Buttonholed by history: His memorabilia dates to 1820

Paul Bengston was different from the other boys in the Minnetonka neighborhood where he grew up in the 1960s and early '70s. At age 10, while his pals collected Marvel comic books or chased the latest Roger Maris baseball card, Bengston was searching high and low for pins from Franklin Delano Roosevelt's political campaigns. The cherished baseball cards probably ended up in Mom's garage sale after his friends left for college. But Bengston's childhood hobby blossomed into what he calls an "adult obsession." Today, he spends nights and weekends tracking down rare treasures to add to his vast collection of political memorabilia, which includes about 30,000 items from 1820 to the present -- with a special focus on Minnesota political history. To put Bengston's collection in perspective, the Minnesota Historical Society owns... [read full story]