Regarding these marbles for sale.... Please take note, I'm not a marble collector/expert nor do I make any claims otherwise (my passion is collecting Indian artifacts),  I do not know whether these marbles are genuine or not (it is my opinion that they are from 1860's, weather they were meant to be used in mill drums or as game/toy marbles and/or both--seems to be a  matter of opinion & debate.. PLEASE READ THE FOLLOWING AND BID AT A DOLLAR AMOUNT YOU ARE COMFORTABLE PAYING....

 

PLEASE READ THE TWO OPPOSING STORIES ON THESE MARBLES THAT I HAVE FOR SALE !...I RECEIVED THIS INFORMATION REGARDING THE MILL DRUM THEORY ON SEPT 15 2007, UNTIL THIS TIME I HAD NO OTHER INFORMATION RECEIVED, NOR WHEN I DID A GOOGLE SEARCH DID I TURN UP ANYTHING EXCEPT NEWSPAPER ACCOUNTS OF THE ATLANTA CONNECTION (WHICH MATCHED THE STORY I WAS RELATED WHEN I PURCHASED THIS COLLECTION)...PLEASE READ ON!

The story carried by an Area Atlanta paper is that during construction in preparation for the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, workers excavated an old cistern. One worker took the old tools found, another worker took a bunch of other old items that were found and a third worker took the marbles that were found approx 50,000 of these marbles. He has since traveled the country and sold all but about 8,000 of them.  The story said they were produced by a now-defunct marble company in 1820-1837.

Are these genuine marbles or not? The same could be asked of steelies...,  several people have attempted to research the origin of these. Historical accounts show that the area of Atlanta was in control of the Creek Indians until 1821...in the 1840's the town of Atlanta began to grow.... Some collectors have noted that these marbles, or spheres, are similar to porcelain spheres used in factories in the 1860's to crush and smooth mill materials.

 

I DO BELIEVE THE PAINT HAS BEEN ADDED AT A LATER DATE...

 

GREAT EDITION TO YOUR COLLECTION!