Campaign-Gear Collectors Vote With Their Money

Politics and political campaigns are featured in every newspaper, website and blog, and collectors are looking at the new memorabilia that can be part of a collection.

The official pins sold or given away by the party, not the souvenir pins sold by merchants, are the ones that gain in collector value. The signs, T-shirts, pencils, jewelry, mugs, hats, dishes, paperweights and other memorabilia should also be official.

Some collectibles are new: TV and radio commercials, songs and viral videos (amateur Internet videos) can now be collected and stored electronically.

Some political memorabilia has almost disappeared. Past campaigns featured soap babies, cigarette packs, ceramic figurines, bandannas, knives, watch fobs, wristwatches and even packing boxes that held lettuce.



Some of the items that are rare today were throwaway items.

Even candy and gum wrappers were made to tout the virtues of a candidate. A few, like the "gold bug" pin, promoted a party view more than a candidate.

Save the interesting political items you see. Usually the material from primaries is of little interest later, but this year the first black and first woman candidates created a "crossover" appeal for collectors.

That means three groups will be searching for these. They'll be wanted by collectors of black memorabilia, women's rights materials and political items.