Collector's Item

In the candlelit Governor's Palace at restored Williamsburg, Va., a string ensemble played Mozart, liveried footmen served fruit punch, and 200 visitors swapped the latest ideas about antiques. It was the 19th and final night of the second annual forum on antiques, sponsored by Colonial Williamsburg Inc. and the magazine Antiques. Lock, stock & rocking chair, Antiques' Editor Alice Winchester and most of her staff had traveled to Williamsburg to pick up a few ideas themselves. Last week they were back at work in their modern Manhattan offices, getting ready to tell their readers all about it in a forthcoming issue.

Though not many people outside the publishing business are aware of the connection, the Straight family,*which publishes the politically conscious New Republic (TIME, Feb. 23, 1948), also publishes the politically unconscious Antiques. An illustrated monthly,. Antiques is the biggest and most successful magazine in its field. In the depression years, when the leftish New-Republic prospered, the newly purchased Antiques lost money. Now Antiques makes money and the New Republic loses it. From a circulation high point of 96,441 in 1948 under Editor Henry Wallace, the N.R. has slumped to 37,000; the current issue carries only three ads and a column of classifieds. In 1942, Antiques had only 8,043 readers. But the wartime shortage of household furnishings caused a boom in the secondhand market, and Antiques boomed with it, now has 29,921 readers.

Besides a fine assortment of ads for furniture, ceramics, glass, silver and other collector's items, the current issue carries such big news for antiques lovers as the discovery of the first authenticated life portrait of Revolutionary Tom Paine. The most popular feature in the magazine is "Living with Antiques," compiled by blonde, 42-year-old Editor Winchester, who lives with some antiques herself in her bachelor-girl Manhattan apartment.

Though the New Republic and Antiques share the same offices, Michael Straight never interferes with the profitable half of his odd team. In fact, staffers complain, he doesn't even read the magazine regularly.

-Michael, who is editor of the New Republic; his actress-sister Beatrice, star of the current Broadway hit, The Innocents; brother Whitney, managing chief executive of British Overseas Airways Corp.; and their mother, Dorothy Payne Whitney Straight Elmhirst.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.