Jared Says for April

Yard sale season is beginning, and as luck would have it, it began for me with a bad experience. I was at a dream yard sale: the total contents of the house were on sale! After filling a box with carefully selected paper items I wrote SOLD on it, and left it near the seller while I continued to look for choice items. When I return to retrieve, it had disappeared. So much for trust.

In last month's column I mentioned precautions to take when you are lucky enough to be the sole buyer in a house. Once you are in the house be sure to leave your business card or some other reference to yourself in a prominent place. This is very important, especially if you are dealing with older people. Also be sure and put the money in their hands and not leave it on the table. The perception often exists that we are out to rob or short change them.

I once received a call from the daughter of a couple that sold me numerous items. It seems the couple's friends said that since I had been in their house and I knew where everything was, that I would come back and rob them. Because I left my card it helped to ease a potentially difficult situation, and it turned out well for everyone in the end.

On another topic, I have just come back from a dream trip traveling Route 66 in Arizona. My brother and I took off to experience some of the history this famous stretch of highway has to offer.

If you get to do this, don't expect to see much in the way of original memorabilia for sale. It is geared to the tourist and there are repro items galore. The main reason for the trip was to get in touch with a past that had both sad and happy times for many people.

I visited towns like Kingman, where Andy Devine  grew up and Clark Gable married Carole Lombard. They spent their honeymoon in Oatman which I also visited. Then there was Holbrook, home town of Guy Madison (Wild Bill Hickok). Madison's daughter is still in Holbrook and was having a scholarship auction of some of her father's items on 2 April, after I had to return home. These and the other towns along Route 66 made for some interesting stops.

A few pictures from our trip are here.

If you don't know any of the people mentioned above, the collectibles business may not be for you!