By Brian Slemming
There’s no indication that Victoria Court in Toronto’s North York, one of many office complexes there, has a name. “The Victoria Court sign blew down in a storm earlier this year,” says Barbara Rusch, Victoria Court’s property manager, “I am working on a new sign now.” It will have a drawing of the grand old Queen Victoria. That sign, and the name of the complex, are the secret indicators of Rusch’s interests away from her real estate work.
She describes herself as “a raving obsessive/compulsive,” an admirer and expert on the life of Queen Victoria and the mores of Victorian life. In the pursuit of ever more detail about those far off times and its peoples, she has become a collector of Victorian bric-a-brac, or as she refers to her collection “ephemera.”
It’s one of those words that has developed a new meaning. Most dictionaries describe ephemera as “that which lasts for a very short time.” To collectors around the world, ephemera means “anything that is printed as a document intended for a very short life and then to be disposed of after use. Bus and train tickets, newspapers, advertising flyers are all examples of ephemera. We are surrounded by ephemera everywhere we go,” Rusch says. “It tells us so much about the times and people for whom the ephemera was produced.”
These dedicated collectors band themselves into societies. Rusch formed the Ephemera Society of Canada in 1987 and is the current president of the group. The paradox is that these original items, destined to be discarded after use, are now keenly collected and treasured. The ephemeral articles have now taken on a life that will long outlive their collectors. The Ephemera Society and its members are in the process of changing the ephemeral into the permanent.
One large part of Rusch’s collection is made up of Victorian cards. These include Christmas and valentine cards, but the real heart of her card collection is visiting or calling cards. “Because Victorian life was so severely circumscribed, there was a secret language imbued in those cards. It was almost a secret code,” she says.
Cards could contain a specific meaning when a particular corner of the card was turned down. In an 1894 book titled Enquire within upon everything, readers are directed that “after a ball or party, cards should be delivered to the host within one month. It is polite to send your servant (with the card) or to deliver it yourself. In the latter case a corner should be turned down.” A turned down lower left corner implied condolences and the lower right corner meant farewell.
Cards were just one of the methods by which messages were exchanged without being expressed verbally. “Fans were another method of passing hidden messages,” says Rusch.
Again quoting Enquire within upon everything: “When a gentleman presents a fan, flower, or trinket, to a lady with the left hand, this, on his part, is an overture of regard; should she receive it with the left hand it is considered an acceptance of his esteem; but if with the right hand, it is a refusal of the offer.”
Rusch started her collection in 1980. “The very first thing I started collecting was advertising trade cards. Coloured cards produced in vast quantities advertised the services or goods available in Victorian times. They were given away at the point of sale. They were one of the main ways companies or shops promoted themselves. Today they are almost completely forgotten, but that is my largest collection.”
The heart of her collection is artifacts directly associated with Queen Victoria herself. Rusch produced an impressive invitation produced on thick expensive card with beautiful copperplate handwriting, which regally and formally announces:
“The Lord Chamberlain is commanded by Her Majesty to invite the Countess of Clarendon to attend the ceremony of Her Majesty’s marriage in the Chapel Royal, St James’ Palace on the 10th February 1840. Full dress. Ladies without trains.”
On the top corner of this rare artifact there appears a hand-written note, presumably written by the Countess of Clarendon herself. It says: “This will someday be a curiosity. Lord Clarendon’s name is not here because he attended the Queen’s marriage in his official capacity at the time of Lord Privy Seal.”
“It is a very great treasure,” Rusch says, “Strangely, I bought it at a collectors show in Toronto. Invitations to the Queen’s wedding are extremely rare.”
If the invitation is at the heart of her curios, a close second and third must be two items of Victoria’s clothing. Not to put too fine a point on it, Victoria’s underwear.
“Her underwear was hand-made for her. It all carried the Royal cipher and was numbered. I bought these in an auction in England by phone,” says Rusch. The items are a chemise with a 60-inch bust and a pair of knickers, 50 inches at the waist. They were, as was the fashion of the day, crotch-less with separate legs joined by a drawstring at the waist. The size of the garments says more than anything else how overweight the Queen had become, not at all like the slim young 18-year-old girl who ascended the throne in 1837.
Rusch is proud of her collection, but like all dedicated collectors she is in pursuit of what she describes as her Holy Grail. She is seeking a piece of Victoria’s wedding cake. After the wedding, a cake was cut into small pieces, sealed in suitably decorated boxes and sent to people not privileged to attend the ceremony.
“I saw one of these boxes at an exhibition in London, and a few years ago one came up for auction in New York. I placed a bid but it came second so I lost out. But I keep searching.”
Will that illusive box of wedding cake take front and centre in her collection? Time will tell, but “raving obsessive/compulsives” are not easily deterred. It would be unwise to bet against her finding her particular Holy Grail.
