Collectors Corner! Ed Sandoval's Newsletter (Taos, NM)

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Collectors Corner!

Ed Sandoval Gallery's Newsletter

119 Quesnel Street, Taos, NM 87571

www.edsandovalgallery.com

edsandovalart@gmail.com

(575) 770-6360

Antiques: Value Is in the Eye of the Beholder

For the past couple of months, I’ve been sharing highlights from my road trip adventures. All of the places I’ve visited are unique, but they all have one thing in common: some kind of antique store. Thought it would be fun to do a story about hunting for rare treasures.

First, I’ve learned there are all kinds of “antique” stores: thrift shops with TONS of cheap junk scattered about pretending to be old and valuable; the hybrid antique-retail store with a few older things and lots of newly produced knickknacks like clothing, jams and home décor trinkets; high-end vintage places where you have to put on your waders to enter…extremely overpriced; and my favorite, the true antique store that has well organized rows of all kinds of eclectic, unusual and nostalgic oddities.

Leather Chair (circa 1930's) Found in Roswell $40

Cookie Mold - We Hang as Artwork

Copper Chafing Dish with Candle Warming Base Found in Silver City $30

It's overwhelming in some stores. You hardly have room to turn your body and inch down the aisles, afraid your rear end will catch on something and send shelves of merchandise tumbling down. But some are roomy – a true leisurely browsing pleasure. Las Vegas (NM) has wonderful antique stores. And one of my favorites is the Silver City Trading Company because I ALWAYS find something there.

What do we look for? Well, that’s hard to define...You just know it when you see it. It must be unusual and have a “cool factor,” but it also has to blend with our style. Some things I did NOT buy are: a six-foot neon fish, old McDonald’s glassware with the Hamburglar etched on it, a full suit of armor, a doll in a crochet dress over a roll of toilet paper, dusty and creepy taxidermy… you get the picture.

I don’t want to bore you, so I’ll only share a couple of our awesome "finds." In Artesia, we spied an original drawing by artist Gary Roller of legendary singer and songwriter Michael Martin Murphey. It’s a wonderful portrait done way back in 1987 (Michael looks so young!). I thought he would like to have it, so I bought it to give to him and called when I got back home. He’s excited to see and receive it when he gets back to Taos.

Michael Martin Murphey Portrait

Hand-Crafted Wooden Bucket

Bottom of Wooden Bucket with Chinese Writing

In the southern part of the state (I can't remember where), we also found an awesome wooden bucket. The hand-hewn craftsmanship attracted our attention, but when I turned it over… there was Chinese writing on the bottom! Wow! I wonder…since the Chinese came to the U.S. to build our country’s railroads, was this a bucket used during that time? I had to have it – and if anyone knows anything about this type of bucket, please let me know.

So get on out there and do some exploring – you never know what you might find!

And Speaking of Collectibles...

On one road trip, leaving White Sands and heading to Silver City, we decided to stop for lunch. We were near Deming, and Gwen had Googled restaurants in the area and chose a place called "The Adobe Deli." Traveling west on the Interstate, we got to Deming, turned onto a lonely one-lane road, and started going back east into a flat landscape of absolutely nothing.

After five or six miles of open fields but nothing else...no houses or town...I got suspicious of this plan and wanted to turn around. Gwen said, "Siri says it's just up here a bit." More miles... more fields... and I say, "I think we should go back to Deming. There will be something there." Driving, Gwen turned to look at me with a raised eyebrow and asked, "Where's the trust? Where's your sense of adventure?"

Oh my sense of adventure was wavering folks, especially when we came upon a clump of buildings that looked abandoned, like old wood & tin barns surrounded by farm equipment. In fact, it looked for all the world like a ramshackle salvage yard... Not a single other car in sight, but Gwen parked, bounced out and announced, "I see an entrance sign!"

I tentatively stepped inside... OMG! From the moment you enter the door, you don't know where to look – every surface was COVERED with curiosities! And it's HUGE, with a main bar/dining area with lofts, hallways, display and meeting rooms, etc.

We probably took 20 photos before we even got out of the entryway. It's like a museum, steakhouse and saloon rolled into one. Sitting at the bar (we were the only customers), the wonderful bartender told us about the place. In the 70's, a guy who LOVED collecting rare and bizarre artifacts bought an old schoolhouse, converted it into a museum/diner/bar and proceeded to fill it with stuff for the next 50+ years.

There's a combination library and cigar room, windmill fans, numerous wood-fired stoves, hundreds of dollar bills tacked everywhere and more taxidermy than I've ever seen in my life, including a water buffalo, alligator, mountain lions and all kinds of other creatures.

The full name is The Adobe Deli Steakhouse and Saloon. We had an incredible Reuben with spicy Bloody Marys, but they are famous for their steaks and French onion soup. A couple came in from El Paso, and we started chatting with them. They said they drive all the way from El Paso to get a steak once a week: "Best steak west of the Pecos!"

A Dizzying Array Americana Collectibles

If you are feeling overwhelmed by these stories, by all the "stuff" out there in the world, you may want to skip this next story. LOL. Folks, we hadn't seen anything yet.

Driving through Fort Sumner, we spied the Billy the Kid Museum. Now, neither of us are particularly interested in Billy the Kid (not even a little), but, on a road trip, 80% of the fun is wandering randomly into places just to see what's inside. We paid $5 each, and started looking at the displays. We watched part of the welcome video about Billy's life and death, and eventually strolled into adjoining rooms.

In my mind, I started moving from "this is sort of nice" to "this is pretty cool" when we got to the collections. For example, they had cases upon cases of historic guns – every type of gun you could imagine from rifles to pistols, with the history of each gun written neatly on a card beside it. There were also fantastic collections of typewriters, cameras, saddles, oil burning lanterns, medicine bottles, old telephone switchboards, clocks...etc. etc. etc.

After looking around for 45 minutes, we decided to go. They had told us to exit through the back door, go through the "outdoor auto halls" and the path led around to a gift shop. We went through the door... What????? The "path" led from building to building and went on and on and on, a labyrinth of buildings, courtyards, barns and room displays. It was so long and circuitous that there were yellow arrows painted on the concrete floor so people wouldn't get lost! And every inch was PACKED with Americana treasures...

Replica frontier rooms, farming equipment, wood-fired stoves and heaters, horse-drawn buggies, wagons and even a hearse, jail cell bars and rooms, tractors, horse harnesses and saddles, Model T cars, old fire trucks...oh this place had it ALL. Amazing...

They need to change their name to "Billy the Kid and Everything Related to the Western Frontier and Early American Life Museum." Only $5 to see all of this??? I don't know how they do it – we stayed there at least another hour...probably more...to see everything.

My favorite item was the horse-drawn hearse because I had never seen one before.