the forest bloodthirsty Count Dracula wanders. When the clock strikes twelve evil creatures like him are at their most powerful. If you must travel on, then for your mother's sake--wear a crucifix.
Transylvania, Dracula's home, is a place of beauty as well as mystery. If imagination is a window to the soul then Bram Stoker's 1897 vampire novel is a dark passageway.
Dracula was not so much a character out of Stoker's imagination as he was a living, breathing Prince of Darkness for those of us who poured over his tales as kids.
At the turn-of-the-century, in response to Stoker's 'Dracula' novel, vampire killing kits were supposedly sold to curiosity seekers and tourists in upper class European hotels and exhibitions.
Kits were also popular among nervous Brits headed to Eastern Europe and looking for ways to fend off vampires.
Many of the kits bear labels with what appears to be a fictitious person named 'Professor Ernst Blomberg.'
Blomberg reportedly assembled the kits in the 19th century. Many experts say the kits were actually assembled in the early-20th century.
Maybe vampire killing kits were tie-in products to Stoker's book? Maybe they were part of the patent medicine schemes of the day? It's anybody's guess.
One thing for sure, there are more around than you might expect.
They're unusual and attention-grabbers when they come up for auction. On Sept. 1-2 Garth's auction in Delaware, Ohio, offered a selection of vampire killing kits in its Arts & Antiques auction.
Read the entire article at www.LiveAuctionTalk.com.
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