Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Pinkerton Credentials, Redux

Julian DiMarco has posted the source files for his Pinkerton credentials project.

8 comments:

Alex Kaeda said...

I find myself giggling with glee, despite thinking poorly of what the company is today/has come to represent.

CoastConFan said...

It’s beautiful except for one glaring inconsistency: Social Security and the associated unique number did not exist until the 1935 Social Security Act and the first social security cards were not issued until November 1936.

A Pinkerton Detective Agency ID would not have a SSAN in 1920. The Pinkerton badges are available and are pretty good, although I don’t know the dates issued of the shield vs the star badge. There is a supposed original Pinkerton star badge with original paperwork for sale on this site: http://www.flyingtigerantiques.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=fta&Product_Code=pdpi00012&Category_Code=13pdpi I simply have not bothered to research deeply into its authenticity, but it passes basic cursory inspection.

CoastConFan said...

As a side note, the founder, Allan Pinkerton had a stoke in 1869 and his sons took over the agency. He died in 1884, so his signature probably wouldn’t appear on documents after his retirement circa 1870, although his two sons took over the business. He wrote over a dozen detective story books in his lifetime, most of them after he retired in the 1869. Here is a site about his books and short stories: http://www.thrillingdetective.com/eyes/pinkerton.html

Here are some interesting Pinkerton buttons: http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~pinkerton/trivia_pinkerton_buttons.htm

DevilDan said...

Great work despite the minor errors. CoastConFan, I found that Flying Tiger Antiques web site awhile ago And I love it. Do you know of any that have CD's for old time radio programs I.E. old news reports, mysteries, dramas, etc?

CoastConFan said...

DevilDan,

Do a google search for “Old Time Radio” or “OTR”. Nearly all 20s, 30s & 40s radio show were not copyrighted, despite what some vendors claim such as Radio Spirits. They and others have been blowing smoke up consumer’s fundaments since the time of audio cassettes in the 1970s. They don’t own the copyright, because there was none filed! These shows aired once, generally live, and there was no intent to air them again. Shows were recorded for release in different time zones, such as overseas. Most of these 20s, 30s & 40s shows are available for free and legal download on various sites and on bit torrents.
http://www.archive.org/details/oldtimeradio
http://www.otr.net/
http://www.freeotrshows.com/
Not many people saved vintage radio commercials, sorry to say. BTW a free 20s and 30s web radio station is Radio Dismuke @ http://www.dismuke.org/radio/ Sorry for all these long posts, folks – there is a lot of information available.

Julian DiMarco said...

This particular piece is not 'finished' per se, just a proof of concept, but I appreciate the observations. It was also pointed out to me that the watermark will be destroyed if people try to change the information - I don't work much with graphics, so this is a consideration I hadn't made.

Anonymous said...

That Pinkerton badge is a known reproduction badge.

Anonymous said...

That Pinkerton badge is a known reproduction.