Dealers not set up in the school’s main hallway were in this room, which had large windows on two sides, making it a well-lit space.
Review & Onsite Photos by Madelia Hickman Ring
DUXBURY, MASS. — With the exception of a pandemic pause, the Duxbury Antiques Show has been taking place for 42 years, with proceeds to benefit the Duxbury High School Athletic Booster Club. This year’s 43rd annual show — April 26-27, at the Duxbury High School — was the first time the show has been run by the powerhouse show managers John and Liz DeSimone, who are Maine-based Goosefare Antiques & Promotions. The DeSimones combed their sizeable network of dealers and fielded about 40, including several who had never participated in the show before.
Weather on the first day was conducive to being inside antiquing, with gusty winds that some dealers noted “kept buyers from leaving!” Everyone reported at least a few sales, with some having an exceptional day. The second day started at 11 am with overcast skies and sprinkles that soon dissipated in sunny weather but visitors still came. The realities of current world events — the health of the economy and uncertainties with proposed tariffs among them — were not far from most people’s minds and a few dealers reported feeling some hesitancy on the part of shoppers but most were able to put these worries behind them, at least for a short time.
“We sold lots of smalls,” John DiSimone told Antiques and The Arts Weekly. He was hoping to find buyers for some of the furniture he’d brought as he said he is doing a show in Hanover, Va., next weekend.
Among the new dealers were Susan Baker, proprietor of Uniquities in Essex, Mass. While she usually brings a large selection of fine art to the other shows she does, she mixed it up for Duxbury, bringing smalls as well.
Susan Baker, showing for the first time, is seen here (left) with a father and son (behind him) who were inquiring after a painting in her inventory. Uniquities, Essex, Mass.
Also participating for the first time were Michael Westman and Dan and Angela Triggs. Westman does “all of the other” Goosefare Productions shows and said the first day was “fine,” with sales of Asian and Native American objects, among other things. A couple of important pieces the Peace Dale, R.I., dealer brought were a Spanish Colonial silver wine pitcher, a modern work by Norris Embry (American, 1921-1981) and a landscape by Danish painter, Peter Christian Thamsen Skovgaard (1817-1875).
Dantiques is the business name of Dan and Angela Triggs and the Hingham, Mass., dealers were not only participating in their first show in Duxbury but their first show ever. Dan has a passion for restoring antique and vintage bookcases, among other furniture forms. They reported selling a couple of bookcases on the first day but had brought so many that their booth still had several pieces to choose from.
Alan and Day Herman, Whaling Days Antiques in Wareham, Mass., reported several first-day sales, including a diorama, several signs and a big ship weathervane. They’ve been doing the Duxbury show for about 25 years.
Across the hallway, Carl Goveia noted this show is usually his “second-best” annual show. Saturday shoppers snapped up a big, enamel Bell Telephone sign, an ornate key box and a stoneware jug. Among the Eastham, Mass., dealer’s good pieces were a ship’s liquor box and a stained glass window a local collector had their eye on.
David Thompson was holding a frame enclosing two silk ribbons from the 1843 dedication of the Bunker Hill Monument that he’d acquired from a collector near Boston. David Thompson Antiques & Art, South Dennis, Mass.
South Dennis, Mass., dealers David and Jane Thompson were all smiles when we came through their booth. Several pieces connected to Hingham, Mass. — about 20 miles from Duxbury — traded hands, as well as a pantry box, a whaling harpoon and lance and a painting that Moby Dick author Herman Melville had owned and described in the book.
Paul Saccocia has been a Duxbury show vendor for more than 35 years and also shows in Hingham and Osterville, Mass. He was pleased to show off a pair of vintage Gene Autry rubber cowboy boots made by Servus from the mid Twentieth Century, and a big trencher he said was from the early Nineteenth Century. A pine three-drawer chest and a “bunch of smalls” had found new homes the day before.
Carol Petraglia, of Barnstable, Mass., has been doing the show for between 20 and 25 years. Characterizing the previous day as “very good,” she reported transactions on stoneware, woodenware, smalls, primitives and a bronze and shell lamp that was waiting to be transported to its new home.
The foyer of the school’s auditorium was where Cathy Cwilichoski set up, around the sign for the school’s theater productions. She said she’d received several inquiries about the sign, which advertised the school’s black box production of She Kills Monsters. A handful of small objects were among the Orange, Conn., dealer’s sales on the first day.
Cathy Cwilichoski said people wanted to buy the school theater’s sign, seen hanging here. Chester Cwilichoski Antiques, Orange, Conn.
Brad Finch exhibits in Newport, Nantucket and other local shows; it was his tenth year in Duxbury. He debuted an early Eighteenth Century spoon rack he’d found in a farmhouse in Carver, Mass., that was made of chestnut and had a dovetailed candle box. The dealer, who hails from Brewster, Mass., specializes in early maritime objects, telescopes, maps and charts and said he’d sold well on the first day.
“Years and years” was how Peter Murphy characterized his participation at the Duxbury show. The Bath, Maine, dealer had sold three pieces of furniture that were still in his booth on Sunday morning: a glass coffee table with shell-form base, a Federal bowfront chest of drawers, and an English traveling trunk that had been converted to a silver chest with later stand. All of his sales were to new, local collectors.
Murphy’s neighbor was Topsfield, Mass., dealer, Elizabeth Murphy, who is not related. Elizabeth is Windy Hill Antiques, which was started by her 96-year-old mother Eleanor Duffin, who is still active. Like Peter, “all new clients” were her buyers, of a dresser, a painting, a miniatures salesman’s chair and the specialty of the shop: “decorative accessories” she described as “just pretty things.”
Scott Ciardi is a master restorer of brass, copper, silver and pewter, carrying on a 100-year-old family tradition. He brought several lamps, trays and other implements that he’d brought back to life, cleaning off years of grime and exterior finishes. Photos showing what objects had looked like “before” he’d restored them demonstrated his talents admirably. He was showing alongside Cynthia Marland, of Two Hunters Antiques, Dartmouth, Mass.
Middle Eastern works with Charles Wibel Antiques, Orleans, Mass.
“It was a huge crowd; I had a super day,” Charles Wibel reported, noting sales of “a little bit of everything.” The Orleans, Mass., dealer had a few things at the end of one table that he’d acquired from a couple who had lived in Pakistan for several years while working for the government: two framed Nineteenth Century watercolor drawings and some inlaid brass or copper articles, including two bowls, three ewers and three bells.
A smaller room towards the back of the school had large windows on two sides and housed more than a dozen other dealers. One of the dealers along the back window was Lincolnville, Maine, dealer Martin Ferrick, who noted selling a one drawer stand and an early Hingham photo on the first day, and a decorated box within an hour of the show’s opening on the second day. A pair of anchor-form andirons that he’d found on Cape Cod looked great on either side of a long painted wooden seaman’s chest with becket handles.
Donna Kmetz of Douglas, Mass., was next to Ferrick with three tables with many framed pieces and small objects. First day sales included a “huge” colorful garden farm-scape by Cathy McDonough she said was “the first painting Dave and I ever bought.” It was sold to a new local client, as well as a few other “tidbits.”
Dunstable, Mass., dealer Bud Tully had buyers across multiple categories, including paintings, Imari porcelain, art pottery and silver.
Across from Tully, Jen Schwartz was helping local Hingham, Mass., dealer and interior designer, Amber Waterhouse, who has been doing the show for eight years. One of Schwartz’s sales was a poster made in 1979 by Jamie Wyeth for the John F. Kennedy Library that was signed by the artist. First-day transactions Waterhouse closed included art, furniture, garden and nautical.
Dates for the 44th Duxbury Antiques Show & Sale have not yet been announced. For information, www.goosefareantiques.com.
