As a kid I was in love with old movies, old books, comics, toys—anything nostalgic. In fact my very first startup, a gourmet food business based on my grandfather’s famous barbecue sauce recipe from his pre-World War II restaurant, was an outgrowth of this fascination. As an adult I had a vintage loft apartment in Chicago that was filled with my collection of autographs of movie comedians, a working Victrola, two working Philco radios, a working crank telephone and a working candlestick phone just like Sam Spade might have used. My apartment looked like a high class junk shop. It’s one thing to play Frank Sinatra tunes as a prelude to romance, but playing a 78 rpm disc of “Someone To Watch Over Me” by ‘Ol Blue Eyes on a hand cranked phonograph slayed them every time.
