Antiquing in Pennsylvania

A trip along Route 80, down I-99 and back brought us to a number of antique malls and shops and enough merchandise to make your head spin. The first stop was in Lewisburg, Pa.

Roller Mills, 100 N. Water Street, Lewisburg, Pa—Contains merchandise from some 400 dealers including furniture, glassware and more. There’s a lot of stuff in here and probably only a small portion meets the hundred years of age required to be an antique. Still, most anywhere you find this much stuff, there’s got to be some goodies. As the old saying goes, there’s a treasure in every pile, you just have to know it when you see it. I didn’t have time to look through all the prints, there seemed to be many of reasonable quality. There’s some interesting stoneware and a basement full of goodies including old telephones and a film splicer. Had you the time and energy, I’d bet you can make a living driving to Lewisburg and taking the merchandise back to the Brooklyn Flea. I should also mention two other things, first, the café has very good comfort food. Second, this is a mall that doesn’t allow photographs, which means I can’t easily show someone who may want to purchase something that it’s available. www.rollermills.com

125 Shops “An Indoor Country Village,” Lewisburg, Pa–A large portion of this place is a flea market, and almost the other half is country accents that have little to do with antiques except having some customer base crossover. There is one booth of books and railroad stock certificates I spent a considerable amount of time in. We left with a book and a couple stock certificates. The book turned out to be a good value, the stock certificates, priced at $5 each were $1 each online. The shipping cost takes them up to almost $5 each, however. There are some items of interest to be found in the flea market section. We noticed thirty bound volumes of Scribner’s Monthly for around $60. www.streetofshops.net

Antique Depot, 1401 2nd Ave, Duncansville, Pa—This place is pretty big and also attached to a flea market. I find myself here a couple times a year. It’s always interesting to note what people are buying. The clerk was ringing up a number of ceramic turtles for one fellow who told me his wife collects them. This trip the merchandise here seemed to be better than it has been in recent memory. If I didn’t have to lug anything I buy from Newark (where we drop off the rental car) to Brooklyn, I might have left with a lot more. The prices are generally very reasonable too. Antique Depot also doesn’t allow photographs, yet I imagine a dozen are more are taken every day with camera phones. duncansvilleantiquedepot.com

The Historic Red Mill, 44 Red Mill Road, Bloomsburg, Pa—This shop is housed in an 18th Century Red Mill. Inside we found mostly furniture, including some empire scroll game tables and dining room tables that look like they could be from the early 1800s. It’s all neatly displayed and in usable condition. About half of the furniture here isn’t very old, but all in a similar style. It’s a fun place and definitely worth a stop. You’ll also get to meet Roger and Me, two large dogs that inhabit the place. http://www.the-red-mill.com

Hoffman’s Antiques, 1028 Millville Rd, Bloomsburg, Pa—If you’re looking for shades for a gas chandelier, this could be the place. One area has a large number of glass shades for a variety of lighting fixtures including gasoliers. There’s also a good selection of 19th-Century furniture, clocks and an especially nice pair of cut glass decanters priced at around $150.

Flemings, 1609 Montour Blvd, Danville, Pa—Flemings is a store filled with lamps and lamp parts. Chandeliers, table lamps and a large array of oil lamps fill the space. They also stock lamp parts. I didn’t notice any solar or argand lamps, but nonetheless found one cut-glass kerosene lamp far too attractive to use for lighting.

There are many more shops we were unable to visit. If you go, check out www.sundaydriver.com. They publish a number of maps that show shops in Eastern Pennsylvania, Western Pennsylvania and elsewhere. There’s a form on the site where you can request a pdf of any map. Hard copies are available through the mail for $1.00 each. This company needs to develop GPS programs for its maps. They might not do it because they’re worried about hurting the ability to sell map advertising. It would be very valuable for the consumer and advertiser if they included the positioning free with an ad. If they don’t do it, someone else will.