Why Spoons? The hobby of collecting souvenir spoons dates to Americans vacationing in Europe in the mid-1800s. These travelers brought back spoons with the names of European cities or famous landmarks. By the 1890s, United States silver companies started producing special spoons for American cities, landmarks, and anniversaries. The spoons became incredibly popular and relatively affordable due to the low price of silver at the time. The fad ended by World War I. Souvenir spoons continue to be sold at tourist sites, but are now more of a niche collectible.

In the 1800s and into the early 1900s, it was not uncommon for tourists to want to take a memento from a landmark home with them—literally. “Souvenir hunters,” as they were known, sometimes took actual pieces of a historic site or landmark, such as chipping a stone from Plymouth Rock or a piece of wood from Mount Vernon. This practice damaged these sites and was essentially theft. In the late 1800s, some organizations that operated historic sites started selling trinkets as an alternative to souvenir hunting. Today, most tourist destinations have a gift shop.