Collection Galore

This was intended to be a photo of my cane collection, but it also shows a wide variety of other items we have enjoyed. Hanging on the wall on the left is the bottom portion of the “Grandmothers Clock” we purchased at an auction in Shipshewana, Indiana. Just below, a plant is in the brass pot we got in the Flea Market in Wetzlar, Germany, while visiting Emmy’s cousin, Gerd. The pot sits on a small stool from Ribeauville, in the French Alsace.

The cane collection is in a 15 year old “temporary” cane holder that I made. The two tall items on the left are “flails” we purchased in the Czech Republic. The tall cane with a crook, is from Silver Lake, Indiana, near where my mother lived for years. The two tall items to the right, are Greek Shepherd Staffs — one we found in an antique store in Githio, the other I bought from a shepherd in Kótronas. (If you know the story about the design of either staff, please contact me!)

That pipe, with a nozzle, sticking out to the left, we found while we were eating lunch in our RV while parked right next to a leg of the Eiffel Tower. The red item is a “shooting stick” that says “Bob Hope Desert Classic, 1977.” The other canes were purchased throughout the USA and in many countries in Europe. I had my 18th birthday on a troopship in the harbor in Singapore, and my son-in-law happened to be there on a business trip on the 49th anniversary of that birthday, so he bought me a cane.

When I get a complement on one very nice cane, I say, "I bought it at a store across the street from McDonald's." Then I quickly add, "In Prague, at the end of the Charles Bridge, a couple of blocks from the American Embassy, the residence of Madam Shirley Temple Black, then the US Ambassador to the Czech Republic."

The copper pot that holds the collection was purchased in an antique store in Stockholm. But the most exciting items are the couple of chunks of concrete (at each end of the copper pot), that we know came from the Berlin Wall.

At the former Checkpoint Charlie we asked a Berlin Policeman if we could “liberate” a piece of the Wall. As he gave us directions to nearby Mühlen Straße, he put his hand over his eyes, as if to say, “If I don’t see you … .” With his tacit permission, we helped remove the Wall. On September 4, 1991, two 10” pieces from the Berlin Wall joined our collection, along with the hammer that did it.