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The distinguishing characteristic between buyer and seller is no different than who stands behind those tables.
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Ty Gangelhoff of the Winona Daily News
Gordon MacMasters plays a hand saw while Verne Koenig accompanies with acoustic guitar. The men, both from Decorah, Iowa, played as part of Pickwick Mill Day in Pickwick, Minn, where MacMasters started playing the saw in 1985. Of their performance, Koenig said "I’m playing with Gordon to fill in with some acoustic." Koenig then jokingly added, "And sing if he lets me, (but) I’m not so sure." |
"I'm just selling what I've collected," said Doug Remme of Spring Grove, Minn. "I'm more of a collector though."
Remme had an assortment of used books, TV and childhood memorabilia, and vinyl records with him on Saturday.
Remme, like many others, packs up his van almost every weekend with goods in tow to travel all over the Midwest "to get around and see all the places."
As a part-time flea market vendor for more than 30 years, the 57-year farm hand still doesn't sell everything.
Even before the recent death of music legend Johnny Cash, which is expected to boost the prices of his albums, Remme said he had been collecting them for years. But they're not going anywhere.
"I'm hoarding them," Remme said.
Jean Mickelson of Mabel, Minn., said her kids make sure she doesn't sell the history book she has from 1869. The rare ones, she said, are all hers.'
What she brought Saturday was books from more modern authors like Dean Koontz and Danielle Steele.
"I don't charge too much for them," Mickelson said. "Only two bucks for most of them."
Mickelson amassed her collection in a similar fashion to Remme's.
"I mainly sell books and whatever else I can find to sell," she said.
With an array of Elvis 12-inch vinyl records and a $20 price tag on The Jimi Hendrix Experience "Axis: Bold as Love," Remme said he is always willing to make a deal.
Flea markets aren't about cold, hard cash — it is more of a barter system, Remme said.
Most of the sellers at the flea markets are selling the same items they had bought at markets just like this one.
However, for Louis Boettcher, Winona, to get what he wants he said he sometimes has to look at auctions and mail orders.
That is where his "Flying Eagle" 1857 penny came from.
Along with rare coins, Boettcher brought the kind of goods almost any man would want — collectable steel beer cans and golfing goods.
"I don't play much anymore," Boettcher said of his golf clubs for sale. "It's just for the flea market."
Contact reporter Brian Krans at 457-3500 or news@winonadailynews.com.
