...for all the marbles (histarch)

I recall the now of late late night TV host Tom Snyder who once visited with a man in the Seattle area who (as i recall) had over an estimated 1 million glass marbles in his collection. I think it was tied in with a contemporary artist on a wharf there who worked in the furnace "glory holes" of art glass making and blowing. It was an interesting show. There was an excavation in lower Manhattan which recovered some clay marbles as you describe in "Alphabet City" which is named from the avenues made on top of land fill, where previous the various shipyards had been (Webb, whom our government ignored became an Institute of naval architecture on Long Island) and their "church on a barge" (around 10th Street and Avenue C?) are named using the alphabet rather than a negative number, using Avenue A, Avenue B, etc. instead of 0 Ave., -1 Ave. -2 Ave. from west to east into the East River. Not really a river it was also called the Sound River as it connects with the Long Island Sound through the former Hellgate (from Dutch "light gate" foaming water over rocks) and because of prevailing west to east winds, made it advantageous for the mooring of ships in the age of sail. In this cistern feature, "circa Civil War water control feature" next door to a ship "furniture" workshop, apparently occupied by two tailors over it, were also "abolitionist" coins that were minted and distributed in the coinage of the city to remind people of the cause of abolition, perhaps in competition with "bar tokens". On the same lot the Steven Spielberg film "Batteries Not Included" was filmed and nearby were local gardens that were threatened under the former Mayor Giuliani administration which was stopped by an effort started by Bette Midler to purchase all the community gardens from the city to keep the small pocket gardens alive which was followed by larger donations. She was given an award in parks and preservation on Long Island, NY sometime after. The behavior you cite seems to be consistent thrown away along with the remains of over a dozen chamber pots which may have coincided with arrival in that neighborhood with public water. It seemed to be a complete set with large shooters and smaller marbles, glazed, hand painted and glass. The site was to be a housing police headquarters for all public housing below 42nd Street and to contain some low to middle income housing. The contractor hired non-union workers and we had to cross a picket line there to work. I lost a toolbox perhaps as a result. We used to have lunch around the corner in the Castillo de Jaguar. It was a rough neighborhood, and one episode of "Law and Order" with Jerry Orbach was taped while we were there. The "PSA 4 (Police Service Area) Site".