Soooo......Why Collect VPOTUS Gallery Passes to the U.S. Senate Chamber? Glad You Asked!

Flag of the Vice President of the United States - Image Credit: Wikipedia Commons

When people first hear that I collect Vice President's gallery passes to the U.S. Senate Chamber, they typically respond with genuine interest - though with a slight undertone of thinking, "that's an oddly specific sort of thing to collect." And it is! As such, I thought it would be helpful to readers to provide some background on what got me into this subfield of American political memorabilia collecting. Overall, as a historian who specializes in several aspects of American history, I have long been fascinated with studying Members of Congress, Presidents, Vice Presidents, and other noteworthy political figures. I have also long been fascinated by American political ephemera - especially Congressional Gallery Passes. I remember visiting the U.S. Capitol Building as a teenager and first seeing these elegant, ornately designed passes - thinking they were a "Golden Ticket" of sorts to experience amazing things. So when I first saw the even more ornate Vice President's gallery passes to the U.S. Senate Chamber some years later, that feeling was magnified. Against this contextual backdrop, I also started to collect these passes in earnest in recent years due to following (more practical) reasons:

1) Compared to other areas of collecting (like historical signatures or autographs), VPOTUS Gallery U.S. Senate Chamber passes are not nearly as expensive. Some can be purchased online for as low as about $20. While others can get more expensive (running in the hundreds or in some rare cases thousands of dollars), they are still on average significantly less expensive than some other sorts of historical political documents.

2)  Coming from a background of collecting historical signatures/autographs, another nice thing is that determining authenticity of signature is not a big issue with VPOTUS Gallery U.S. Senate Chamber passes. To be sure, it's nice when they have an authentic signature on them, but the point of collecting them is to get the pass itself (not the signature), so the autopen/stamped ones are just as good. Thus, one doesn't have to deal with the stress of authenticating signatures as much with these passes.

3) These passes are a gateway to learning about fascinating people (Vice Presidents of the United States) and the times in which they led. 

4) The passes are also (in my view) beautiful pieces of art. As their design has evolved over time, it is also interesting to study how their appearance has changed and which historical figures played roles in making those changes.

5) There is also a fair amount of detective work involved with this subfield of collecting - trying to figure out which Vice President's had passes issued and which did not. Even though these passes are fairly modern, there is a great deal we do not know about them, so doing the detective work to get those answers is exciting. 

6) Lastly, as there are not (yet) legions of people who are into this subfield of collecting, it is not yet fully defined, thus allowing lots of amazing opportunities to help shape how it will evolve from here.

With all of that being said (or written), I welcome you to come along on a journey with me so we can learn together about VPOTUS Gallery passes to the U.S. Senate Chamber. Welcome aboard!