East Coast collectors of political buttons, badges, ribbons and related ephemera will meet in Titusville on Saturday, April 28, to sell, trade and display memorabilia from elections throughout the centuries.
The 15th annual gathering will be held at the Titusville United Methodist Church that Saturday from 9 a.m. through 3 p.m.
Attendees can expect to see a wide variety of political items, ranging from 2016 presidential-campaign buttons promoting candidates Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, to items from such popular former presidents as Teddy R. and Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama.
The gathering will be hosted by the local chapter of the American Political Items Collectors national nonprofit hobbyist association, dedicated to preserving political history.
“We invite the young and old alike to learn more about collecting buttons from the heated 2016 presidential campaign, as well as from other campaigns throughout American history,” says Tony Lee, a Titusville resident and president of APIC’s Big Apple Chapter. “Most political items don’t survive the elections in which they were used, so to see an ‘I Like Ike’ apron or a Ronald Reagan cowboy hat or a clothing button worn at George Washington’s inauguration and inscribed with ‘Long Live the President’ is a great experience for students of political history at any age.”
Titusville United Methodist Church is located at 7 Church Road. The button show will be held in the church’s Education Building. Free parking is available.
Admission to the event will be $3 for each adult. Any child 12 years or younger will enter free of charge. Children will receive assorted buttons, free of charge.
Free appraisals will be offered for all political items brought in by members of the public; members of the public can also bring items for auction, with a commission rate of 10 percent of the overall sale. Refreshments will be available for purchase. For more information, please contact Tony Lee at (609) 310-0817 or tonylee08560@gmail.com.
