The Canadian Antiques Roadshow is on its way to North Battleford after a four-day event in Red Deer, Alta.
Red Deer folks turned out in droves to discover if Gram's old vase or dad's old guitar was the next million dollar discovery.
One of the many discoveries uncovered in Red Deer was an ivory chest set that dated back to the 17th century and was valued at $20,000 and a painting by Leo Guiling of England worth $50,000 to #$0,000.
In Prince George, B.C. a couple showed up with an old duffle bag, but it was what was hidden inside the bag that took appraisers' breath away.
A Stradivarius violin made by a member of the Stradivari family during the golden period of 1770 was tucked away inside an old stinky hockey duffle bag.
Not everything that comes into the roadshow is of great value. The vase a lady brought into the roadshow in Prince Edward Island was said to have belonged to Queen Anne of Scotland. However the little tag on the bottom that read Made In China confirmed it was in fact a $19 vase from Walmart.
At the roadshow in Saskatoon an elderly gentleman brought a child's little red wagon full of what he claimed was gold nuggets. The show's gold appraiser and long time gold buyer quickly discovered the rocks where just that, rocks from good old Saskatchewan. But a rare discovery was made, because the little red wagon was built by Renaldo Brothers in 1918 and was in excellent condition. The owner was offered $700, but he declined the offer saying if he sold it he would have no way to take his gold rocks home.
People usually have a few hundred dollars coming to them from the sale of their items reports roadshow manager Amy Kyle, however one gentleman walked into the show with a dolly loaded with three car board boxes full of silver and gold coins.
It became sorting the coins would take several hours as there was thousands and thousands of coins, both Canadian and U.S. coins.
The huge collection was accumulated over 50 years by the now current owner's grandfather. Mike Scotsman shared his story of how his grandfather found most of the coins while working at the municipal dump in Brandon, Man.
Papa was the only employee at the dump for 33 years and during that time he set up a small car washing and cleaning side business at the dump. He offered service free of charge in exchange for any pop bottles or beer bottles the customers would donate.
Papa also offered a free interior vacuum service with the car wash and he would always find a few coins in the ashtray or on the floor and mostof the time his customers would tell him to keep the coins.
For 30 some years Papa would come home each day and put the few coins in a glass jar and over the years the collection turned into hundreds of jars of silver coins. Scotsman said he can clearly remember his grandfather saying, "someday we will be rich, rich, rich when I sell my coins" and then he would break into a big belly laugh that would rattle the dishes in gamma's china cabinet.
Papa never did cash in his coins, however he spent many a night picking out what he thought would become rare or collector coins and would tell Scotsman someday this coin or that coin would be worth a fortune.
After several hours of going over the coins the road show staff discovered 21 U.S. silver dollars that had the rare mint mark from the San Francisco Mint and these coins alone are worth $8,000 apiece. They also uncovered one half ounce gold coin and seven one-quarter ounce gold coins.
The Antiques Roadshow staff will evaluate coins for free.
What's in your treasure chest or up in the attic? The roadshow will be at Frontier mall April 2 to 5.
