ANTIQUE HUNTING HAS BEEN A FAMILY EVENT

ANTIQUE HUNTING HAS BEEN A FAMILY EVENT

     Even today, with our boys in their mid twenties, antique shop owners will still greet us with that wonderful and friendly welcome, "Hello Currie family. Good to see you all again." I get kind of misty-eyed because we don't get out with the boys all that often any more, as they have retail responsibilities of their own now. It's hard for my wife, Suzanne, and I to believe Andrew and Robert are now finishing-up their sixth year, in their small vintage music shop, in the old converted Muskoka Theatre building, in uptown Gravenhurst. They both started off their careers in the antique trade in snugglies, either on Suzanne's chest or mine. Some vendors we've known for years, often embarrass the boys, by reminding them of those days, on the antique hunt, when they were tucked into carriers, with pacifiers and silk-edged rubbing blankets. Robert is now over six feet tall. He could jam me into a snuggly if he wanted. Now wouldn't that be a sight.

     As I found the antique hunt a big deal when I was in my early twenties, heading out for a day at an auction sale, or out in the field to dig bottles from homestead dump sites, I was able to fascinate myself quite adequately. I didn't mind being alone on a dig for hours and hours. Accept when a bear ambled by. When Suzanne and I married, she had a wealth of knowledge, early in her life, about vintage wooden boats, that her father Norm Stripp, used to refinish at their Windermere, Ontario home. Suzanne actually used to drive one of the longest Ditchburn boats ever built, known as the "Shirl-E-Von" that was owned by her parents, who at that time, in the 1960's, operated the Windermere Marina on Lake Rosseau. If you know much about old wooden boats, you might get a kick out of the fact, this massive and beautiful watercraft was used a livery boat, ferrying people and luggage from the mainland, to cottages on Tobin's Island, and taking hydro crews out to repair storm-damaged hydro lines.

     Suzanne also came into the marriage with about a thousand old bottles that she had found submerged in Lake Rosseau. I brought about six hundred medicine bottles with me, all of them from digs around Muskoka. We both like antiques, and even before we were married, a fun day was spent wandering antique malls and visiting hole-in-the-wall antique shops throughout our region of Ontario. When we went to Virginia for our honeymoon, we haunted all the flea markets, antique fairs, malls and shops, and of course, spent a lot of time at Colonial Williamsburg. She almost had to launch an intervention to get me out of the colonial print shop. I've been an old book collector since my early teens, and I've been a newspaper type since my first reporting gig when I was twenty-one. The hand-operated printing press was pure magic to me. Not so much for Suzanne, who had many stops yet to make in Williamsburg, including a nice dinner at an antiquated roadhouse.

     Our boys were born into an historical environs, and I'm afraid they didn't have too much choice in the matter. Suzanne and I ran a local museum, known as Woodchester Villa, in Bracebridge, and as a Mr. Mom, during their younger days, I brought toys and boys to work each day. On top of this, we ran a small antique shop on the main street, and when we had a free weekend, and a working vehicle, there was no holding us back. In a day we might hit ten or so yard sales, church fundraisers, maybe an auction, and visit four or five shops, and a mall at least once a month. Even if we didn't spend a lot of money, or make many acquisitions, we always enjoyed the adventure of the antique hunt. The boys, over the years, have come to appreciate the immersion they had as youngsters, and if they blame us for anything, it's in a positive vein, because they are living the life of antique dealers / musicians today, and  prospering rather well. But it most definitely was immersion as a family, even if at times they were a tad indifferent to going into an antique shop. I'll tell you how we dealt with their mild chagrin, at being hauled through antique malls and flea markets. We made them partners. Equals. If we could shop and buy, it was only fair they had the same opportunity. Within reason and a tight budget.

     What we believed was fair, and a learning experience, was that they be allowed experience the range and depth of antiques and collectibles, by the same immersion, mom and pop had been exposed in their respective youth. We encouraged them month by month, to develop interests in vintage articles, which certainly began with neat old toys, ones of course, we deemed as being safe for them. By this age, they were past the teething, swallowing odd stuff stage, and very much liked the idea of parallel shopping for interesting collectibles, even though, they truly didn't understand the scope of the hobby. So when we'd hit the road, and start dropping into yard sales, and flea markets, with money in their pockets, they could shop for what they liked without too much micro managing from us. Both boys were very astute buyers from a young age, and I always get a laugh, when a wise-acre today, shows up at their music shop, with the idea he or she will "pull the wool over" and either haggle for a better price, or ask an absurd price for something they'd like to sell us. It doesn't fly. While they might not admit it, much of their success today, is the result of their ability to deal with the public, buyers and sellers, without breaking the bank, or at any risk of losing money on an acquisition. They learned this as grassroots antique hunters, traveling thousands of miles in this beautiful province, as our apprentices.

     It is true, we spoiled the boys, if giving them too much room to navigate constitutes, in some minds, parental softness and liberality. But there were always strings attached. We insisted on their responsibility for managing allowance money, and if they blew it on candy and chips, they lost their financial flexibility to purchase something they really wanted, which they usually found on our antiquing ventures. I remember one day, while we were at a large community flea market, in the Village of Port Carling, finding Andrew walking back, to our own booth we had taken at the sale, with one cover (sleeve) for a 45 rpm record. It didn't have a record. It was just the cover. He explained that another vendor had the wrong cover for the record inside, and he only wanted the sleeve. So he bought the record, took it out of the sleeve, handed it back to the vendor, and went off merrily on his way. The vendor spoke to me later and said, "You've got a real wheeler dealer there." She explained how Andrew had haggled to get the price from a buck to fifty cents. What she may not have realized, is that it was a hard-to-find Beatles cover, that had a Perry Como record inside. Andrew wanted the sleeve because he owned the correct Beatles record, which previous to this, had been sleeveless. The boys interest in records began when Suzanne gave them her entire collection of vintage 45's, that she had been given as a teenager, by the gentleman who owned the juke boxes at the snack bar, known as "The Skipper," her family operated in space above their marina. When he'd change the old for the new, he just gave Suzanne what he had removed, and over the years, it added up to hundreds of records. We also bought the inventory of a former disc jockey, when he fell on hard times, and the boys got these too.

     Every antique dealer who sells furniture, will be asked at some point, why a Hoosier cupboard, for example, is worth a grand, when a well crafted, new wood cupboard, could handle the kitchen storage chore just as well, if not better…..and cost so much less. Or why buy an original, pioneer crafted, flat-to-the-wall pine cupboard for fifteen hundred dollars, versus a replica cupboard for a thousand dollars less. If you're reading this column, you know a little bit or a lot about antiques, so I don't need to answer this. But the same thing happens to our boys in the vintage music business. They will have the same type of comparisons hurled at them, as to why a vintage guitar, or amplifier, is worth as much or more than a brand new instrument, or sound gear. While they know the answer, because they both deal with professional musicians all the time, as sound technicians at local entertainment venues, it is hard to convince some musicians, especially fledgling ones, what old wood, and aging can do for sound. I've actually heard customers laugh when the boys try to explain, the incredible sounds that can come from a vintage amplifier, based on age and quality craftsmanship of another era. They don't believe it, which is fine. Then again, they'll have a blues guitarist come in, and settle into their studio, and drool over the old equipment still employed everyday, in the recording studio, to achieve the sound they desire.

     A friend came rushing to the store one Saturday morning, with a copy of the Toronto Star. Their music colleague was almost speechless about the article on Canadian music legend Murray Mclauchlan, and his new album, inspired in part, by the amazing sound of an old guitar he had recently purchased from a junk shop in the Town of Gravenhurst. "Junk Shop," they both yelped-out, while reading it over their friend's shoulder. Well, junk shop or not, and I'm pretty sure that was the reporter's words, the joy was that he had purchased it from their music shop, when he was in Gravenhurst for a concert. They have a copy of the article, and a few others that have been published since, to show customers, when once again, one of them will complain about the fact vintage guitars are more expensive than new ones. Murray Mclauchlan, at a recent concert in Gravenhurst, where Andrew was doing the sound, credited him, in front of the audience, for selling him this wonderful vintage guitar, that had given him a great deal of pleasure, (after full restoration), and a great sound, as he moved ahead on this new phase of a storied career in music. You know what? It makes it all worthwhile when something wonderful like this happens. When I try to tell folks that we're in the antique business for the fun of it, they respond as you'd expect. "Yea right." The boys believe in what they're doing, and they've already had long lives in the antique and collectible business, even though most of their contemporaries from school are only just embarking on their careers.

     I must admit, I do like it when some familiar clerk, at an antique venue, or antique mall, will welcome us as a family, because this is exactly what it has been for the past quarter century with our wee lads. It's been a family adventure in a family enterprise, and now we are the junior partners.

     If you're looking to invigorate the senses, and try something new, that you can share with family and friends, take a wee stroll through an antique mall or antique show and sale some day soon, and enjoy the ambience and fun of history re-visited. It's a great way to connect with the past. You'll meet some kindred spirits there, who are always willing to share a few stories about the life and times of antique hunters the world over.