Trip to the Rose Bowl flea...did pretty good!

[CarltonHendricks]

I ran down (6 hr. one way) to L.A. for the Rose Bowl Flea market last weekend. Nice driving my convertible down. Hit it at 6:15AM and the weather was perfect....overcast for the first three hours...sweatshirt and shorts...Had not been to the RB in YEARS and had been wanting to hit it for the last few months....it's such an investment in time and money to drive all the way down there I put it off....but it only comes once a month, second Sunday....Personally I've always found L.A. to be tough for antiques...it's always been as though there are more collectors than stuff...and the good stuff gets bought quickly....in other words lots of competition in L.A..

Was walking around grumbling about the crummy nights sleep I got for my $110.00 at the Ramada Inn.....didn't find a thing in the front part....just a lot of cool interesting non sport things...maybe got total of 3 hr sleep on account of the crummy A/C going off and on all night suffocating me...was wearing down so took a break at the food court....Danish and coffee under $5.00...which was fine....but then I went back for a $3.75 bottle of water....

Made it to the back part where it's mostly a sea of vintage clothing dealers.....world's largest gathering I'm sure of bowling shirt dealers....was nearing the end and blam!!!.....I walked up and saw a rare 7" tall 1880's baseball figure. Price tag $75.00....I wouldn't say they are extremely rare but they don't grow on trees....when they surface they seem to go in the $300.00-$400.00 range...Originally they were a decorative gas lamp and they came as a pair...the mate has an H on his chest....the general consensus is that it stood for Hartford Blues I believe...anyway, I've never done deep research on them. Sometimes you will see them still attached to the lamp apparatus...and sometimes you find them like this...with just the figure....As I recall the full lamps have a marble base....

Anyway...the dealer yells out to me from across the booth "prices are negotiable"....I looked it over while he's babbling away selling it to me....I'm hardly listening....just making sure they're not popping them out in China now...finally I go "what's the best you can do"...he looks it over with the price tag...you can have it for $40.00.....we chat...I go how about $35.00?...yeah sure he says.

With three hours sleep and 2 1/2 hours walking it's hard to fully comprehend stuff....but I knew I scored and would take it in later....Before I could even get my bearings about two minutes walking later I see two scruffy ravaged easel back advertising signs for Kuppenheimer Clothiers illustrated by Joseph Leyendecker...probably the biggest name American illustrator from the late 19th- early 20th century see here......you never see these Leyendedker posters....and one has a crew rowing theme....$30.00....deal...bought the rowing one....got 15 feet further and came back for the other for $25.00....This is very odd....but then I get maybe ten booths up....and there's another Leyendecker Kuppenheimer sign...a bigger horizontal format one....obviously all from the same barn find....$20.00.....blam it's mine....the rower stays with me and will undergo restoration where they'll soak off the top litho....wash out the stains....remount it and paint in the missing gouged areas...It may look rough but that is very restorable condition..(easy restore)...the others are eBay bound where I'll let the Leyendecker collectors fight it out!

Now that's a good Rose Bowl!