A heavy box of coins once sat in a Copperas Cove home as part of a 40-year untouched collection.

“They were collected many years ago by my husband’s uncle,” said Sally Cox, 87. “I have had them for 40 years.”

Cox brought a small portion of the collection to the Olan Forest Smith VFW Post 8577, where the National Coin Collectors Association’s Antique Pickers Back Roads Tour is purchasing collectables until Saturday.

“You don’t know what you are going to get,” said Cox as Jeff Hunter, a general manager for the organization, examined her first haul of coins. “If I don’t get rid of them, someone will have to.”

The antique pickers are looking for a variety of items, such as old toys, coins, war memorabilia and jewelry, Hunter said.

The group came to Copperas Cove to make the show more accessible to area residents.

Hunter travels every day of the week for the group.

“There are so many things in different regions,” he said. “You never know what is out there, so you’ve got to go out there a lot of the time to let people know it is valuable.”

Tuesday’s crowd was steady with people entering the building almost every 30 minutes looking to sell some old items.

“Some of the shows are steady like this and then there is one where people are waiting an hour or two,” Hunter said.

Cox was excited to sell the coins she brought, so she went back home for the rest of them.

But some people, such as Winniferd Turner, 44, and Dahal Ivory, 48, both of Copperas Cove, were not as lucky.

“We thought we would have something of value,” said Ivory, who brought several items from home.

The two were disappointed their haul didn’t amount to a lot of money and they took the majority of it home.

When Cox walked back into the Veterans of Foreign Wars hall, she breathed deep and exhaled quickly as she carried a larger and heavier box inside.

Hunter bought every coin she brought in.

“I am glad to get these things out of the way,” she said.


Source: http://kdhnews.com 

A new exhibit at the Antique Boat Museum in Clayton has been under development for six months, with help from a design firm from New York City.

It's called the National Motorboat Show and focuses on the first 50 years of motorboating from roughly 1895 to around 1945.

"Our curator has gone into the storage units and found boats that have great significance to the time frame we're trying to replicate here," the museum's Mike Folsom said, "and has pulled those out for people to see and touch."

The exhibit also features early-era motorboat engines and the vintage advertising that helped launch new boats of a 100 years ago.

Museum officials say the exhibit may be up for about the next 10 years.

Source: http://www.wwnytv.com 

PITTSYLVANIA CO., Va. - A $2 buy turned out to be worth thousands of dollars and earned Pittsylvania County's Amie Pickeral a spot on national television.

She is a self-described born antiquarian.

"Most 20-year-olds aren't into antiquing," I said.

"No. Certainly not. My friends kinda get a little creeped out when they come in here," Pickeral said.

Her walls are lined with dolls -- dozens of them -- some dating back to the 1800s. It's her prized collection she started when she was 13.

She also collects old prints, letters, and books. One book published in 1632 titled, "The Lawes Resolutions of Women's Rights" about women's rights is worth more than the rest of her collection of antiques.

She found it in a box at an estate sale in Danville. It's hard to read and worn but looked like a perfect $2  buy. After some research she had a hunch it was worth more.

"It was possibly the first book ever published in the English language concerning women's rights. And I thought, hey, that is pretty cool. But I couldn't find any figures on it. So that's when we went to 'Antiques Roadshow'," Pickeral said.

"Lets have a look at it," said Martin Gammon, an appraiser from Bonhams and featured regularly on the show.

Last August the PBS show happened to be in Richmond and by the luck of the draw she was chosen to appear in front of a national audience. It was right there on camera where she discovered it's real value.

Her reaction is priceless.

"It probably has an auction estimate of this condition of $6,000 to $8,000," Gammon said.

"Oh my! Are you serious?" Pickeral said. "Oh my goodness."

The shock hasn't worn off. Since the show aired this week she's still holding that book close, where it will stay.

"I will definitely keep this book. It is absolutely my treasure," Pickeral said.

To watch the episode that aired 5/18/2014, click here.

Source: www.wdbj7.com 

CHELSEA — Marj Daniels is preparing to close another chapter in her life’s story, but she does not want the next chapter to be her last.

After 25 years as the owner of Uptown Antiques in downtown Chelsea, Daniels has closed her shop forever. It was a good run, but the time has come for her to wrap up that part of her life and get on with the next turn in her journey.

The antique store is being liquidated through an auction set for 10 a.m. May 28 at the old Ace Hardware Store next door to the Chelsea Clock Tower Annex on Main Street. A preview of the items for sale will begin at 9 a.m.

Marj opened her store in November 1989 after her family encouraged her to become a business owner. Her late husband Bob was running the family lumber business across the street at the time in front of Jiffy, with youngest son John learning the business that he now runs.

The first 10 years were fun, Marj said. The economy was strong and young couples and families would come in and buy a lot of her wares. Then a recession hit around 2000 and the fun and the boom times ended.

“People would be driving through Chelsea from out of state and if they were from the east or west coast they would see an antique store and have to stop,” Marj said.

Instead of people coming in and buying antiques they would bring things in looking to sell or even worse, bring their kids into the store like it was a museum and explain what the items were.

“The first of the month, I knew it was time to go,” Marj said at her home on Cavanaugh Lake.

Marj has been a fixture in Chelsea for decades. She grew up on a farm and was a classmate of Bob Daniels. They both attended college after high school, with Bob graduating from Michigan and Marj from Eastern Michigan University in 1951 with a fine arts degree.

They married in 1950, but knew their future was going to get off to a rough start as Bob enlisted in the Navy to avoid being drafted. That was during the Korean War and Bob served for three years.

The couple lived in New Jersey, staying in Bayonne and Woodbury, before the Navy transferred Bob to Athens, Georgia.  Life was good there as Bob was an instructor at the Supply Corps School. When his discharge came, they thought about staying in the south, but the call from Chelsea was too much for them.

The couple came back to town as Bob worked for the lumber business and Marj became a homemaker.

“We liked it here,” Marj said.

Marj said she saw the potential Chelsea had and organized many fundraisers that involved bringing the first fashion show, first home tours and a 4-H club the Fair Acres, to town.  The young couple began to take an active role in the affairs of the community.

In 1961, Bob, at 31 years old, was the mayor. During this time Marj entered the Mrs. Michigan contest and came in second. She was told she lost because her family was so young at the time (Jeff (the actor) was 5, Jody was 2 and John 1); the winner’s children ranged in age from 8 to 18.

During those years she was judged on her homemaking talents, community involvement and what kind of marriage she had.

Marj maintained her community involvement and when the Chelsea Community Hospital opened in the 1960s, she was a buyer for the gift shop for nearly 12 years. After that she worked with a friend who owned her own antique store.

“I put two and two together and decided to open my own shop,” Marj said.

Son John had purchased the former Sylvan Building which had fallen into disrepair. He renovated the building, transforming what had once been home to the Sylvan Hotel into a mix of retail space and professional offices.

Her family’s impact on the community is well known with Jeff opening the Purple Rose Theatre to Chelsea as well as helping with the Chelsea Center for the Arts.

Husband Bob and a friend are credited with bringing Craig Common from his job as a corporate chef in Ann Arbor to opening a restaurant downtown.

“He was only going to stay 13 years, but he’s been here for 27,” Marj said.

Chelsea has always possessed a progressive streak and it has kept that spirit alive today, she said. She appreciates the growth and new buildings that are popping up all over town. 

But that meant an active and involved local government.

“There isn’t a street without a curb today,” Marj said, crediting the village and city councils for keeping the town’s appearance up. “They do a really good job.”

The local schools are another feather in the town’s cap as it reflects the area’s forward-thinking tendencies, she said.

“We have always been progressive, never going backwards,” Marj said.,

For more information on the auction, visit braunandhelmer.com. All the details you will need will be there.

Don’t expect to find Marj  at the auction.

“It would bother me to see items for less than I paid for it,” she said.

Source: http://heritage.com 

HOUSTON -- Around the antique shops along lower Westheimer, a gentleman named Peter Schofield hunts for treasure.

“Sometimes I’m lucky and sometimes I’m not,” he said in his distinctly British accent, peering into the window of a building cluttered with old furniture.

Amid the funky and junky stuff scattered about the stores, Schofield searches not for bargains, but for bonanzas.

“One never knows,” he said.

But Schofield does know his art and he does know his history. So one day in 2012 when he wandered into one of the shops he regularly patrols, he knew he’d hit the jackpot.

Just as lottery players fantasize about buying a winning ticket, a good many antique collectors long to discover a lost work of valuable art gathering dust in a forgotten corner of an obscure shop. Like the Maltese falcon chased in the old movie, it’s the stuff dreams are made of.

Schofield has enjoyed his share of luck on these shopping expeditions. He tells a story about buying a damaged old painting for $1,000, spending $6,000 restoring it, then selling it for $140,000.

Now he’s about to collect the reward from the most lucrative treasure hunt of his life, when an auction house sells some rare arts works he found in 2012. On the floor of a little shop just off Westheimer Schofield discovered 17 old lithographs of drawings, undistinguished but for a unique mark: a butterfly, the little-known signature of one of the most prominent artists in American history.

“Always, Whistler, look for the butterfly.” Schofield said, pointing to the telltale clue that identified the lithographs as the work of James McNeil Whistler.

Arguably the most significant American impressionist, Whistler is best known for a painting entitled “Arrangement in Grey and Black,” the iconic work most people call “Whistler’s Mother.” But he also produced more than 150 lithographs of etchings, a fact Schofield knew when he saw those works lying amid the antiques on lower Westheimer.

Schofield bought the entire collection for $60. The owner of the antique store, which has since gone out of business, never knew what he had until Schofield told him.

“He was flabbergasted,” Schofield remembered. “He said, “Most people in Houston looked at them and thought they were very boring. They weren’t interested. And I couldn’t get five dollars each for them.’”

Sotheby’s, the famed auction house, has since offered written estimates suggesting the lithographs are worth up to $30,000 each. Schofield expects the entire collection to fetch more than $250,000.

Sadly, a half-dozen lithographs in the same batch had been chewed up by cockroaches. The destroyed works of art were worth about $300,000, Schofield said.

“Gourmet roaches,” he jokes.

So how did those valuable works of art end up collecting dust and roach bites in a shop on lower Westheimer? Schofield believes a bank obtained them during a foreclosure proceeding, then somehow unloaded them without knowing their value.

Antique dealers say that’s a common scenario. Sometimes when wealthy people die, their heirs sell valuable collectibles for bargain prices and never realize they’re dumping treasures onto the market.

“Sometimes we get lax and lazy and it bypasses us,” said Becky Pieniadz, the owner of B.J. Oldies Antique Store on Westheimer. “And then, somebody else has reaped the benefits of it. That’s okay. That’s what people come in here for.”

That’s what keeps Schofield coming back. Just a few days ago, he said, he bought a collection of Emile Zola books for $150. He figures he can sell them for more than $3,000.

“All these little shops from time to time produce very good results,” he said.

Source: www.khou.com 

MCCONNELLS — Antique tractors, big and small, attracted hundreds of visitors, young and old, to rural York County on Saturday for the 17th annual Antique Tractor and Engine Show in McConnells. Russell Dover of York, sat in a lawn chair under a tent behind three of his tractors, watching children play and adults take pictures. He was relaxed, almost as if he was watching the world go by from his front porch.

The annual McConnells show is one of nearly 100 similar events offered regionally for antique enthusiasts to display their machines or see someone else’s collection. Dover goes to many of the shows and has been doing so for several years – always with a few pieces from his collection of 25 tractors.

Nearly every tractor at the show on Saturday had a story.

Dover’s 1977 Power King, made by the Economy Tractor Company, has come a long way, he said – from sitting in a swamp in York to joining his garage about ten years ago.

Always on the look-out for an old tractor, Dover found his Power King after hearing about an unused antique tractor in York, he said. He didn’t know the man who owned the tractor, but he knocked on his door anyway to see if he’d be interested in selling it.

Dover was surprised to hear that the tractor had been abandoned a few years prior in a swamp in the man’s backyard.

“It was in bad shape. It was all rusted up,” Dover said.

After hauling the Power King from the swamp, he bought it for $700.

To many people, he said, the hunk of metal would have looked beyond salvation. But, like most antique collectors at the McConnells show, Dover has an eye for items thatrequire some restoration to return to working order.

Through his company, Upstate Tractor Restoration, Dover fixes modern, working tractors for farmers and restores antiques for himself and other collectors. He estimates he spent about $1,500 restoring the tractor he found in the swamp.

A retired truck driver, Dover said, “it’s a lot of fun to show this stuff,” but meeting new people and seeing old friends from the community is the major draw for the event. Many of the tractor shows that Dover and others attend double as benefit events for local fire or police departments.

On Saturday, firefighters and others with the McConnells Volunteer Fire Department sold plates of BBQ, baked beans and slaw to raise money for the department. The volunteer unit covers a nearly 50-square mile area of rural York County and depends on donations and fundraisers.

The event also featured wagon rides for children, craft vendors and bluegrass music.

Many people there were repeat visitors. It was the 13th year for Charles and Jean Faile of Lancaster.

Charles Faile tinkers with old engines and machine parts in his workshop. After seeing others display battery-operated and steam-powered engines, he started the hobby about six years ago.

Building and repairing engines, he said, keeps him busy in his retirement. Faile worked for 30 years with Springs Industries in Lancaster before his doctors advised him to retire after triple-bypass heart surgery.

Faile’s collection of small engines includes one that is solar powered and another that’s made from an old sewing machine wheel and VCR bearings. He also displayed a 1930 Maytag motor, complete with the old foot pedal that kept the washing machine running.

He hopes that tractor and engine shows such as the one in McConnells will help get children interested in machines. He wants young people to learn about building small engines so that they can keep the tradition going.

“You’d be surprised at the people that’s never seen anything like this.”

Source: www.enquirerherald.com 

BRIMFIELD - Brock A. Lewis, of Framingham, hit the Brimfield Outdoor Antique Shows bright and early - 5 a.m., to be exact.

And by 7 a.m., he had a $45 Mickey Mantle Louisville Slugger wooden bat to show for it.

Lewis said he bargained the bat price down $5. He collects baseball memorabilia. Some of it he keeps. Some he sells.

Why does he show up so early at the famous antique shows?

"There are other people just like me," he said.

There were plenty of shoppers out at 6:30 a.m. on Tuesday morning, the opening day of the May show, getting a glimpse of the wares in the various booths. The six-day show runs until Sunday.

The shows, which feature thousands of dealers along Route 20, attract thousands of people. Antique shows are also held in July and September.

It was Mary Moore's first time as an exhibitor at Brimfield. She operates "The Claw Foot Tub" in Amherst and reported that she was making sales - at least 10 - as she set up her booth at Sturtevant's North Field before 7 a.m.

"We were setting up and selling things. We couldn't even get them out," she said.
"People definitely like the unusual things."

One of those things was a 1960s red Columbia bicycle with handlebar tassels that she sold for $200 to a man who planned to bring it back to his "man shop" in Stockholm, Sweden.

"The guy loved the tassels," Moore said.

Going to Brimfield is a tradition for Carol A. Sylvester, of Haverhill; Joanna M. Donahoe, of Hollis, N.H.; and Leanne Kelly, of Nashua, N.H. They said they always arrive at 6:30 a.m. on the opening day of the shows, and love searching for items.

"This is amazing," Kelly said, as they browsed the Mahogany Ridge field.

James Brady, of Taunton, has been selling antiques at Brimfield for 40 years. His specialty is lighting, and he pointed out some turn-of-the-century railroad lanterns going for $40 a piece and astral oil lamps from the 1800s going for $300 each, or $600 a pair.

He said the early shoppers prefer the oil lamps, while the younger shoppers, who often arrive later in the day, prefer electric. He was in the Mahogany Ridge field.

Mother-and-daughter duo Lois G. Lichstein and Amy Karyn Lichstein were shopping for items for Amy's New Jersey store, Amy Karyn Home, which features home furnishings.

Amy Lichstein found 16 wood blocks, in a variety of designs, that she planned to use to create new patterns for fabric through the screen printing process.

She got them for $130, which after some haggling was cheaper than the original advertised price.

Amy Lichstein said she's been attending Brimfield for more than 20 years. Lois Lichstein said they come every year.

"It's great," Lois Lichstein said. "The whole excitement of the place. You can always find something. You never go home empty-handed. The truck's always full."

Source: www.masslive.com 

ST. LOUIS (KSDK) - Furniture from the 1960s, which is known as mid-century modern, is all the rage, thanks to TV shows such as Mad Men starring Jon Hamm.

And that's great news for vintage dealers in St. Louis.

Claude Denis owns The Future Antiques, and he's had a successful business for decades.

He has sold clothing to the costume designer on Mad Men and furniture to the producers of the movie Gone Girl, which was shot in Missouri.

But his newest customers are 20 and 30-somethings.

"They're coming around and realizing that they can buy a piece of midcentury furniture for basically the same price and in many cases less and it's been around for 40-50 years, so it's going to last another 40-50 years," Denis said. "And they're doing their eco-friendly job of trying to recycle."

Please click the link below to watch the video:

Source: http://www.ksdk.com/story/entertainment/television/today-in-st-louis/2014/05/12/the-future-antiques-midcentury-modern-furniture/8992961/ 

Prairie Public Broadcasting’s “Antiques Roadshow” will be in Bismarck May 31.

Ruth is elated because she wants to have me appraised. She says it will be better than an MRI to have one of those roadshow appraisers look me over and decide whether I am real or fake. She already knows I am an antique.We watch the “Antiques Roadshow.” It’s nostalgic to see all of those things we grew up with. In some cases, people are getting big bucks for stuff we could have saved if we had known.

Some folks come up with real pricey antiques bought at garage sales or salvaged from dumpsters. “Antiques Roadshow” has really helped the garage sale market. Of course, the garbage collectors hate to see all of that junk scattered around the dumpsters.

Ruth is on the right track. As we get older, one could start out real and become fake. I don’t know of any aging person who is proud of approaching inevitable decrepitness. So we fake it.

The Medicare people appreciate it when we pretend we don’t need medical help. Of course, there are always some folks who have no self-respect, running to the doctor for every hangnail. They think they are cheating the government, but taxpayers are the victims.

Auction sales used to be real entertainment for me. I loved the camaraderie of other cheapskates. I would even buy something once in a while. I have 57 screwdrivers to prove it. That’s not an exaggeration; it’s an actual count. I find it difficult to resist those boxes of junk going for a dollar.

But I no longer have any interest in durable goods. The only advertisements in the Sunday paper that interest me are the grocery inserts and restaurant discount coupons — immediate usable items.

One time Phil Harmeson, my associate in the University of North Dakota Bureau of Governmental Affairs, was trying to persuade former Gov. John Davis, R-N.D., to buy airline tickets 30 days in advance to save money on his travel to a gathering of governors we were sponsoring.

“Look!” Davis said. “I don’t even buy green bananas.”

It was an old line but really funny when said by a former governor.

Folks respond to becoming antiques in unpredictable ways. Some decide to splurge on fancy vehicles to burn up the estate before they go. Apparently, they doubt the intelligence of their spendthrift kids, often for good reason.

At our house, we are on the frugal side. In fact, our car is so old it eats hay. I buy tires one at a time as needed. A gas fill is now 5 gallons. As for my aged pickup, it has none. If it were a horse, I would shoot it.

Pharmacies are now authorized to go from 30-day to 90-day supplies of drugs. Just think of the windfall with folks leaving huge drug collections behind after Medicare has paid for them. Most medications are going to outlive people.

Gun fever has seniors behaving as though they were fighting snakes. The National Rifle Association has them believing they needs guns to “stand” their ground even though they don’t have anything worth stealing.

With reduced cognitive skills, they are more likely to shoot themselves than a burglar skulking in the dark. Their homes have never been burglarized, but everybody needs something to fear. It justifies irrationality.

The man said that we have nothing to fear but fear itself. It seems that fear is back. I am beginning to fear the fear of others, especially when they have guns.

I wonder if the “Antiques Roadshow” will have rest areas.

(Lloyd Omdahl, of Grand Forks, is a former lieutenant governor, state tax commissioner and state budget director)

Source: www.jamestownsun.com