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Photograph courtesy of Cookie Curci-Wright
Bargain Hunter: The author's mother, Sarah Curci, introduced her to the world of collecting and garage sales at an early age.
Remember When
The Incurable Collector
By Cookie Curci-Wright
Do you champ at the bit when a yard sale sign appears? Do you camp out at swap meets in hopes of getting the best deal? Do you revere the memory of attending your very first estate sale? When buying a new car is your primary concern finding a model with a large trunk, roof rack and fold-down rear seat? When attending the flea market do you carry with you a magnifying glass, price guides and shopping cart?
If so, then you're an incurable collector like me.
Chances are you were probably just a kid when it all started, way back in the postwar era, when ranch-style houses with attached garages came along. It was around that time when garage sale signs began to appear. Someone was probably cleaning out his garage and a curious passer-by offered to buy some of his junk, and the rest is suburbia history.
Like me, you probably tagged along with mom to a neighborhood yard sale, squeezing the event in between a fast-food hamburger and the Saturday matinee. Never imagining that one day you'd schedule your weekend around such an event.
But, that's exactly what America's collectors are doing these days. They attend local garage sales, estate sales, street fairs and flea markets in the hopes of finding a hidden treasure. They purchase used housewares, furniture and vintage textiles from their childhood, and revel in old pottery, paintings and glassware.
Every weekend, for the past five years, public television's wildly popular "Antiques Road Show" has encouraged viewers to haul out family heirlooms and collectibles for appraisal. Like most Americans, my garage is cluttered with old household items, junks and collectibles. And, as with a lot of people, I faithfully watch the "Road Show" in hopes of learning which of my things are junk and which are treasure.
I'm convinced that collecting and bargain-hunting are in my genes. My mother introduced me to the habit at an early age. Willow Glen's garage sales, the Thrift Box and Goodwill stores were among our favorite haunts.
We collectors are an eclectic mix. Treasure-hunting is an activity that displays no gender preference. The collector/bargain hunter comes from every background and profession and their lifestyles are as varied as the objects they search for. However, there's a unique camaraderie among us bargain hunters and garage sale browsers--a shared likeness that unites us in our search for the elusive treasure. And every summer, on warm weekend afternoons, the faithful gather in the driveways, on lawns and in garages of our community to celebrate that sameness.
And what is it we collectors are searching for? What is it that's so intriguing and important we're willing to give up Saturday afternoons? Well, in addition to a good household bargain, many of us are looking for those things from our past that helped to shape who we are today. For me, and most of my generation, it's the games and toys that echo our childhood, the things we touched and things that touched us: a G.E. clock radio from the 1950s, the kind that woke us every morning with rock & roll music; a manual typewriter--the kind we baby boomers learned to type on; or that set of colorful Fiesta dishware, just like mom used to own.
In addition to nostalgia, we're also in search of monetary rewards, such as the illusive treasure that will provide us with a small fortune. We've all seen it often enough on those TV appraisal shows; the lamp purchased for a dollar that turns out to be a genuine Tiffany, or that old chair that has the name Stickly, or Frank Lloyd Wright on its backside.
Recently, on PBS television's "Antiques Road Show" a lady brought in a painting for appraisal. She had paid a dollar for it at the Salvation Army. It turned out to be an original Peidmont Ellis worth a tidy fifteen grand!
And then there's the lady who brought in a table to the road show for an appraisal and discovered it was a genuine John Seymour and Son, worth an astounding $300,000! She paid $25 for it at a garage sale. It later sold at a Sotheby's Auction for a cool $490,000. That's the stuff dreams are made of. It's that same incredible return that spurs on the bargain hunter.
There's a fine line between collectible and junk, and both can pile up quickly in your garage. But, before you tack up that garage sale sign, I'd like to share some hard-learned advice. First, take careful inventory of your stuff. This, you will find is the toughest part of a garage sale- the digging, finding and sorting. Deciding what you will keep and what you will sell can be a heartfelt compromise. There's a bond to these old things--a link to our past that's difficult to break. I learned this the first time I tried to clean out my garage for an impending sale.
Mom and I decided to rid ourselves of all the clutter filling our garages. I approached the dusty boxes with a vengeance. I indiscriminately tore open containers and tossed out anything that came my way, until mom's voice and some common sense told me to stop.
"Look, Look what I found," Mom cried out with the excitement of someone who had just discovered the Hope diamond. "It's your little communion dress, the one I sewed by hand for you."
There it was all right, my white satin dress with lacy communion veil, all intact and slightly yellowing with age, lovingly folded in its box and neatly protected by several layers of decaying tissue paper. "You were so small, so angelic," mom sighed. "Your father was so proud." Mom's voice quivered with emotion. "Remember?"
I remembered. And I could see by the light in mom's eyes that she was reliving the event just as it happened over 50 years ago. The dress was worthless as a garage sale item, but to me and mom its memories were priceless. The dress, along with all our family keepsakes, were lovingly returned to their boxes.
Hidden in America's garages, attics and basements are family mementos and heirlooms that hold special memories, deciding which to sell, and which to keep can put the garage sale host in a quandary.
I'm sure it will get easier to part with these things as time passes and memories fade. Perhaps, someday, when the sight of an old baby blanket no longer evokes warm memories, or that venerable family heirloom ceases to rekindle a yearning for the past, maybe then, the job of cleaning out my garage won't be such an impossible task.
Until then, local garage sale enthusiasts will have to be content searching for treasures and bargains at someone else's yard sale. Until that day, I'll make the big decision and mean it when I finally put up a big poster on the front lawn that reads in giant letters: HUGE GARAGE SALE TODAY.
Contact Cookie Curci-Wright via email at cookie-wright@mymailstation.com.
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Willow Glen, California Since 1992
