There were no tags. We met the man in charge at the garage door. “Make your pile and come to me. I’ll give you a bargain.”  With only a narrow alley way to pass through and into the house, we had come to browse, and perhaps to find a treasure. The cold day-long rain urged us out of our house. So here we are – a tag sale.

There was so much stuff it looked like avalanches pouring out of the walls. So much was covered up that we had to pull stuff off to see the stuff underneath. I was discouraged. This was stressing me out. Nothing was organized except bottles of alcohol. A woman pulled bottles from a cabinet and lined them up on the top. We were looking at the accumulation of a lifetime. We spent two hours looking to “make our pile.” We started to accumulate biographical information. I spotted a man leaving with his pile. He carried some vintage stuff. My spirits rose.

The owners must have saved everything, took many vacation trips, played an organ and piano. I found a bookshelf, four tiers high filled with bibles, music books, and “whatnot” In one corner, mice had chewed into two books and made a nest. This was the empire of stuff. In the music room, a man sat in a rocker looking befuddled. He was waiting for his wife. I pulled on old book from a stack to start my pile. I followed with large tin Italian cookie box which I filled with books. I always try to find some small item for my grand kids. Bingo…a tiny imitation alligator skin change purse only 1 ½ inches across for Maggie.

There were shoppers who gathered piles to resell on line or at an antique store… One had a flashlight looking over my shoulder as I rummaged through a pile of books. Another had a hand computer to get prices on his pile of stuff in order to bargain. We were there just to have fun. “They are collectors in business.” one shopper said.

I started going through the music book collection and found a few items. I looked around and could not find a place to set them down. In order to make my “pile” I cleared a nearby table and began a pile of my stiff. My wife Nancy was assembling her pile in the living room.

Aha, here are a dozen three penny post cards. What we were doing is creating our own stash at home so others could come by and make their piles out of our piles.

If Nancy hadn’t signed up for e-mail notifications of tag, estate, yard, or garage sales, we never would have known. There were no telephone pole signs or even a sign in front of the house.

Lighting was poor it was tough going with single light bulb in an old lamp in the music room. Yet I managed to find a recorder in its box with instructions. My pile was growing. Look, a metronome like the one my dad used!  It works! My brother Dave lamented about not snapping up dad’s metronome when we cleared out hour house years ago. No problem Dave – I have one for you.

Nancy has an eye for good stuff. On her pile…Scottish pottery sugar and cream set and two classy scarves, a nice wool blanket, and a brand new steamer pot. We were rich!

After two hours of looking at stuff, we made our way to checkout…$35 total. We left like smiling gulls just after snapping up a bag of unguarded potato chips at the beach.

The 1865 Sargent Primary Standard Speaker school book was my best find. Any book 152 years old was a chance for me to imaging myself back in the 1870’s in a one room school house with potbelly stove with a stern-looking teacher and a bunch of kids of several levels sitting at desks with inkwells and slate tablets.

The book, with illustrations was printed in Philadelphia. The title page reads “original and selected pieces especially adapted to Declamation for the youngest pupils…” The jacket was worn, but the pages looked untouched. A musty smell accompanied as I surveyed the contents. There were poems and prose  “exercises are especially suited to be committed to memory and spoken by the young.” This book predated the Dale Carnage public speaking course I took in college in 1959 by almost 100 years. Of course all the poems rhymed which are easier to memorize than open verse.

I found some interesting essay titles: SPEECH OF RED JACKET, AN INDIAN CHIEF (The Forest Lawn Cemetery is directly across from Canisius College in Buffalo, New York. I recall discovering the grave marker for Red Jacket, a lawyer for his Senaca Nation.)

ON EMPLOYING INDIANS

SPEECH OF A CHOCTAW CHIEF

SPEECH OF A POCOMTUCK INDIAN