A record price of $32,000 was paid last year in San Francisco for a typewriter with mother-of-pearl keys.

The record was quickly broken when an 1867 Malling Hansen Writing Ball typewriter sold at Auction Team Breker in Germany for $84,000. The strange-looking machine has keys that protrude from a circular, slightly domed top piece. The keys strike down onto the paper.

This rare typewriter, the Malling Hansen Writing Ball, was made in 1867. It auctioned for the record price of 4,000 in Germany.

At the same sale, an 1873 Sholes & Glidden typewriter made by E. Remington & Sons brought $33,500. The Edison Mimeograph typewriter made in 1894 auctioned at $12,300.

European auction houses are leading the way to high prices for technical collector’s items, but interest is gaining in the United States as well.

Common typewriters of the 20th century do not bring high prices. But the early, rare machines are selling, usually at special shows or shops.

When you clean Grandma’s attic, pay attention to the old typewriter you find up there. It might have value.

I bought a child’s wall clock for $2 at a flea market. It is a rectangular scene of a child’s bedroom. The scene shows a child in bed with a lamp on the bedside table and a working clock on the wall. The clock is marked “Spartus.” Can you tell me when it was made?

The Spartus brand name is found on kitschy table and wall clocks of the 1950s and ’60s. The brand was purchased by General Time Corp. in 1996. When General Time Corp. went bankrupt in 2001, the Spartus brand and other General Time brand names, including Westclox and Big Ben, were acquired by Salton Inc.

My family has been packaging cheese for many years. We have some old cheese-making bowls and utensils, but we want to collect more. What is available?

Cheese has been a popular food since ancient times. In 18th-century England and France, cheese-making was not just the industry of farmers; it also became a fashionable pastime of the rich to pretend to be dairymaids.

Special strainers, skimmers, dairy spoons, butter kits, molds, whey cups and other utensils were made by famous potters like Wedgwood. They even made pieces with monograms or coats of arms as decorations.

You could also look for cheese-serving pieces, like covered cheese stands, cheese boxes, cheese toasters and cheese scoops. Less-expensive items are cheese labels and packing boxes.

My husband was a plumber for the city of New York. In 1988, he was working at the city penitentiary on Rikers Island when he dug up an old, dark-brown beer bottle. The quart bottle is embossed with a sunburst and the name of the brewery, Obermeyer & Liebmann. Can you tell us the bottle’s age and value?

David Obermeyer and Joseph Liebmann operated their Brooklyn brewery from 1868 to 1924. The earliest glass beer bottles, dating from about 1870, were plain. Embossed bottles, like the one your husband found, were being used by about 1885. The bottle is worth about $40.

I have a small, brown purse with a celluloid clasp that pictures the Dionne quintuplets as toddlers. All five are wearing pink and are sitting in front of a pile of blocks. The clasp measures 1 inch by 1 3/8 inches. A tag inside the silk-lined bag reads “Dionne Quintuplets, Exclusive license, Herz and Kory.” What is the purse worth?

The Dionne quintuplets, the only known set of identical quints in the world, were born on May 28, 1934. Your purse, made of a leatherlike material, dates from about 1936. It was available in brown, red, blue or green. The clasp alone is worth about $25. The purse with the clasp would sell for up to $75.

What is pinchbeck?

Pinchbeck is a metal made of zinc and copper that was used to make jewelry in the 18th and 19th centuries. It looked like real gold. Christopher Pinchbeck invented the alloy about 1720 and used it for watch cases.

Until the 1830s, the name “pinchbeck” was used only for the metal he created. Later, the term was used to refer to many types of gilt metal.

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