At this town, man.
Robbie: It's cool. He's got an engine in the back.
Jersey jon: Let's see what he's got. Any leads? Any old motorcycles around?
Man in truck: I wish I did. Jersey jon: Alright, dude.
Man in truck: You have a good day, man. Robbie: Alright, see ya buddy.
Mike: What are you, texting those guys again?
Danielle: Yeah.
Mike: They couldn't do anything without you telling them to do it.
Danielle: That's what I tell them all the time.
Mike: What am I doing for the day?
I don't know, let me ask danielle.
What am I doing, I don't know.
Jersey jon: Alright, got a text from danielle.
Jersey jon: Sending you precious little angel babies.
Robbie: What is that? Jersey jon: I don't know.
Robbie: I mean, that's something mike told her to say.
Jersey jon: Probably something like that. This guy's name is steve.
And his family property dates back to 1916, dude.
Yep. His great-great-grandfather was an inventor
And pioneer in the telephone industry.
Robbie: You're the guy that likes all that little...
Jersey jon: I love all that stuff, man.
Switches and all that stuff that makes stuff move.
Motors that make the pulleys move. I'm totally into that.
Woohoo!
Mike: So you're up here, girl. Danielle: Yeah.
Mike: You're up here. So tell me about this place, what is it?
Danielle: We're going to see a fella named jerry
Who has an antique shop that also is a general store museum.
Mike: Oh that's cool.
Danielle: Yeah. So their father had it in another location. They actually moved it.
And right around covid, they closed it up.
So the roof is starting to go, they're getting some leaks,
But when that happens, you know once the elements come inside.
Mike: Then it's a different situation.
Danielle: It's all over.
Mike: So it's a general store museum, so they got all the counters and the display cases.
Danielle: Yeah, they got tons. Mike: They got antique signs?
Danielle: They got signs. They got signs, toys, they got all the stuff you like.
Mike: They got antique tools?
Danielle: Petroliana, they got like... Mike: They got everything.
You know I love general store stuff.
Danielle: I do too.
Mike: I mean, I just kind of grew up around, you know, like in iowa, all the antique shops
And everything, they just had a lot of it. I love it!
Jersey jon: His great-great-grandfather was an inventor,
So he's probably got cool like gadgets and wizardry
And all kinds of neat stuff in there.
Robbie: You like to use that word a lot, jersey - wizardry.
Jersey jon: Dude I'm kind of a mechanical wizard myself.
I make these old motorcycles work and do all this crazy stuff.
Robbie: I guess I could call myself the wizard of cars then.
Jersey jon: You're like the wizard of signs.
Robbie: The sorcerer. Jersey jon: The sorcerer of signs!
Jersey jon: I'll be the wizard, you be the sorcerer.
Robbie: Okay.
Jersey jon: Turn right here, robbie.
Robbie: Yeah I know, I see- oh I'm glad that you're on it.
Jersey jon: There's the driveway right here.
Wow!
Look at the roof on this thing!
Robbie: Holy toledo! Jersey jon: Very cool.
Robbie: Wow!
Jersey jon: Yeah. This looks like the wizard's castle, man.
Robbie: Dude, look at this thing!
Jersey jon: Very cool, whoa. Get a flyer.
Wow.
Robbie: Steve. Jersey jon: Look at this place.
Steve: Hey fellas! Jersey jon: Hey man.
Steve: Can I do something to help ya?
Robbie: Yeah, I'm rob. You talked to dani on the phone?
Steve: I did, rob.
Steve: Nice to meet you, hey jon!
Robbie: Dude, this place is crazy!
It's one of those properties that just takes your breath away.
I mean, literally, it looked like chitty chitty bang bang
And the professor lived here and he was going to roll
The car out of the garage.
I've never seen a roof like this.
Steve: Me neither. It's going to be quite the undertaking.
Robbie: Where's the gutters at?
How does the water flow off this thing?
Jersey jon: It's a shingled roof, but it looks like a thatched roof
From an english cottage. It's so cool!
Robbie: Who built the house?
Steve: The original barn here and the house was built
In late 1800s.
So in 1914, my great-great-grandfather,
W.J. Moore, purchased this property.
My great-great-grandfather redesigned it.
He did the roofing, the stonework, all the cool stuff.
W.J. Was a pretty inventive guy.
He hid his gutters inside the roof,
And they would go down the stone columns
And come out and water different sections of the property.
He was a telephone pioneer,
He was a gadgeteer, an inventor.
Jersey jon: This car is cool.
I mean, the windows and the wheels.
Steve: Yeah, they open up too.
That's a replica of the car he imported from France in 1899.
Jersey jon: What kind of car is it?
Steve: De dion-bouton. Robbie: Yeah, yeah.
Jersey jon: They made motorcycle engines. Steve: Really?
Jersey jon: They were the first ones imported into america.
They were the first ones to come up with a small enough motor to put in a motorcycle.
So this is the stuff that we're looking for.
Steve: Oh cool. Jersey jon: That's stuff that we're buying.
So, you got anything like that around?
Steve: We sure do. Uh, interesting story,
Our family sold it in '65. And we just got it back.
Jersey jon: Wow!
Steve: And lots of w.J.'s stuff is still up in there
And then there's been an accumulation over the years.
I didn't see this property until my mid-20s,
When I started visiting michigan from arizona for the summers.
It reminded me of like an abandoned amusement park.
About 6 years ago, the caretaker of the property
Thought it was really cool that I was
W.J.'s great-great-grandson
And offered me and my brother a chance to stay the night here.
And I feel like at that point,
I don't know if you know, w.J.'s spirit tapped in or something,
But it was like, ding! Like, you need to own this place.
And just last year, the owners offered to sell
The property back to the family, which you know, was a blessing.
And so without much thought, we just jumped right on it.
Robbie: That's crazy! Steve: Yeah, let's go and check it out.
Jersey jon: Is that wrought iron decoration?
Mike: Alright, how far is this place?
Danielle: It's right up here, I believe to the right.
Mike: Alright, I see it, I see the sign. Oh yeah.
Whoa.
Danielle: Davis general store and museum.
Mike: Let's pull right up front. Hey, you got the flyer?
Danielle: Yeah. Mike: Who did you talk to here?
Danielle: Jerry. Mike: Alright.
Mike: You're right. It is a general store and a museum.
Danielle: Right? Mike: Yep.
Danielle: They open? Yeah.
Jerry! Hello?
Jerry: Sorry, we're not, we're not open right now.
Danielle: It's danielle and mike.
Mike: How're you doing, you talked to dani on the phone?
Jerry: Oh, I talked to her on her phone.
Danielle: Hi. How are you, nice to meet you.
Jerry: Hi, how're you doing?
Mike: Is this the general store side or the antique shop side?
Jerry: This was the antique side; the other side is the museum side.
We bought it about 30 years ago.
Mike: Oh wow. You moved everything here 30 years ago.
'cause dani said you guys had another location.
Jerry: It was down state, yeah. Mike: Okay.
Jerry: It was my father's dream to have a building and a place
To put all his collection in, because he had it
In our basement at home,
And you couldn't get in the basement anymore.
'cause the collection got some big.
He had to do something, and he happened to find
This old building out in the country there.
It was a general store, a real general store.
Mike: So that had to be the ultimate.
That's like me collecting old motorcycles
And finding like an old motorcycle shop
To put my stuff in.
Jerry: Yeah, exactly. After he passed away, we said,
Let's move it up to houghton lake.
Mike: So you guys are honoring him still through all his dreams.
Jerry: Absolutely, this is his monument, right here.
Mike: I love that. How'd you choose this town?
Jerry: Well, actually, me and my partner
Were musicians from detroit.
Mike: No kidding. Jerry: Yeah.
Danielle: Nice. Mike: What'd you play?
Jerry: I played guitar, saxophone, she played all the keyboards.
Our agent called and he said, I got a job for you
Up in houghton lake. I said, houghton lake? And...
Mike: You fell in love with it. Jerry: Yeah.
Mike: Dani said that this place closed during covid
And you guys have just never opened it.
Jerry: Yeah. 'cause we're all getting older now,
And it's time, you know, maybe we should send this stuff
Back to the collectors.
My father had the rule of anything in the museum
You can't sell it, no matter what somebody offered you.
And this was all the real good stuff.
This is the first time we ever opened up to
Selling anything in the museum.
Mike: Oh wow. You guys did a good job with this.
I mean, it looks authentic.
They completely nailed it.
I mean, really truly nailed it, because you know,
It's one thing to have all of these items, but it's another
To display them in a way
That looks natural and organic and real.
This stuff is getting all hard to find, you know.
Because a lot of it's been snapped up by collectors
Over the years. But now, it seems like a lot of the people
That are collecting the general store stuff, they're ageing out.
And that's unfortunate, because a lot of this stuff,
It's america, you know, it's entrepreneurs,
It's small businesses. Jerry: That's where we came from.
Mike: Yeah and little towns. These are the stores
That served rural america, you know, and so they needed to
Basically have anything and everything.
It's almost like an art installation,
Like look at all those egg beaters.
And then you got all the padlocks,
And then you got the meat grinders.
I'm appreciating it, but I'm
Seeing it from a completely different light,
Because nothing in here has ever been for sale.
This is cool because it's a trailer coach.
So this gets into the travel trailer stuff.
And then they're using a covered wagon to connect that.
How people were traveling in the covered wagon
And they're traveling in the travel trailer.
Mike: Uh, like 40 bucks.
I think that's like 75 bucks.
Jerry: 50.
Mike: Okay. I'll do it.
So when somebody says they collect general store stuff,
That's just their way of saying, 'I collect everything.'
Here's the cool piece, man.
1960s mountain dew store display.
But what's always missing
And what's missing on this one is the jug.
And then there was a metal wire that went up with a cork on it,
And that cork went through his hat.
Jerry: Oh I wondered what that was.
Mike: So it was looking like the cork was exploding
From the jug, through his hat.
Nowadays when you think of mountain dew,
You think of x games and energy drinks.
But originally, it was made by 2 brothers out of knoxville,
Tennessee as a mixer for moonshine back in the 1940s.
Which is where the mascot of a moonshine totin' hillbilly
Named granpappy came from.
His feet are nice, you know, the denim is nice,
The shirt, everything's nice, except for that jug,
And you- every once in a while, you can find a jug.
They're out there.
But you know, you're not going to find the finger, okay.
We've bought these before,
And there's always something missing or something broken.
This piece is actually pretty intact.
It would have said 'mountain dew',
You can barely read it.
But the paper label's still on the back.
This is how creatively different advertising used to be.
This was handmade, this is paper-machéd,
There was a jug there, his clothing,
Someone who had to make that.
Nowadays when you see in store advertising, it's cardboard.
Um, like 700 bucks.
Jerry: 750 sounds good to me.
Mike: Alright, I'm doing it. Jerry: You're doing it?
Mike: I'm doing it. Jerry: You got it, sir.
Steve: Welcome to the private club and garage of w.J. Moore.
Robbie: W.J. Moore.
Jersey jon: Whoa, look at the pulleys in this place, man! That's cool!
Steve: Yeah, it's kind of what I'm working on right now.
Robbie: Yeah. Was this his car?
Steve: It was not. This is my stepfather's.
Robbie: Is this for sale?
Steve: Oh no. Oh no. He loves this thing more than he loves me.
Robbie: Oh. (laughs) steve: Yeah, yeah.
Robbie: I'm trying to figure out this pulley system
You got hanging from the ceiling here.
Steve: Me too! Jersey jon: Is it a garage opener?
Steve: Heh. I've got this motor working one way that way.
Robbie: And what's that motor do?
Steve: That motor controls the outdoor garage.
Jersey jon: See, it goes up here, robbie.
It's got this pulley system that operates the garage door.
Now 1920, you didn't have garage door openers,
They weren't around.
And this thing has got bells and whistles and pulleys all over,
All kinds of motion gadgets and stuff.
Steve: This pulley system here,
Is the zip-line pulley system back there.
Jersey jon: Zip-line? Robbie: Zip-line?
Steve: Oh yeah well, yeah, yeah.
He, he had a zip-line. Here I got a cool photo of him over here.
Robbie: Let's see this.
Jersey jon: Wow, look at this place, all kinds of cool neat stuff in here.
Steve: There he is riding that zip-line.
Robbie: W.J. Moore and his flying trapeze. 1954.
Steve: One year before his demise, and he passed at 85,
So he was 84 right there.
Jersey jon: That's an airplane. Steve: We got it right here.
Robbie: Dude, I got to look at this thing. This thing is crazy looking.
Steve: It's upside down.
Jersey jon: Right, right. Are the wings around for it?
Steve: I have not found the wings.
The zip-line was just another example of how w.J.
Took everything to the next level, and beyond.
Robbie: What's this?
Steve: That right there is an old dusty sign I found.
Robbie: What the heck? Where I mean, was it hung up in here?
Steve: Uh, I think you need to flip it up this way.
Robbie: Sherry's office. Steve: Sheriff's office.
Robbie: Oh sheriff's. Jersey jon: Oh sheriff's office.
Robbie: God, you can barely read it there, I see.
Robbie: You're dealing with a house that was built in the late 1800s.
This sign could have came from that time.
Jersey jon: Is it smaltz?
Robbie: No, it's not smaltz. It is- but hey, right here it is.
Actually, that is, jersey, they actually raised that in.
Steve: What's smaltz?
Jersey jon: Like glass ground into paint, so it reflects.
Robbie: So it'd be early, really early.
Jersey jon: So when light hits it, it shines.
Robbie: Is it part of the estate?
Is it part of the property?
Steve: It is not part of the estate. I would be willing
To get rid of that for sure.
Robbie: It's cool. Um...
300.
Steve: 2 pieces of wood with paint on it?
Robbie: Yeah. Steve: You got a deal.
Robbie: It's early, it's early. I think it's cool.
It's inscribed and painted.
Yeah, it's in 2 pieces, but man, it still exists.
Mike: You got just about everything in here.
Oh here's your pharmacy. This is more apothecary stuff.
Would you be interested in selling those cabinets or no?
Jerry: Well, you know, it breaks my heart,
But it's probably time to send it out there
To some of the collectors and let them enjoy it.
Mike: I want him to know that I understand what these items are,
And that they are going to go somewhere.
Like these apothecary cabinets.
Well these are neat, these are really popular right now.
Whether they're bare metal or white
With that queen anne style iron leg,
They're great to put in a bathroom or any kind of display.
It's got the manufacturer's tag, look at that one.
This was made in detroit. Isn't that cool?
Jerry: Yeah, everything local we could get our hands on, we bought.
Mike: This was a key lock one right here.
They're very simple, and they're steel, so they're over-built.
And that's what people love.
You probably know these poison bottles are collectable.
Jerry: Oh yeah.
Mike: You know, like that with that label on it.
That one, and then this one, same exact label,
But different top, it's a larger top,
You know, and these are always missing.
Back in the day, we didn't have the convenience
Of really good lighting,
And there was a lot of illiteracy.
So poison labels had to be big and obvious,
With the skull and crossbones.
The retail on a cabinet like this
Is probably anywhere from 600
To maybe 900.
I'd be a player at like 400 apiece on them.
Jerry: Could you go 500 apiece?
Mike: I'd do 500 apiece with those two bottles.
Danielle: With these 2? Jerry: Oh.
(both laugh)
Jerry: Whoa now.
Mike: Whoa- okay, what are you thinking on the bottles?
Jerry: Well, they should be worth 100, wouldn't you think?
50 a bottle there?
Mike: Why don't we do this, why don't we do 1,050?
So we'll do 500 bucks apiece on these and 50 on the bottles.
Jerry: Yeah. Alright. Mike: You want to do that?
Jerry: Alright. Danielle: It's a good start.
Jersey jon: So are any of these tools for sale?
Like I love this dorman thing, this is neat.
Robbie: Does it still have the pieces in it?
Jersey jon: Yeah it's, well, it's got random stuff.
Steve: Yeah, yeah, take all that too.
Jersey jon: Because these only went to distributors,
Dorman products and dorman chests are rare.
You don't find them very often.
Steve: What's dorman, what do they do?
Jersey jon: They were a parts manufacturer, distributor
Of nuts, bolts, screws, whatever that,
Like a mechanic shop would use.
Robbie: They also made the freezer plugs.
Jersey jon: They made everything.
So it's like having a really cool piece of advertising sign
For your hardware in your shop.
So is that something you'd think about selling?
Steve: Absolutely. Jersey jon: Alright cool.
I mean, 100-and-a-quarter.
Steve: (exhales)
Jersey jon: Yeah? No?
Steve: That seems like a pretty fair deal to me.
(group laughing)
Jersey jon: Thank you, man. I'm finally buying something. I like that.
Steve: Cool, cool, yeah, let's get going.
Jersey jon: Let's see what else we got going on here.
Danielle: Jerry. Jerry: What's up, danielle?
Danielle: This hat stand is what's up.
I love a utilitarian antique.
But look how beautiful the hat stand is
By itself, just as a conversation piece.
I lot of people who collect hats want a place for them,
You know, they don't want to keep them in boxes.
So this is a nice piece, a great display piece.
You ready to let this one go?
Jerry: I would let it go, yeah. Would that be a $50 piece?
Danielle: I mean, I would give you 50 bucks for this piece.
Jerry: Alright then, we made a deal.
Danielle: Yeah. Alright, sweet.
Hey, by the way, I saw this incredible texaco hat.
Jerry: Isn't that something?
Danielle: Yeah, look at that texaco hat, fits there just perfect. And this jacket.
Jerry: You got to have a shirt to go with.
Danielle: Right? Isn't that a great jacket?
Jerry: You can trust your car to the man that wear the star,
The big, bright texaco star.
I can't recall where that came from,
Because my dad, he would go out buying stuff,
And every day we had a constant flow
Of all kinds of things coming in.
Danielle: It is special that you have a hat
And the jacket together.
Jerry: Is it $50 too much for ya?
Danielle: No, I would give you 50 for the jacket,
25 for the hat. Maybe 75 sounds a little more.
Jerry: I'd do that.
Danielle: Sounds more fair. Sweet! Okay, I'm going to keep looking around too.
Jersey jon: All kinds of little gadgets here.
Steve: This cardboard box right here.
I found in that metal scrap bin over there.
And it was full of these old telephone parts.
Jersey jon: Did he make a telephone?
Steve: This is where he made his telephone boxes.
And he invented a transmitter,
We've got a patent for it inside.
Robbie: When the patents ran out for the bell in the early 1900s,
Telephone exploded across the united states basically,
There were over 6,600 independent phone companies.
W.J. Moore was one of them.
Steve: W.J. Started his phone company selling phones
To businesses first, and then got into residential
And pretty much just set up the telecommunications
Here in the thumb.
Jersey jon: Oh the moore telephone system box.
Steve: Yep, this is his old toolbox here.
Jersey jon: Toolbox? Yeah look at that.
Steve: This is actually the only piece of his equipment
That I have that says 'moore' on it.
So I got to hang onto that one.
Jersey jon: This needs to stay, but I love the bench, man.
Let me take a look at this thing.
Steve: Yeah, let me get this out of the way.
Jersey jon: Ooh wow.
This is the kind of thing that a cabinet maker would use.
This is something that you would build fine furniture with.
Like all these holes in here, would be for a bench dog,
And it would hold the wood on the bench
While you're planing it with a plane.
It's really a neat bench. These benches are really hard to find.
You don't find them in the wild very often.
A lot of guys are gobbling them up, putting them in kitchens,
You know, refinish them, putting them in their living rooms.
It's a neat, heavy bench.
It was probably made by a company called christiansen.
They made a lot of benches like this around the turn of the century.
Is this something you'd be willing to sell?
Steve: I think I could part with something like this.
Jersey jon: I'm thinking like, I'll give you 500 bucks for this thing, man.
I really like it.
Steve: Oh wow, that was about $400 more than I was thinking.
Jersey jon: Dude, I would love to have this bench.
Steve: Awesome. It's yours. Jersey jon: Very cool. Thank you, sir.
Steve: You bet, thank you.
Mike: These are what's really interesting to me.
Jerry: Those are advertisements for walk-over shoes.
That was a big shoe company. Mike: In michigan?
Okay, do you remember where you got this stuff at?
'cause this seems to be all from maybe the same place,
'cause you got the shoes, you got the shoe display.
There's four pieces here in total
That connect to anybody that's going to be interested
In shoes and vintage clothing.
No one's going to actually wear these,
But people that collect menswear and women's clothing,
All that kind of stuff.
The pedestal is really what sets it apart.
So I've got this piece, leather shoes.
I'd do...
I'd do 60. 30 and 30.
Jerry: 75. Mike: Okay, 75. Jerry: Alright.
Mike: 75 shoes and stand.
Okay here, these two pieces are very cool.
They're plaster. Jerry: Yeah.
Mike: They're early.
She's got a crack in her neck all the way around. See that?
Jerry: I never noticed that.
Mike: I never noticed that until just now either.
He looks like he's in pretty decent shape. 70 bucks.
Jerry: I'm thinking $100.
Mike: I'd do 80 bucks.
She's got a massive crack right there.
Jerry: How about $90? Mike: 90 bucks.
Jerry: $90.
Mike: Okay 90 bucks. And then look at this.
Blackhawk's blood and body tonic.
Chief blackhawk.
Jerry: He's a man that really knows the market.
He knows what people want.
Mike: Blackhawk was from our area, in illinois.
Jerry: There's no fooling around with him.
He knows what he's doing.
Mike: 15 bucks. Jerry: Ah come on, mike, 25.
Jerry: And I know what I'm doing,
So we didn't bluff each other.
Mike: 20.
Jerry: Alright.
So it was fun dealing with him.
Mike: This is a carnival chalk piece.
This would have been for like a knock-down game or something.
Jerry: That should be... Mike: 10 bucks.
Jerry: 10 bucks, come on, 15 at least.
Mike: 12. Jerry: 15.
Mike: 14. Jerry: 75.
Mike: 14.75. Jerry: 14.75.
Mike: Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
I was thinking 30 bucks.
Jerry: I'll let it go for 40, mike.
You'll never see another one.
Mike: Interesting enough to me. 40 bucks.
Mike: Alright. I got some other stuff over here
I want to show you too.
Steve: So that was the manufacturing section
Of the company, and here's where he would keep
All of his work trucks and tool, you know, some more supplies.
Robbie: So everything happened in this building.
He manufactured the phones and then the guys would come in
And he'd be like, hey I need you to go put a phone somewhere.
Jersey jon: Before we had a nationwide network,
There were smaller regional grids.
So guys like w.J., they had to put the poles up,
They had to put the lines up, they had to sell the phones.
Robbie: Oh, what the heck's that? Look at that!
What up, jersey? Jersey jon: What is that, a downrigger?
Robbie: You don't even know what that is,
You live on the jersey shore, you don't even know what that is.
Jersey jon: It's like a downrigger, dude.
Robbie: I'm a fisherman. I love antique vintage reels,
I love the poles, but I've never seen one like this.
I mean, the reel's as big as my head.
Steve: What do you catch with it?
Jersey jon: Big fish. Robbie: Huh, big.
This is metal. See the roll around the end of that?
Jersey jon: Yeah, and that would bring the lure way down.
Robbie: You're going deep with this thing. 50 bucks.
Jersey jon: There you go. Steve: Cheers.
Robbie: Dang. Woo!
Steve: You're a fisherman.
Robbie: Alright, what else are we looking at in here?
Jerry: So you wanted to see this one?
Danielle: Yes, please. Jerry: Okay.
Whoa, this has got a cast iron base to it.
Danielle: Ooh, that's going to be a heavy one.
While this corset represents a thing of beauty,
It also represents women's bondage.
Quite literally.
It was not unusual for women to actually break their ribs
When they were corseting themselves into a dress.
It's not whalebone. This is a metal rod.
Jerry: About what year would that be?
Danielle: Roughly turn-of-the-century.
Jerry: The pinched waist was the big style at that time.
Danielle: Yeah, right after that like, right around
Like 1911, 1910.
Things started to loosen up on the female body.
In 1911, the lampshade tunic
Was invented by paul poiret.
And when that happened, women stopped wearing corsets.
Jerry: Oh excuse me, I didn't mean to do that.
Danielle: (laughs)
Also, the suffragette movement started to gain momentum
And it's wild that these two things
Collided at the same time.
Women needed a little bit more flexibility,
And didn't want to be corseted in.
'cause you can't sit there at a desk
If you're corseted into the garment.
Jerry: A little liberation. Danielle: Right, you have to
Kind of lay on a fainting couch.
That's why the fainting couch was invented,
Because women would regularly pass out,
Because their corsets were too tight.
We couldn't even sit down!
But it's still such a beautiful piece of history
And I do love to wear a corset.
In the condition that this is in,
I would offer $25 for it.
Jerry: Ooh I thought it'd be more than that.
Danielle: Yeah no. Not really.
Jerry: How about that and the stand, $40.
Danielle: I'll tell you, that and the stand.
I'd do 65 bucks.
Jerry: They're yours.
Danielle: Yeah, 'cause the stand is definitely worth that.
Jerry: Okay, I feel good about it. Danielle: Amazing.
Steve: Alright guys, I got to show you the inside of the house.
Jersey jon: This is awesome! Robbie: Wow!
Jersey jon: Yeah man, woo. Robbie: So what is this?
Steve: This is the master control panel
For the entire property.
You could open those garage doors,
You could start up the zip-line,
Turn on the lights on the tennis court.
Robbie: Everything was right here?
Steve: Everything was right here.
Robbie: "south hall"
"lock down the front garage"
"burglar alarm".
Jersey jon: Here's the airplane.
Steve: Some of these control some of the lighting in here.
But I've been pushing them all and haven't seen-
Jersey jon: Did I just turn the lights on downtown?
Steve: Maybe. (group laughing)
Robbie: I mean, that's crazy. Steve: It's pretty awesome.
Jersey jon: That's really cool.
Robbie: What's the top lights for?
Steve: Those are little indicator lights that would
Let you know when certain water pumps were running,
Or if they were failing to run.
Jersey jon: At this time, people washed their clothes by hand.
There was horse-and-buggies still on the streets.
Meanwhile, w.J. Was building the luxury of automation
Way before its time.
It was the first smart home.
Steve: Check out these little indicator lights up here.
Jersey jon: Oh wow, it's got lights on it, robbie.
Steve: It'll tell you what doors open here, what door's there.
Robbie: He had to build this house, jersey!
With all this stuff in it!
All that wiring is built inside the fireplace,
It's also interconnected
To everything else that's in the house.
Steve: You hit the switch, and this panel would pop open.
So he came up with the burglar alarm.
That switch would turn on every light on the property,
It would phone the police.
It's been a bit of an overwhelming experience
Seeing all these lights and switches and wires
And cable pulleys.
I've got to basically reverse-engineer.
Robbie: He can actually make this work again. Just crazy.
Mike: Alright, you got a flange sign in here,
Auto supplies.
Obviously tires, firestone, porcelain.
Jerry: Oh yeah. Oh that's going to be something to get down.
Mike: Oh I know. See how it's got loss of porcelain on the edge?
Mike: It's the same thing on the other side
Crawling up a little bit higher.
And then you've got some chips, but I mean, overall,
It's a great sign, the color's great, awesome subject matter.
The fact that it's a flange,
Those are getting harder to find.
Great color, great subject matter. It's cool.
Mike: Here's what I'd do.
I'll do 1,200 on the firestone sign,
And then on this clock,
There's a big crack in the top of it.
Right there.
It's an advertising clock for tobacco.
I'd do a grand on the clock and 12 on the sign. 2,200.
Jerry: Well those clocks are going for probably 2,000.
Mike: Not in that condition.
We're talking about a high-test antique here.
I mean, something that's rare, that's difficult to find,
But any little thing knocks it down in price.
See the crack? Jerry: Yeah.
Mike: See it? Jerry: Yeah, I seen it.
Mike: It goes, just goes all the way through, you know.
I tell you what, I'd do 1,200 on it,
And 1,200 on the sign. 2,400.
Jerry: I'd like to get 2,000 for it.
Mike: Yeah I can't do that. I can't do that.
You want to do 1,200 on the firestone sign?
Jerry: I'll do that.
Mike: Okay, let's do that, 1,200 on the firestone sign.
Jerry: So, what would you give for that clock?
Mike: I mean, I'm at 12 on it now.
Jerry: Well give me 15 and you can take it then.
Mike: I'll do 14 on it, I'm coming all the way up on.
I'm telling you that crack hurts it.
What about, what about, here, let me show you this.
You stay right there.
When you and danielle disappear,
That's when I start digging deep.
Jerry: Oh yeah, I seen that.
Mike: Alright. Let's do this.
Jerry: Boy, you got a good eye.
You're pulling out the best stuff we got here.
Mike: What are you talking about?
I call this a tv light, or just a mood light.
Obviously this is not a light.
That would be made for you to see anything with,
This is just to strike a mood.
Jerry: It's beautiful when it lit up.
Mike: It's a cast iron frame,
With a golden piece of slag glass, and then in the cast iron
Is the impression of a majestic native american.
I was blown away by it,
Because the glass is intact in this piece,
And things like this just didn't survive.
Jerry: So what do you think? Mike: What do I think?
Jerry: Yeah. Mike: Well...
Jerry: Well you, you want to buy it?
Mike: You want 15 for the clock.
So let's do...
Let's do 1,600
For the clock and this.
Basically what I'm offering for this is 200 bucks.
I think this is probably like 350.
Jerry: Yeah, that's really old.
Mike: What if I came up 100?
I'll just, I'll just almost pay retail for this.
So then I'm at 17
On the clock and this.
Jerry: Okay.
Mike: We're doing it? Alright.
Jerry: It hurts. Mike: I appreciate ya.
Steve: So yeah, apparently, you would hit that button.
Upstairs in the garage, is a private club.
This door here, I found buried up in the attic
And I kept wondering what this piece was here for.
Robbie: So that was like the little peephole,
Hey the cops might be here, the party might be over.
Jersey jon: The speakeasy door.
Steve: Let them in or not. Jersey jon: Very cool.
Robbie: Man, you have to wonder what the heck happened up here.
Robbie: Holy cow! Look at this. Jersey jon: What a nice space!
Robbie: What a killer space. Steve: Yeah.
Robbie: Wow. So it looks like it was even an exercise room.
Jersey jon: Cool. Robbie: Yeah. Feels good.
Steve: Now I know what to use them for.
Robbie: Yeah, you want to do it? Let's do it.
(group laughing)
Robbie: So what's the deal with all this soda pop stuff?
Steve: I've just found them up in the attic.
I don't have any connection to them.
I don't think they're really related to the home much, so.
The house has been out of the family for over 50 years,
And lots of things have come and gone.
And so those are one of the things that
Must have came and stayed.
Robbie: You're kidding me. Steve: What do you think?
Robbie: Wow. It's a whole crate.
Jersey jon: So it's new-old stock.
Robbie: It says there were 50. Steve: There were 50.
Jersey jon: How many are in there now?
Robbie: Let me ask you, are you seriously
Thinking about selling these? Steve: Yeah.
Robbie: Okay. So can I pull them out?
Cause condition means everything.
Steve: Yeah, let's check them out.
Robbie: I'm just going to lay them on the ground.
They're in the original shipping crates.
They were still sandwiched between the wax paper.
Got to get them all out of here.
You never find stuff like this.
These hires root beers, these in particular,
A mint one would sell for about 500 bucks.
That's a retail number on that.
But condition means everything.
The biggest thing with soda sign collectors,
These guys want to nitpick you on every little scratch,
Every little scrape.
The condition to me, I think, the retail number on them
Is going to be 3, 3 and a quarter on the top side of it.
1,600 for the 8.
That where I'd want to be.
And I'm kind of varying that number because you know,
This one right here is probably...
Steve: Taking an average, kind of?
Robbie: Yeah, that's what I'm doing.
That's probably $100 sign right there.
You don't have any of them that are dead mint.
The fact that they were in this crate, I mean, makes a big plus.
I'll tell you what I'd do, I'd give you the 1,600,
And I'd give you another 100 for the crate.
Steve: I like it. Robbie: Alright.
Jersey jon: Thanks, buddy. Steve: Cool, thank you.
Steve: That was quite shocking.
I didn't know the retail value of them at all.
Jersey jon: Wow. Robbie: Oh wow.
Jersey jon: That's unusual.
Robbie: Man, that I'd grade a nine all day long.
Steve: Okay, good to know.
Robbie: Most soda signs were painted.
They weren't porcelain.
Porcelain itself is going to be shinier and last longer.
Where painted signs got scratched up. Three.
Steve: 3, that's it, brother.
Robbie: These actually are worth a lot more.
Steve: Okay.
Robbie: If these hadn't been set in between the wax paper
In their original state, they would already be scratched up.
Robbie: 1,600 bucks for the three.
Steve: You do 18?
Robbie: 1,700. 1,700 with the crate.
Steve: And you guys carry them out? Deal.
Jersey jon: Thanks, buddy. Robbie: Appreciate it.
The fact that they're still in the original crate
Makes them worth more money.
Don't scratch it, don't scratch it.
Jerry: Alright dani, I got to show you something over here
You're not going to believe this one.
Danielle: I'm pretty excited to see this.
Jerry: This is one of our crown jewels of our collection.
So...
Danielle: Whoa!
Jerry: This is a tub that mae west took a bath in.
Danielle: Do you mind if I start taking some stuff out?
Jerry: Yeah sure. Danielle: Okay.
Jerry: These people came in, older people.
He was a nice old man.
And he said he was a bellhop there at the park hotel.
It was the most luxurious hotel in michigan at the time.
And all the movie stars stayed there
And all the big-time gamblers.
When the park finally closed down,
They were going to bulldoze the whole thing.
And they went to their employees and they said,
If you want anything, go and get it now,
Because it's going to be bulldozed.
Danielle: Shoot.
Jerry: And then he said, mae west was the most beautiful
Woman I ever seen in my life,
And she took a bath in this tub.
And went right for this tub right away.
Danielle: What!
Jerry: And all those years he had it in his basement.
Danielle: And it says right here 'the steel bath manufacturing
Company in detroit michigan.'
Do you think if I sat in it, it would hold me?
Jerry: Oh absolutely. Danielle: You think so?
(laughs)
Danielle: I got to just see if it'll...
Mae west was the end-all-be-all.
There will never be any better. There just won't.
She was magnetic.
Holy monkey!
And she just laid here
In her little bath and just luxuriated.
Wow.
Robbie: What the heck is, that's not even a pool, man.
Jersey jon: It's like a lake.
Steve: The pool was almost like an abandoned,
You know, sea world or something.
Robbie: Wow!
Steve: So this once was just a pond. So in the '30s,
He did all this transformation, poured all the concrete,
Did a cool waterslide feature over here.
Jersey jon: It's like a water park.
Steve: And over here, this lighthouse used to light up at night.
Robbie: What the heck.
Jersey jon: And over there was for the...
Steve: Yes, the zip-line.
He'd come out of his room in the morning and jump on...
Robbie: Oh basically he would come off the house right here,
And zip-line down into the pool.
The features that w.J. Put into this pool
Are over 100 years old.
All the features are one-of-a-kind.
It needs some serious restoration work.
Steve: And then, when you're done, you climb up,
You hit a little button with your foot,
And zip, it takes you back up.
Jersey jon: The kids must have loved that.
Jerry: That's the story that... Danielle: This is the story.
Jerry: They printed in the local newspaper down there.
And that's my dad sitting there.
Danielle: That's your dad with his cowboy hat! Yes!
Jerry: With his cowboy hat on, he's probably got his coveralls on too.
Danielle: Oh wow.
So the timing of this bathtub is about right
For mae west
To have been able to have been in it.
But we don't have any solid provenance.
Jerry: We don't. I can't prove it.
All's I can say is I have no doubt that
That man was telling me the truth.
Danielle: Without the story it's worth $500.
Jerry: Yeah, yeah.
Danielle: It's just with that story,
It definitely is worth more than 500 bucks.
But how much is that, you know?
Jerry: So what would you think?
Danielle: I could see adding another 1,000 onto that,
Doing 1,500.
I could see that with the local folklore,
With your history it, with your father's history with this tub,
With the...
Jerry: So you're saying you believe that.
Danielle: I believe that that could very well be true.
Jerry: Okay, so this is your bathtub.
Danielle: Ah! Jerry! Ah!
Jerry: It's not about the money all the time, you know.
These are my children, I want them to go to a good home.
It's crazy, I know it sounds crazy,
But that's what collectors do, they get a little nuts.
Danielle: So exciting.
Steve: Alright come on,
You need to break out your flashlights.
Jersey jon: Going to go right through the floor on this one.
Robbie: Right here, dude, look at this.
Steve: What do you got? Robbie: I think this is an early rat trap.
Jersey jon: What? Steve: Is there anything in it?
Jersey jon: Look at that thing, robbie.
Robbie: It looks like, looks like, ooh hold on here.
Jersey jon: I think it's upside down, no?
Robbie: It's an early trap, dude.
It could have been for,
So I don't know how it would have worked.
You really have to figure these out,
How these guys were making stuff back in the day.
Jersey jon: Like for a rat or something?
Robbie: It could have been for a raccoon.
Steve: Squirrels, lots of squirrels around.
Robbie: There is a huge collecting field out there
That collect mouse traps, rat traps, bird traps.
So to find one and figure out how it works,
That's what people are intrigued by.
Robbie: I think the way this thing sat,
It sat like this.
And this string then ran back to here,
Which is on a... Steve: Clothespin.
Robbie: Right here. Jersey jon: Right.
Robbie: And then this one did the same thing.
So depending on which way you came in...
Jersey jon: And the bait was in here.
Robbie: The bait was in there. Jersey jon: You trip the bait.
Steve: They both fall. Robbie: And then they both fall.
Robbie: Boom, boom. Jersey jon: And you got a live animal in there.
Steve: I could use that. Jersey jon: (laughing) yeah.
Robbie: You want to keep this? Jersey jon: New pet squirrel.
Steve: Yeah, you know, it's... Are you interested in it?
Robbie: Dude, I think it's cool as can be, I love these things.
Every single one of these... Jersey jon & steve: Is different.
Robbie: Is different. 75 bucks.
Steve: 100?
Robbie: I think the top, top dollar on it's 125.
I'm trying to leave a little... Steve: A little wiggle room?
Robbie: Yeah. Steve: How about 80?
Robbie: 80 bucks. Jersey jon: There you go. Thanks, bro.
We'll be trapping raccoons by tonight, robbie.
Jersey jon: It's like $100 piece. You ?
This sign has incredible subject matter,
The condition is a little bit rough,
But this is a company that's been around
Since the early 1900s.
You know, it's a household name.
It's a very cool piece.
Mike: Look at that.
Jerry: Whoa. So...
Our store down state there...
Mike: You're talking about the first place you guys had this museum?
Jerry: Yeah, all the stuff used to be there.
And to get to the little town of davis,
You had to drive through waldenburg.
And so this was the hardware store in waldenburg,
The only store in the town of waldenburg.
And we knew mr. Stier also.
Mike: Yeah. What's great about the sign is,
It's got graphics on it of the outboard motor.
This is what they call a privilege panel,
Where they would have put your name up here.
A lot of times that's down here on the bottom.
You know, this is much larger at the top.
But look at the font and the way they did this.
Mike: The problem with it is,
Is you can see through it right here.
And it's about ready to rip.
But you can tell, did you pull it off the wall?
Jerry: No. We got that at a flea market.
Mike: Okay, oh no kidding.
Jerry: Out in the town of almeda.
Mike: But you drove through this town all the time.
Jerry: Every, every day.
Mike: Okay. If this sign was really nice, I mean, to me,
It's probably a $2,500 sign.
But you know, it's got issues.
It's got this going down the center, there's paint loss,
There's a hole in it, there's a lot of nails
That were tacked through it and such.
In this condition, I'd pay,
I'd pay a grand. Jerry: It's yours.
Mike: You're doing it? Jerry: Yeah.
Mike: Alright, my friend. Jerry: 1,000?
Mike: $1,000. Jerry: Okay, you got it.
Mike: I appreciate it.
Jerry: I was sad to see so many things go in here today,
But I know they were going to collectors.
Mike: Alright, okay.
Jerry: Collectors take good care of the stuff,
And they treasure it.
And then they pass it onto another.
Mike: Alright, buddy. Thank you. Jerry: Alright.
And that gives it a chance for all these objects
To have a much longer lifespan.
Danielle: So good to actually meet you.
Jerry: So nice to meet you.
Danielle: And get to see you and hang out with you all day.
Jerry: Nice to meet you. Danielle: Thank you.
Mike: It was so important to jerry to honor his father,
His mission, and his passion.
And as a romantic, jerry wants to pass this stuff on
To somebody that understands it.
We understand it, and we're going to push it forward.
Mike: I'll see you, buddy. Jerry: Alright.
Mike: Thank you for sharing your family's story with us.
Jerry: Absolutely. Thank you. Mike: You held on, my buddy.
Jerry: I feel good they went to some good people.
Danielle: I'm going to stay in touch.
Jerry: Do that. Danielle: I will, I will.
(honks horn) mike: See you, buddy!
(honks horn)
Jersey jon: Hey steve. Steve: Hey yeah.
Jersey jon: Hey, so I found this industrial base,
It's like a foot-powered mechanism
To drive a piece of machinery.
Steve: Would it have a belt on there?
Jersey jon: Yeah, it would have had a flat belt on it.
So it's kind of cool, probably about 1875, 1880.
Before electric motors were around,
This was a human-powered motor, by your feet.
Jersey jon: I mean, to me,
It's like $100 piece.
Steve: Okay, 'cause to me it's like a $500 piece.
Jersey jon: Really? No.
Steve: I don't know, you said 1880, man. Like, I don't know.
Jersey jon: Yeah, but I see quite a few of these.
I mean, the most I'm going to do, dude, is like 125 bucks.
What do you think?
Steve: I say you bring it on out.
Jersey jon: Yeah? Steve: Yeah. Why not?
Jersey jon: Alright. I like that, thank you.
Steve: You bet. Well I like you.
Every little bit's going to help us out.
Jersey jon: Yeah, and then we got to get a new roof on this place.
Robbie: This is hands-down the most customized home
I've ever been in, in america.
From the roof line to the pool, to the automation.
Everything that w.J. Moore did here, was a one-off.
And it's all right there in his head.
Alright, jersey, I can't believe...
Dude, what's up with that? Jersey jon: That's heavy, man.
Robbie: Alright, I know it's heavy.
Steve: Good luck catching some there and catching something here.
Robbie: Yeah. Check that out.
Dude, it has been one incredible day.
Jersey jon: It really has. Steve: Likewise.
Jersey jon: The whole story, this whole place is amazing.
It's so cool it's still intact, like it's all still here.
Robbie: I'd love to wake up to this every day.
Just the challenge of it.
Steve: Put a little elbow grease into it, and...
The stuff that we sold, hopefully will pitch into
The new roof and to some of the other pieces of the property
That we need to fix.
Robbie: Appreciate it, thank for sharing.
Jersey jon: Really appreciate it.
Steve: You bet, thank you. Jersey jon: Alright.
Robbie: Steve has a huge task to undertake.
(honks horn) jersey jon: Thanks, buddy.
Steve: Yeah, thank you guys.
Robbie: But the biggest plus for him, is that w.J. Left enough
Behind to give him the path that he needs to finish this project.
Subtitling: Difuze