“The weather is so great, it almost doesn’t matter if I find another treasure of not,” one visitor to Antiques in a Cow Pasture said on Saturday, September 11, at the flea market in Salisbury. While everyone on the former Russell Carrell field agreed on the weather, warm sunshine and cloudless skies, few wanted to go home empty-handed and were busy sorting through the merchandise presented by the 77 exhibitors.

Early buying started at 8 am and at 7:30 show manager Frank Gaglio was ready to rethink the show. “We had only a handful of people at that hour and I thought it was going to be a disaster,” he said, but in the end 155 people showed up to shop the show before the regular 10 am opening. “We were down only 13 people from last year, so we plan to have early buying again in 2005,” he said. He is also planning on admitting the dealers to the field at 6 am and setup will take place over the next two hours so that all will be ready when the early buyers come onto the field.

People kept coming all day, the gate was good, and some visitors arrived as late as 3:45 pm, leaving only a few minutes to shop as the show closed at 4 pm.

Close to 1,200 people attended the show in the course of the day, and many of the exhibitors reported good sales. And as with most antiques events, the booths varied from country to formal, mixed with some Victorian, lots of paint and old surfaces. There did not seem to be as much garden and architectural elements, but then again the season is drawing to a close.

A look at a number of the booths, and some of the objects including a soapbox racer and a beautiful rowing canoe, is presented here. And pictured with Frank Gaglio is another antiques show manager, Sanford “Sandy” Smith, who has bought a home near Great Barrington, Mass., and traveled over the hills to enjoy the cow pasture.