Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome the show.
Speaker 2: This is Martin Willis your host. Well, this is my
Speaker 2: one d and ninety ninth show on the Antifa Auction Forum.
Speaker 2: It would be nice to hear from a few people.
Speaker 2: I don't want to make sure that I still have
Speaker 2: some listeners out there, because I have taken a break
Speaker 2: here and there, and this one has been a very
Speaker 2: long break. Recently, I did have Robert Whitman on I
Speaker 2: hope you caught that show. I thought that was fascinating.
Speaker 2: He's a fantastic, wonderful guest in my opinion. So I
Speaker 2: wouldn't mind hearing from you letting me know that you
Speaker 2: still listen, and you can reach me at Auction Podcast
Speaker 2: at m that's Auction podcast at.
Speaker 1: Me dot com.
Speaker 2: So this podcast was actually the first one of its kind.
Speaker 2: I started back in two thousand and nine, and that's
Speaker 2: going back to when creating a podcast was extremely difficult.
Speaker 2: It took several weeks with people that actually knew what
Speaker 2: they were doing to help me build a website in
Speaker 2: what's called an RSS feed to make that work properly,
Speaker 2: and then to get it on Apple Podcasts, you had
Speaker 2: to be approved and wait forever. Now everything can be
Speaker 2: done in an instant from what I understand. When it
Speaker 2: was running steady, I did watch others come along and
Speaker 2: start to do some antiques and art related podcasts, but
Speaker 2: this particular show was rated number one in the category
Speaker 2: of arts for many years, and then I just basically
Speaker 2: got very busy and time slips away, as it always does.
Speaker 2: But I never have lost my passion what I'm actually
Speaker 2: lucky enough to do, and that's being involved in the
Speaker 2: wonderful world of antiques, collecting, auctions and so much more.
Speaker 2: In a lot has to do with history, I believe,
Speaker 2: and therefore I've had a number of gooes related to history,
Speaker 2: and I do believe I'm going to have a pretty
Speaker 2: interesting one coming up, so stay tuned for that. I
Speaker 2: don't have one hundred percent of a commitment, so I
Speaker 2: do not want to announce that yet, but so I
Speaker 2: will be trying to put some of these shows out there,
Speaker 2: you know, more often than I have in the last
Speaker 2: number of years. So I've never really done a monologue before.
Speaker 2: I've never really spoke much about how I got into antiques,
Speaker 2: but I thought I would talk a little bit about
Speaker 2: that and some of the unique things that happened along
Speaker 2: the way now, back in the nineteen sixties and seventies,
Speaker 2: I have to say, well, at least where I lived
Speaker 2: and the people that I knew, it was really cool
Speaker 2: to like anteaks and interesting and started with me. Actually,
Speaker 2: when I started bottle digging, I think I might have
Speaker 2: been I don't know, eight or nine years old.
Speaker 1: I walked back.
Speaker 2: We had a property that was built in eighteen eighty
Speaker 2: eight and southern Maine, right out on the border of
Speaker 2: New Hampshire, and it was a nice house on top.
Speaker 2: It was called Winter Hill, was a house on top
Speaker 2: of a hill overlooking a river, and it was a
Speaker 2: beautiful spot. And in the corner I noticed when I
Speaker 2: was always walking around trying to avoid poison ivy.
Speaker 1: But it never worked. I usually got it.
Speaker 2: Along the border of the property on one side there
Speaker 2: was a stone wall, and along the stone wall it
Speaker 2: was kind of like a hill by the stone wall.
Speaker 2: And I realized one day when I saw old rusty
Speaker 2: cans and broken glass that it was a bottle dump.
Speaker 2: So I started digging there, digging the bottles, and I
Speaker 2: would find these bottles that would say, you know, these
Speaker 2: doctor's remedies.
Speaker 1: And things like that.
Speaker 2: A lot of broken bottles by the way, but still
Speaker 2: some whole ones that were pretty interesting in an ink
Speaker 2: well and trying to figure things out as a little kid.
Speaker 2: Then I got my friends involved, and we got quickly
Speaker 2: rather sick of that dump and we started looking around
Speaker 2: at early you know, homes and started finding some fantastic things,
Speaker 2: you know, as a kid, when you're little like that,
Speaker 2: I was more intrigued by the color of the glass,
Speaker 2: even the shards and the embossed you know, bottles that
Speaker 2: would say these strange things, and a lot of them,
Speaker 2: of course, in the lighten eighteen hundreds, you know, contained
Speaker 2: alcohol and sometimes drugs, you know, cocaine and all kinds
Speaker 2: of things, you know, things to keep the baby quiet.
Speaker 2: So but anyway, it's it was really interesting I had.
Speaker 1: I had a fascination right away, is what I'm getting
Speaker 1: at now.
Speaker 2: There were a few things in our barn when I
Speaker 2: was growing up, and also that was rather interesting, and
Speaker 2: so my sisters and I asked my father one day
Speaker 2: if we could have I don't even know if they
Speaker 2: called them garage sales back then, but we had a
Speaker 2: garage down at the very bottom of the hill and
Speaker 2: a little driveway to it, and so my sisters and
Speaker 2: I set up on a Saturday, and I want to say, well,
Speaker 2: I'm going to find out. You're going to find out
Speaker 2: how old I am when I say this, But I'm
Speaker 2: going to say it was nineteen sixty four or five
Speaker 2: something like that. And so we had this yard sale
Speaker 2: and not even advertised and just a sign, and it
Speaker 2: stood out there. I sold a lot of old bottles
Speaker 2: and things, and between I think we did it for
Speaker 2: two or three days, and between the three of us
Speaker 2: back in that time, we made forty dollars and that
Speaker 2: was absolutely huge. I'd never seen money like that, that is,
Speaker 2: back then at that time. And so my father got
Speaker 2: wind of it, and he thought that was really He
Speaker 2: wasn't upset or anything to demon asked for part of
Speaker 2: the money. I don't think. I don't remember he did,
Speaker 2: but anyway, he had an interest in antiques, but you know,
Speaker 2: just like a passing interest, I want to say, at
Speaker 2: the time. But he couldn't believe that we made that
Speaker 2: kind of money. So I think we might have set
Speaker 2: up a few other times and never really had that
Speaker 2: success that we did that day. And I don't know
Speaker 2: if that planted the seed in any type of way
Speaker 2: for my dad. Or not along the way. So years
Speaker 2: went by and I was fifteen years old, and my
Speaker 2: father was very involved in the Lions Club, and he
Speaker 2: was also involved in our town as the chairman of
Speaker 2: the Board of Selectments. So they basically called him, maybe jokingly,
Speaker 2: they called him the mayor of the town. He was
Speaker 2: also involved in the Lion's Club, and they would have
Speaker 2: a yearly junk auction. I guess that's what you call it,
Speaker 2: but they didn't particularly call it that. But anyway, so
Speaker 2: that was at a little grange hall and that was
Speaker 2: an Elliot, Maine in nineteen seventy. The auctioneer that was
Speaker 2: to auction everything. He drove up and he staggered in
Speaker 2: and he was actually drunk, very drunk, so at the
Speaker 2: time a silly thing to do, but they did it
Speaker 2: at the time. They put him back in the car
Speaker 2: and told him to go home. Hopefully he made it there.
Speaker 1: I never heard anything other than that.
Speaker 2: But so then someone said to my dad, Hey, well
Speaker 2: you're the mayor, why don't you get up and sell
Speaker 2: this stuff at auction. So my dad, you know, he
Speaker 2: was kind of a towering fear six foot two, and
Speaker 2: he got up there and just started auctioning and you know,
Speaker 2: taking whatever he could get for some things, and you know,
Speaker 2: he did a wonderful job. It was a natural talent
Speaker 2: at it. Right after the auction, someone came up to
Speaker 2: him and said, Hey, what are you doing right now?
Speaker 2: I want to show you a bunch of things at
Speaker 2: my barn, you know, down on River Road. So we
Speaker 2: went down there and there was all kinds of actually
Speaker 2: nice antiques that this person inherited. So the next thing,
Speaker 2: you know, he ran an auction at the same grange hall,
Speaker 2: but you know, of nice things and people came for it.
Speaker 2: Now I'm sure he advertised. I don't know any of
Speaker 2: the details, but I remember I was at every single
Speaker 2: one and I helped out. Ever since I was fifteen
Speaker 2: years old. The auctions grew and grew, and he ended
Speaker 2: up actually renting a hall and he had an upholstery
Speaker 2: shop and he let someone else run that, which was
Speaker 2: my uncle. And then he went to the Portsmouth, New
Speaker 2: Hampshire area where I am today, and he rented like
Speaker 2: the bottom of a mall that was there, and it
Speaker 2: was a lot of warehouse space. I remember the name
Speaker 2: of the gallery at the time. But he would run
Speaker 2: started to run regular auctions, and he used the lighthouse
Speaker 2: for his logo, which he was a light keeper. And
Speaker 2: an amazing story I've, you know, told to some friends
Speaker 2: and a few people that when my dad was a
Speaker 2: lightkeeper at the and the Coast Guard, he was at
Speaker 2: what's called Whaleback Light, which is an old lighthouse and
Speaker 2: right off the coast of Kittery, Maine in Portsmouth Harbor.
Speaker 2: And he was there alone, you know, for days at
Speaker 2: a time, many days at a time, and he got
Speaker 2: very lonely, so he would call at nighttime. He would
Speaker 2: call an operator just so he didn't feel so alone,
Speaker 2: and one day he asked if he could actually meet her,
Speaker 2: and he went head over heels, and that is my mother.
Speaker 2: They ended up getting married, having four children. I know
Speaker 2: I wandered a bit there, but my dad decided to
Speaker 2: use a lighthouse as his logo, which I actually still
Speaker 2: use today. So he started having lots of auctions, and
Speaker 2: he built a really good reputation. He just started getting
Speaker 2: nicer and nicer things as he went along. He decided
Speaker 2: to build an auction hall, and at that time I
Speaker 2: had kind.
Speaker 1: Of itchy feet.
Speaker 2: I decided to want to see the country a little bit,
Speaker 2: and someone that he was dealing with had an auction
Speaker 2: hall in Colorado, in a little town called Naiwat. He
Speaker 2: haphazardly said, hey, if you ever want to work for me,
Speaker 2: come on out and I'll teach you how to do
Speaker 2: refinishing and auctioning all that. So that was back in
Speaker 2: nineteen seventy six seven somewhere around there. Decided I wanted
Speaker 2: to go out there, and you know, my father, I
Speaker 2: don't believe he had told me at the time that
Speaker 2: he was going to be building the auction hall, but
Speaker 2: he did start to make plans for that. And that's
Speaker 2: back in the town where we grew up, Me and
Speaker 2: my sisters grew up in Elliot, Maine. I moved to
Speaker 2: Colorado and I worked out that was a lot of work.
Speaker 2: I learned how to refinish furniture that was really popular.
Speaker 2: You know, there's mixed reviews about whether you should refinish
Speaker 2: something old or not, but basically mostly turned to the
Speaker 2: century oak and walnut and Victorian. That was what was
Speaker 2: brought out there and refinished, and actually it made a
Speaker 2: huge difference. That's what people wanted. So there was a
Speaker 2: lot of that. I learned how to do that and
Speaker 2: enjoyed that, and then I worked the auctions. The auctions
Speaker 2: were really big, really busy, and so I worked these
Speaker 2: auctions out there and decided that I wanted to go
Speaker 2: to auction school. So back in nineteen seventy seven, in August,
Speaker 2: I was actually at auction school when elvistied, so that's
Speaker 2: when I know when that was. So I went to
Speaker 2: this auction school in Missouri, auction school in Kansas City,
Speaker 2: and I really had a fun time and learned a lot,
Speaker 2: but I didn't like the way they auctioned. It wasn't
Speaker 2: the way I was used to. It was fast, and
Speaker 2: it was you know, really the rolling off the tongue
Speaker 2: and things like that.
Speaker 1: That's that's just not me.
Speaker 2: But you know, and I tried to adopt that type
Speaker 2: of auctioning, but I ended up basically having my own
Speaker 2: type of auctioning, and that's basically just getting the numbers
Speaker 2: out there and being you know, connecting with the people
Speaker 2: and you know, things like that. So I was out
Speaker 2: there for a number of years, and meanwhile, my father
Speaker 2: built the auction hall, and basically I came back to
Speaker 2: the area and started working with him again. Now I'm
Speaker 2: going to tell kind of a story that you know,
Speaker 2: is one of these things that there's many stories like
Speaker 2: this that I've heard and seen, but this, you know,
Speaker 2: happened personally. So he and I were in discussions about
Speaker 2: me actually taking over the auction business, actually buying the
Speaker 2: auction business from him, and he wanted to do some
Speaker 2: traveling himself, and he worked hard for many, many years
Speaker 2: and deserved it.
Speaker 1: So I was all about it. I was pretty excited
Speaker 1: about it.
Speaker 2: So we went on a couple of interesting calls, and
Speaker 2: I'm going to talk about them once rather hilarious, but
Speaker 2: this one was very interesting. I probably should have told
Speaker 2: the other one first, but because I believe it actually
Speaker 2: happened before this, I know it did. But anyway, I'll
Speaker 2: just tell this story. We were called to someone down
Speaker 2: at Ipswich, Massachusetts, and he said he had a lot
Speaker 2: of colonial antiques and a lot of nice things, and
Speaker 2: he was, you know, from a long descent in his
Speaker 2: family in the Ipswich, Massachusetts area. And so we went
Speaker 2: down there and he had things like as Simon Willard
Speaker 2: banjo clock, and I can't remember a whole lot of things,
Speaker 2: but I remember that he was in a wheelchair and
Speaker 2: he said to me, hey, go over to the tall
Speaker 2: case clock, grandfather clock, and reach down inside and you're
Speaker 2: going to feel a velvet bag and grab that and
Speaker 2: bring it to me. So I did, and it was
Speaker 2: very light, not really much in it, and so he
Speaker 2: took it out and he handed it to me and
Speaker 2: he said turn it over and read it, and so
Speaker 2: I did.
Speaker 1: And it was stamped Revere. So it was a Paul.
Speaker 2: Revere, an original Paul Revere spoon. And I know it
Speaker 2: doesn't sound like much, but it's it's a good story,
Speaker 2: you know, because of how it evolves. But he also
Speaker 2: asked us to take some things that were in his garage.
Speaker 2: He said, really, I'm giving you these nice things. And
Speaker 2: I do remember there was the Simon Willard banjo clock.
Speaker 2: At the time was pretty valuable and I can't remember
Speaker 2: what we got for it, but it was a lot
Speaker 2: at the time. Now they're not selling so high these days.
Speaker 2: But anyway, so we're looking around in the garage and
Speaker 2: he says, could you please. You know, it's kind of
Speaker 2: like here's the deal. You know, you get the good stuff,
Speaker 2: but you're going to have to sell this stuff too.
Speaker 2: So we loaded up a bunch of box loots and
Speaker 2: he said it was basically things that he could not
Speaker 2: sell it as yard sale that he had and so
Speaker 2: things had prices on him. We took the prices off
Speaker 2: and all that and sold them just more or less
Speaker 2: as box lots.
Speaker 1: So we had the auction.
Speaker 2: We advertised a Paul Revere spoon and took pictures of it,
Speaker 2: had it in the Antiques and Arts Weekly and things
Speaker 2: like that. There was no internet, of course, back I'm
Speaker 2: talking this is I believe in nineteen eighty six, so
Speaker 2: there was no Internet or anything back then. The spoon
Speaker 2: came up to bid, and it's really nothing these days,
Speaker 2: but you know, back in nineteen eighty six, I believe
Speaker 2: it brought eleven hundred dollars for a single spoon, and
Speaker 2: that's you know, that was not a lot of things
Speaker 2: brought that kind of money, So it was it was exciting.
Speaker 1: Of the clock.
Speaker 2: Of course, bought more and brought more, and I don't
Speaker 2: remember what else we sold for him, except you know,
Speaker 2: the bunch of box lots and things like that. So
Speaker 2: the person that bought the spoon was the local and
Speaker 2: he lived in the Pepperrell House in Kidtery Point, Maine,
Speaker 2: which is a beautiful old mansion historical and he came
Speaker 2: in the next day and he said, I want to
Speaker 2: show you something, and what he brought was five Paul
Speaker 2: Revere spoons and this was the sixth one. It was
Speaker 2: the exact one, had the same monogram on it. Somehow
Speaker 2: that got away from his family like a hundred years ago,
Speaker 2: and he had always known and his father before him,
Speaker 2: they always knew of five spoons, and the sixth poons,
Speaker 2: the sixth spoon came back to them. So he was
Speaker 2: just so happy, and he wanted to show that to us,
Speaker 2: and he wanted to make sure that we knew that
Speaker 2: it came home, and so that was really exciting. My
Speaker 2: dad decided to leave and travel and he traveled on
Speaker 2: the Blue Highways, that's what he wanted to do, all
Speaker 2: around the country. And meanwhile I was buying the auction
Speaker 2: gallery from him, not the real estate, but just the
Speaker 2: business itself. Was really excited running my own auctions, and
Speaker 2: right away things did very well. I had a very
Speaker 2: successful start. I was really happy about that. So I'm
Speaker 2: going to say that was in I believe it was
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty six going toward nineteen eighty seven when I
Speaker 2: actually bought the auction hall and he bought the auction business,
Speaker 2: and he left for the road. So one day I
Speaker 2: got a phone call, and this phone call was from
Speaker 2: a reporter, and the reporter said they were doing a
Speaker 2: freelance writer and I could have swe They said Time magazine,
Speaker 2: but I'm not really sure. It was some mainstream magazine.
Speaker 2: I just can't remember the name of it. And they
Speaker 2: said that we sold in a box slot, something really rare,
Speaker 2: and did we have any idea, And they said it
Speaker 2: originated at our auction, and they rattled off the name
Speaker 2: of the dealer that bought the box slot at my
Speaker 2: auction and what he sold the item for, and they
Speaker 2: talked about the chain of.
Speaker 1: Events that happened.
Speaker 2: So the box lot was purchased for seventy five dollars,
Speaker 2: which was actually quite high for a box slot. What
Speaker 2: a box loot is, it's just stuff that can't be
Speaker 2: sold alone.
Speaker 1: So it's grouped in a.
Speaker 2: Bunch and put in a box and put underneath the tables.
Speaker 2: And people look through these things and they decide whether
Speaker 2: they want to bid on them or not, and so
Speaker 2: they usually don't bring They usually bring like ten or
Speaker 2: fifteen dollars. So that's what they did at the time.
Speaker 2: Some people would just buy box slots. But this guy
Speaker 2: was a professor of music and he was pretty sharper.
Speaker 2: His name was Stan Hedinger, and he was also, you know,
Speaker 2: quite involved in the antique business way back in the
Speaker 2: seventies and eighties until he passed away in the nineties.
Speaker 2: So Stan bought this box loot for seventy five dollars
Speaker 2: and inside of it was a fragment of a rug
Speaker 2: and I do not recall it at all, but it
Speaker 2: was in, you know, in one of the box lots,
Speaker 2: So it was a fragment of an old rug, and
Speaker 2: he actually thought it was pretty cool and unique looking.
Speaker 2: He brought it to an antique show in New Hampshire
Speaker 2: and he sold it, I believe, for I think I
Speaker 2: heard around five hundred dollars, but you know, I can't
Speaker 2: remember clearly exactly what the amount was. So it ended
Speaker 2: up eventually, it sold many times and ended up eventually
Speaker 2: selling in brust at a rare rug and textile auction.
Speaker 2: So this person on the phone said that they are
Speaker 2: writing the story about this fragment that originated at my
Speaker 2: auction and has recently sold for three hundred and twenty
Speaker 2: five thousand dollars in Brussels, and so that would be
Speaker 2: like a million dollars today. That was in nineteen eighty six,
Speaker 2: and so at the time I was just absolutely flabbergasted,
Speaker 2: and I said, well, what exactly was it? And they
Speaker 2: said it was an extremely rare, unknown twelfth century fragment
Speaker 2: of a rug. And you know, as as it stands,
Speaker 2: you know, textiles are biodegradable, so for this thing to
Speaker 2: have lasted this many years was just unheard of. And
Speaker 2: so just a frag been of a rug at that
Speaker 2: time sold for that kind of money, and that was
Speaker 2: just like a number I never heard, you know, anything
Speaker 2: so for at auction, unless it's down in New York
Speaker 2: or in Europe and it's something really special.
Speaker 1: You know, you just never heard those numbers.
Speaker 2: So I said, you know, I had just bought the
Speaker 2: auction business, and there was just no way that I
Speaker 2: could have my name tied to something that I sold
Speaker 2: or my father, who was ever auctioning at the time,
Speaker 2: sold for seventy five dollars for it to actually have
Speaker 2: a record that we missed the boat on that one
Speaker 2: and it sold for over three hundred thousand dollars. I
Speaker 2: just couldn't have it out there. So I said, you
Speaker 2: cannot use this gallery name. You cannot use my name.
Speaker 2: All you know, I would give you permission to say
Speaker 2: in New England, but not even in the state of Maine.
Speaker 2: And I never saw the article. I never had real proof,
Speaker 2: you know. At that time. There was just no way
Speaker 2: to look things up again. There was no Internet or
Speaker 2: anything like that. That was one that got away over
Speaker 2: the years. There's been many that got away, but that one,
Speaker 2: you know, right off the start, was something you know,
Speaker 2: who would have known. You had to have such a
Speaker 2: specialty of knowledge to understand what that actually was. And
Speaker 2: so now that's it supposedly went to a museum, and
Speaker 2: it's somewhere in some museum on a wall, I'm sure,
Speaker 2: encased and well preserved. But so that was interesting. Things
Speaker 2: have slipped away, you know, slipped through my hands many times,
Speaker 2: I should say, over the years, but this one in particular,
Speaker 2: that was that was a tough one to hear right
Speaker 2: off the bat when when I was starting. But I
Speaker 2: had lots and lots of great luck over the years.
Speaker 2: Things that I've talked about before being able to sell
Speaker 2: the signer of the Declarations his whole homestead back in
Speaker 2: nineteen nine, that was really the feather in the cap
Speaker 2: even now all these years to be able to say
Speaker 2: that that was, you know, really my top auction of anything,
Speaker 2: all the history involved in everything, and that auction was
Speaker 2: absolutely incredible. And what made that auction get publicity is
Speaker 2: at the time the State of New Hampshire secretly appropriated
Speaker 2: one million dollars to bid at that auction. Someone busted
Speaker 2: it wide open. They secretly hid it in some bill
Speaker 2: and when it was found out, it made the news
Speaker 2: all over the world. Associated press got ahold of it.
Speaker 2: It was the best advertising and certainly you know, there
Speaker 2: was well over a thousand people in attendance and from
Speaker 2: all over.
Speaker 1: Very exciting.
Speaker 2: And so anyway, I want to tell this one more
Speaker 2: story because it predates Missus Doubtfire, and I've always wanted
Speaker 2: to tell this story and a public venue. It's kind
Speaker 2: of crazy, silly, but it's kind of like the country
Speaker 2: boys going to New York. So was this was when
Speaker 2: I was working with my dad, when we're getting ready
Speaker 2: to you know, he was getting ready to turn the
Speaker 2: business over to me, and so we were doing a
Speaker 2: number of things. We got a call from New York City, Manhattan,
Speaker 2: and a gentleman said that him and his mother own
Speaker 2: a huge estate in Margate on.
Speaker 1: The shores of Jersey.
Speaker 2: He had a lot of really valuable and important antiques
Speaker 2: in Manhattan and in his apartment. And at that time,
Speaker 2: again there was no internet. You couldn't send you could
Speaker 2: send pictures, photographs through the mail, that type of thing.
Speaker 2: But anyway, he described the things well enough, so my
Speaker 2: father was excited about the trip. So we left and
Speaker 2: we headed down. This was I think about nineteen eighty six,
Speaker 2: something like that, So we headed down to New York. Now,
Speaker 2: from where the auction house was in southern Maine to
Speaker 2: New York City was about five and a half hours
Speaker 2: something like that. So, you know, we left I think
Speaker 2: real early in the morning, and we got there somewhere
Speaker 2: I think before noon. It was a really hot, hot
Speaker 2: summer day. And this was on the ninth floor in
Speaker 2: a building, and we went inside and the elevators were broken,
Speaker 2: so we had to walk up the ninth floors, knocked
Speaker 2: on the door, and I noticed there was a good
Speaker 2: like six or seven locks maybe more on the door,
Speaker 2: and they all were snapping unlocked. And the store opens
Speaker 2: and it was a very pleasant gentlemen and fast talking
Speaker 2: and The first thing I noticed is when we opened
Speaker 2: the door that you couldn't really see anything because everything
Speaker 2: was stacked to the sky. And these were I think
Speaker 2: there were like eight foot ceilings furniture and paintings and things.
Speaker 2: Where this was a big probably a three bedroom apartment
Speaker 2: and a big one, you know, in an old building.
Speaker 2: I remember seeing, you know, period Chippendale furniture and early
Speaker 2: portraits and high boys and all the juicy, great stuff,
Speaker 2: the stuff that you just never see. And of course
Speaker 2: in places in the Portsmouth, New Hampshire are you see
Speaker 2: some but not a lot, but you just didn't get
Speaker 2: the exposure to this type of quality and quantity. So
Speaker 2: every room was stacked all the way up to the sky,
Speaker 2: and I remember there was like you could barely walk through.
Speaker 2: And I saw like an aquarium with a big, huge
Speaker 2: turtle in it, and it was it's just really in
Speaker 2: an odd situation. I couldn't understand. So my dad and
Speaker 2: I both were talking to him and said, well, how
Speaker 2: do you have all this stuff?
Speaker 1: Oh?
Speaker 2: I inherited, you know, but you really have to talk
Speaker 2: to my mother. And so I said, okay, well that's fine,
Speaker 2: as she do to come here. And he says, yes,
Speaker 2: she will be coming here, and you know, she's really
Speaker 2: the one that owns all this stuff. We said, okay, well, meanwhile,
Speaker 2: we're going to go get some lunch and we'll come back.
Speaker 2: And so we walked down the several flights of stairs
Speaker 2: and we went somewhere and got lunch, and we were
Speaker 2: talking about, like, boy, this seems really weird. There's something
Speaker 2: not right here, and you know how, you know, how
Speaker 2: can we protect ourselves?
Speaker 1: How do we know this?
Speaker 2: These aren't stolen pieces or you know whatever. It didn't
Speaker 2: feel right. There was something really really odd about the
Speaker 2: whole situation. So we went and we got dinner, she
Speaker 2: should say, and made our way all the way back
Speaker 2: to the ninth floor again and knocked on the door
Speaker 2: and the door opened, and there was a woman with
Speaker 2: earrings and made up hair and everything, and looked just
Speaker 2: like the man we were talking to. But you know,
Speaker 2: so it's his mother. The voice was the same, it
Speaker 2: was the same person. That's when I said, this is
Speaker 2: the long before missus doubtfire. It was him dressed up
Speaker 2: and pretending to be his mother. So I'm kind of
Speaker 2: looking at my father. We're kind of making eyes at
Speaker 2: each other, and you could see that definitely. The you know,
Speaker 2: when he leaned over the wig came up you could
Speaker 2: see his hair underneath, and and it was a gray
Speaker 2: haired wig, and he had dark hair, and and it
Speaker 2: was like, you know, get me out of here. And
Speaker 2: my dad was really like, well, you know, maybe we
Speaker 2: can make this thing work. You know O. You know,
Speaker 2: you get tempted when you see such a promise in
Speaker 2: you know, merchandise. I mean, you want to have an
Speaker 2: auction with these type of things in it. I mean
Speaker 2: who wouldn't. But you know, you have to ask you
Speaker 2: a question, the question of that time, like why would
Speaker 2: this person call I don't want to say a country bumpkin,
Speaker 2: but someone all the way up in Maine, even though
Speaker 2: it's an established auction hall and all that, But why, uh?
Speaker 2: You know, New York City is the hub for all
Speaker 2: those type of antiques everything that he had, So why
Speaker 2: was he you know, calling us up there? And why
Speaker 2: was he pretending to be his own mother? There was
Speaker 2: something else that happened, But I do believe that once
Speaker 2: I said that we need some type of affidavit or
Speaker 2: some type of proof that you own all these things,
Speaker 2: that he kind of made it kind of uh quick
Speaker 2: that he she, I should say, who was pretending to
Speaker 2: be the mother At that time, there was some thing
Speaker 2: going on and we basically had to leave. I couldn't
Speaker 2: get out of there fast enough. We kind of laughed,
Speaker 2: and you know, we were talking on the way home,
Speaker 2: you know, trying to figure out what the heck, what
Speaker 2: the heck were we just experiencing. This business, I have
Speaker 2: to say, is absolutely full of stories. You know, There's
Speaker 2: been so many things that have happened over the years,
Speaker 2: and some of them are really funny, some of them
Speaker 2: are actually terrible unfortunately, and some of them are really exciting.
Speaker 1: You know, for.
Speaker 2: Instance, when there's really unique finds. To me, it has
Speaker 2: less to do with the value of something and more
Speaker 2: to do with the rarity. Just for instance, when you
Speaker 2: see something that's just really fine quality and when something
Speaker 2: was created, you know two hundred and fifty years ago,
Speaker 2: that would be very very difficult to make today with
Speaker 2: all the modern you know, power tools and things that
Speaker 2: we had. And you think of how these things went
Speaker 2: through the workshops and you know, they just had windows
Speaker 2: for a light, and then you know they wouldn't really
Speaker 2: work by candlelight of oil lantern too often they would
Speaker 2: just work when there's you know, daylight mostly and think
Speaker 2: of all that they had to do, you know, all
Speaker 2: the hand cutting, starting with the tree, starting with the
Speaker 2: rip sawing the lumber, starting and letting it dry for
Speaker 2: years the right way, and finding the right types of
Speaker 2: grains in the wood to make a nice you know design,
Speaker 2: and say the mahogany. A lot of the mahogany, of course,
Speaker 2: came from the islands, and mostly the port towns would
Speaker 2: be the cabinet makers that you'd see, you know, making
Speaker 2: these beautiful mahogany pieces. You know, oftentimes you know, when
Speaker 2: you go into the country pieces they're using the wood
Speaker 2: that's available there. When you see things like tiger maple,
Speaker 2: those are really rare tree. They had to cut a
Speaker 2: lot of maple trees before they found a one that
Speaker 2: had the tiger that type of grain in it.
Speaker 1: I'm rambling here.
Speaker 2: I just thought i'd get a quick podcast out just
Speaker 2: to see if anyone's listening. And I do want to
Speaker 2: thank you all. It's been a real pleasure and to
Speaker 2: think that this started and what does that make this
Speaker 2: It's fifteen years ago when this podcast first started. Again,
Speaker 2: this first time I've done any type of monologue. But
Speaker 2: it's been a real pleasure. I still absolutely love doing
Speaker 2: what I do. I do almost all appraisals, just appraisals
Speaker 2: these days. You know, that's something that's changed too. I
Speaker 2: talk a lot of times about how the market has changed,
Speaker 2: which it really has, and it really has to do
Speaker 2: with a baby boomer effect. But you know, doing an
Speaker 2: insurance appraisal is fine, it's easy to do. But when
Speaker 2: you're doing a fair market appraisal and you really want
Speaker 2: to put what something's worth out there, a lot of
Speaker 2: time it's not what people are expecting. However, there are
Speaker 2: certain things if it's rare enough, it'll sell for just
Speaker 2: as much or more than it used to that for
Speaker 2: the type of thing it is. But I still love
Speaker 2: what I do. I love this, love this business. There's
Speaker 2: so much adventure. I just say that if you're young
Speaker 2: and you happen to be listening to the show, thank you.
Speaker 2: I hope you get an interest.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: I had someone reach out to me when I was
Speaker 2: doing this podcast years ago said he was only twelve
Speaker 2: or thirteen years old and he wanted to become an
Speaker 2: antique dealer. And if you happen to be listening, you
Speaker 2: were in Georgia at the time. I hope that's what
Speaker 2: you became and you're happy, but I know I've been
Speaker 2: very happy for many years. And thank you all for listening,
Speaker 2: and we'll be back before you know it.