COLLECTING BARF BAGS

 

Steve Silberberg was flying from Boston to San Francisco as a college student in 1982 when he took note of the small bag in front of him.

I bet no one collects these, he thought.

So he swiped the bag — United, light blue, instructions helpfully written on the surface — and put it on his door. Friends started offering bags from their own travels. Thus, the collection that became the Air Sickness Bag Virtual Museum, now numbering more than 3,200 specimens, was born.

One can tell a lot about an airline's image from their Air Sickness Bags, Silberberg, 61, writes on one of the two sites dedicated to his hobby. Some barf bags are no more than a baggie with a twist tie, while other sickbags could win international design competitions. Are they art? I think so.

He's not the only one. Contrary to his thought four decades ago, other collectors around the world share his offbeat enthusiasm, posting their own prized possessions online, trading for new finds and even connecting in person at airline memorabilia events during pre-pandemic times.

But the global community of baggists, as some call themselves, is small and not growing — in part due to an aging cohort and because fans say bags just aren't that great anymore. Instead of the branded or whimsically designed ones from the past, many airlines are providing plain white options.

I think it's shrinking a bit because of a lack of new bags, said Bruce Kelly, 79, a retired corrections worker in Anchorage whose maintains Kelly's World of Airsickness Bags online. His collection tops 7,300, which many of the world's top enthusiasts have dropped by to see.

Kelly said he believes there were somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 baggists at one point. He's not sure how many are active now.

Paul Mundy, a Germany-based communications specialist who works in international relations, has nearly 2,500 bags in a collection that started by necessity. (Have you flown with the toddler? he asked a reporter with a 2-year-old. Try it. And you will become interested in airsickness bags, too.) But he only grabs a new bag on the rare occasions that he flies and hasn't updated his site, Bagophily.com, for several years.

The virtual museum has earned Silberberg a small measure of fame; he is even featured in this year's Dull Men's Club Calendar for July. But he'd really love to bring the museum to a brick-and-mortar existence.

John adds:

To read the complete article, see:
Meet the people collecting airplane barf bags (https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2022/10/01/airplane-barf-bag-museum/)

To read the earlier E-Sylum article, see:
WEIRD THINGS PEOPLE COLLECT (https://www.coinbooks.org/v23/esylum_v23n23a40.html)

 

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