Post your Garage Sale/Flea Market/Antique Mall Finds Here 60 60

[Robot Man]

This is easily my favorite thread in general. Probably won’t be able to post here for a while. Everything is locked down here. 

Maybe we can post old finds instead for a while. 

[jcjames]

Strange, a bunch of boxes of nothing but four of these

 

[Junkdrawer]

Flea market closed this weekend. First time I’ve ever seen. Guys down there in blizzards.

[Jimbo749]

On 3/22/2020 at 1:09 AM, jcjames said:

Strange, a bunch of boxes of nothing but four of these

 

Sweet books, one of my favorite series. This is also Alex Ross' first pro work.

[Robot Man]

This thread has been quiet for some time. And, likely to be so for quite a while. It is my favorite thread in General. So I thought, why not post some of your past finds? Could be recent, or could be many years ago. I have been doing this a long time. I have many. So many, I've lot count. Some are very memorable. Maybe because of what you found or the situation. Here is one of the latter.

My friend at one of the flea markets is a guy named Bennett. Bennett is in his early 60's. He is a estate sale junkie and makes a living from it. A pretty hard job. When I go to this show, I always hit him first. Usually his truck is full of his finds. Often, not stuff I want but I have got countless great pieces from him. Toys, Advertising stuff, Americana items and of course comics. He is a gruff, beligerant dealer with a heart of gold as you will soon see. People pull stuff out of his truck and he just let them do the work for him. He is always swamped early. He quotes his price and you take it or leave it. If he is having a bad day, he might come down a little. We get along pretty good because he has the hots for my wife and on occasion, I have actually paid him more than asking when I felt he was a little light.

About a year and a half ago, I hit him up early. With the eternal question "Got anything for me Bennett?". He was busy and not looking too good. He had been sick and it was his first show in a few months. He turned to me and very firmly said, "pull out that box!". He was VERY adimate about it. I was a little slow and somebody else got it first. He firmly told the guy to give it to me.

I looked and it was a full paper box full of 10 cent cover price comics! The ones on the top were Dells which didn't really excite me much but they were old comics! I looked through the box picking out the ones I wanted. Mostly Dell funny animals but some decent stuff. I handed him the pile and asked the price. He told me what he wanted but said I had to take them all. Wasn't super cheap but I made him what I thought was a real fair price. He looked at me and added $25. to the price. He always wants to think he "one ups" you a little. I said sure and handed him the money. Told him thanks and I will see him next month and off I went.

Next month I as usual, hit him up early. But he wasn't there. On a table was a vase of flowers and a remberance card with his picture wearing that grimey old green shirt he always wore. I was floored and shocked but not entirely surprised I guess. Really shook me. Not because of all the wonderful stuff I had gotton from him but because I just loved the guy and his "tough guy" manner. He must have known and really wanted me to have the books. Touched me deeply. Every time I have gone to that show since, I walk by his booth, think of him for a minute and flip him off. I think somehow he is watching and laughing...

Got any good stories? Post 'em. Maybe I'll post a few more later.

 

[spreads]

A couple years ago I was looking at a 'shelving unit for comics' which turned out from a card/general hobbyist dealer that I later ended up setting up beside at the monthly card and comic show.  I had some laughs because this shelving unit looked more like one of those antique trunks for clothes you might find 100 years ago and it was clearly not big enough for comics but it was a neat item.  After a few shows of being setup beside him, I learned how much of a character George was; often frazzled, and a bit of a nut, but fun to be around and would talk your ear off!  Last year, there was an announcement before the show opened among the dealers present that George had passed away and we were having a moment of silence!  We were stunned, we saw the guy a month before and he looked fine and healthy?  It was a bit of a surreal moment for me, but I thought if this is what he enjoyed doing later in life then at least he was happy....

Moving along, I have a story I posted somewhere else on the boards that I will post here.  It really has a great ending and will lighten the mood.  

 

2017

Several months ago, I was looking to grab the last of my comic stuff I had stored at my mom's place - a box full of mylar and half-backs that accompanied a collection of all CGC bronze/silver books (my best collection buy!).  The box was stored in the basement, in an area where her adopted cat was known to spray!  Crash course on cat spraying, male cats (even this one who was fixed) spray locations to mark their scent, this is not urinating, it's liquid that shoots out of their anal glands! 

The first time I saw this cat spraying a neighbor's deck I thought 'haha, that's so cute, look at his butt dance.....hey, wait a minute!"  And then when he started spraying indoors it was time for him to become an outdoor cat, cat spray absolutely reeks and you cannot get that smell out of anything.  ***If you want some chuckles, type lion/tiger cat sprays and see some of the videos of people at zoos being sprayed***

 

At this point, you're probably thinking, let me guess, he sprayed the box?  Correct!  The box was tossed, but on top of the box were some loose Mylites I had to toss as well.  

 

And just underneath the cat spray, oh so close to being destroyed was this scrap of paper.....

 

 

 

[Robot Man]

Whew! But, I gotta ask... How does it smell???

[Robot Man]

Come on, doesn’t anyone else have any stories from the past having to do with a fun or meaningful find?

[spreads]

13 hours ago, Robot Man said:

Whew! But, I gotta ask... How does it smell???

 

Edited March 31, 2020 by spreads

[BlowUpTheMoon]

On 3/14/2013 at 9:59 AM, BlowUpTheMoon said:

Went to an estate sale this morning. Waited outside in the 20 degree weather for 30 minutes.

 

Had seen this on the estate sale website, so I figured "Why not?":

 

 

Then, last night, I saw this additional photo advertising the estate sale on Craigslist: Link.

 

 

 

Swing and a miss on this one.  Was the 20th person in the house and all that were left were crappy dells.

[BlowUpTheMoon]

On 1/11/2014 at 8:42 PM, topcat54 said:

Aces said:

  Shark said:

  BlowUpTheMoon said:

  Shark said:

  BlowUpTheMoon said:

Here's the box. What did I find in it?

 

 

ASM #1? A double cover comic? 50 copies of X-Force #1?

 

I bought all of the Marvel and DCs from this box. About 72 books total. Here are some highlights.

 

 

Holy Stromboli Batman! Great find!

I was in his kitchen drooling on them a day and a half ago.

Dang the JLA 1 paid for the whole lot and more. 3.5 for sure after press, shot at 4.0.

 

$4 a book... that estate sale paid off.

 

Had some Lois Lanes in the 20s that were nice mid grade, and a bunch of nicer mid grade Adam Strange too.

 

Only the 2nd Superman I seen like that the others do not have the green glow around him

Here's my best find.  Looked for the original post but could not find it.  Basically it was books between 1958-1962, 75% DC, 20% Marvel.

[jcjames]

I guess this was my best HPB pik a couple years ago, found #1-20 for about a dolla each:

 

 

The #1 was sent off and came back:

Edited April 1, 2020 by jcjames

[Robot Man]

8 hours ago, BlowUpTheMoon said:

Swing and a miss on this one.  Was the 20th person in the house and all that were left were crappy dells.

That suks. Same thing happened to me a few months ago. The stuff wasn’t anything even close to that though. I just shrug it off and look ahead to the next opportunity. 

[Robot Man]

7 hours ago, BlowUpTheMoon said:

Here's my best find.  Looked for the original post but could not find it.  Basically it was books between 1958-1962, 75% DC, 20% Marvel.

Man, great find. It’s stuff like that that keeps you going on!

[topcat54]

You never know what you will find.

Don't know if this counts. Just don't find this in the wild often.

Found this at a flea market a couple years back and had to talk to the guy for a few months before he would let it go.

Sent to CGC and got this back

 

A friend of mine found this at a local thrift shop. He really didn't know what it was worth but thought it was cool.

 

 

Edited April 1, 2020 by topcat54

[Robot Man]

1 hour ago, topcat54 said:

You never know what you will find.

Don't know if this counts. Just don't find this in the wild often.

Found this at a flea market a couple years back and had to talk to the guy for a few months before he would let it go.

Sent to CGC and got this back

 

A friend of mine found this at a local thrift shop. He really didn't know what it was worth but thought it was cool.

 

 

Man, stuff like that rarely turns up at flea markets any more. Great score!

[Robot Man]

Picked these up at the Rose Bowl Flea Market about 10 years ago. The guy was pulling them out of a box when I walked up. I asked him how much and he said $5. each (don't we all love that word "each"?). I pulled $150 out of my wallet and said would you do this? His eyes lit up and he said sure!

[yecul]

3 hours ago, topcat54 said:

 

A friend of mine found this at a local thrift shop. He really didn't know what it was worth but thought it was cool.

 

 

 

Cant find my post but if you go back a bunch of pages you will see where I posted about finding one last year. That is probably my best "find" in terms of value but it was through LetGo.

[littledoom]

August 20, 2017.. Carpooled with a dealer friend far away to a garage sale in the high desert.. a man had bought a collection and was selling the comics $2 each.... all expect the Supes 233... that was $15.... the SW 1s were the blue error Galactus issues ... I'm going to post a haul a day until this is over

[littledoom]

September 7/2017.. I knew about this estate sale months in advance from an unpopular estate sales website.. I offered a lot to buy the whole collection but the lady running the sale said it was too low.. As I'm driving to the dawn of sale, I think to myself I should have brought my iPod because I'm going to be waiting all alone in the dark.. well there are 3/5 ppl ahead of me (all for the comics)... one came the day before (he bought a VF Hulk 181 for $500)... mind you this was the best advertised comics estate sale I'd ever seen.. not far either.. clear photos of silver, bronze, copper keys right next to each other.. big keys.. nice shapes.. it was a who's who of every dealer, reseller, store owner, collector that showed up.. these are the leftovers I got priced $5 each.. the Avengers 69 was $10, 196 $15

Edited April 12, 2020 by littledoom