Auctioneer details
Upcoming auctions
-
No upcoming auctions found
Recent auctions
Flomaton Antique Auction
Action at Flomaton Antique Auction
Who will give me…‘65…’66…19…1967…September of that year, to be exact, was the first production of Flomaton Antique Auction. In a building that was located where the cash registers of Piggly Wiggly currently stand, was where on a Friday evening Mr. Herbert Heller, along with his wife Dorothy, rang up their first total of $1465.00. Going back before the beginnings of the auction company, Herbert Heller, with his wife, moved to this small town of Flomaton, Alabama in 1961 to pastor a Mennonite church in the community. Having moved here from Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, Herbert was aware of the fine antiques made in America and especially those produced in the population and manufacturing centers of the Northeastern area of the country. After a phone call from a third cousin, Dave Lehman, Herbert accepted his proposal; if Herbert would set up an auction company, Dave, being a fulltime buyer/picker would supply the merchandise. In 1967 Flomaton Antique Auction began having bi-weekly auctions on Friday evenings. By the third auction, Chiquita’s Department Store building was chosen to be the site of the early auctions. In 1972, a new block building with ample parking was built to accommodate the auction company. Both of these buildings are located one mile south of the Alabama/Florida state line, along Highway 29 and currently accommodate Wallace Paint and Body Shop.
Then in 1977 Mr. Heller purchased the Jackson Theatre building in downtown Flomaton giving additional space of 6,000 square feet, along with the adjacent parking lot. In 1981 a showroom was added across the back of the building. Then an additional warehouse was built in 1987 bringing the total square footage to around eleven thousand. In 2002 the town created a parking lot to the south of the building, giving plenty of parking nearby.
About a year after the first auction, the decision was made to open a satellite business in Lyman, nine miles north of Gulfport, Mississippi. Several auctions were held at this location and were supplied by Dave and Bill Hughes. The strong gusts of Hurricane Camille destroyed the building and ended this function of the antique business. Thereafter, some customers from that area were pulled in and did come to Flomaton for their purchases. The 70’s saw the end of biweekly auctions and the beginning of monthly Saturday “day” sales. These auctions had more items being sold and a small 8” X 5” catalog was produced with around 200 items advertised. In 1971, a New Year’s Day sale was begun which has developed into the largest annual auction day for the company, some years having as many as 600 in attendance and includes a record breaking sale of $700,000.00. The average attendance over the years has been around one to three hundred patrons for each auction. During the 70’s each of the Heller’s six children performed some chore around the operation while also becoming acquainted with an entrepreneur’s life and gaining knowledge of the quality antiques that they handled for years as they grew up. In 1980 their son Nevin entered the operations. It was during this time that a truck was purchased for buying trips to Pennsylvania, with Dave Lehman continuing to be a buyer till he passed away in 1982. By this time many local estates and collections as well as complete antique shops were becoming a fascinating source of merchandise to sell, such as the Zeigler family home in Central Alabama. In the early 1980’s Tom and Julianne Gardiner, after retiring from The Brewton Standard, became involved with Nevin in buying trips to the Northeast. In 1983, both sons, Nevin and Lamar, became partners in the business. In 1981 a satellite auction was opened in Opelousas and later Plaquemine, Louisiana, holding quarterly auctions there until 1984. The early 80’s saw single day Saturday auctions being held every three to four weeks, with promotions of illustrated black and white catalogs. In 1989 Lamar left the business for a more “lucrative” job in computer program design and management. In 1990, with the company going from thirteen single day sales to six bi-monthly two-day auctions there was an increase to over 1.5 million dollars in sales. With suppliers/buyers in Pennsylvania, New York, and Massachusetts, the focus was on finer American antiques from 1780 to the Civil War era. In 1993, daughter Sharon joined the business becoming a partner four years later. In early 1996 Herbert and son, Nevin made their first trip to England that developed into the sale of items from there for the next four years. There was a successful mix of European items to sell alongside of the American antiques that their clientele was purchasing.
In January of 2001, Herbert and Dorothy made the decision to retire and by April of that year the business was incorporated and their son, Nevin Heller took over operations. During that year, the catalogs were changed to full color and a website was developed. At the beginning of 2003, after thirty years of mailing over seven thousand of our sixteen to twenty page catalogs across the country, they were changed to a four-page color brochure and customers are now directed to the fully cataloged website with between one and two thousand photographs. Our last May 2005 auction had one million hits on the website the two weeks prior to the sale. In August 2004 we began posting the full auction on Ebay/Live Auctioneers, making it possible to interactively bid against someone in audience while sitting in your living room. This was in addition to the phone call and absentee bidding that the customers had been doing for many years. During the first year on Ebay, we have sold $140,000 of merchandise thru that venue. Our total yearly sales are holding at under two million dollars. We have currently changed our auction schedule and are having them every month on the first weekend – Friday evening auctions on the even months and Saturday day auctions on the odd months. The Saturday auctions have the same fine American antiques that we have been known to offer for many years, items and their accessories dating from the late 1700’s to the 1880’s. In the Friday auctions we are branching out to the ever-popular Oak and Colonial Revival periods of the late 1800’s and up to the mid 1900’s.
The customer base is largely from the Southeastern United States, with the largest percentage being dealers buying for their antique shops or a client. There are also considerable amounts of items going into the Northeast and West Coast areas. Some of our best customers over the years have been – Bob Snow (Rosie ‘O Gradies), Cook Cleland/Pensacola, Dacy Espy/Jackson, Doc Murray/Mobile, Richard Avery/Marion, Wesley Cooper/Natchez, MS, Joyce Bellows/Thomasville, GA and a multitude of others that could be mentioned. Another memorable purchaser was Arlin Dease, who restored Nottoway Plantation Home south of Baton Rouge, Louisiana. It is the largest of all southern antebellum homes with 64 rooms and a total of 53,000 square feet of living area. We sold approximately eighty percent of the furnishings currently in this fine home, called “White Castle”, while it was being restored during the early 1980’s. Another customer has built a large contemporary underground home covered by the plains of Texas, filling it mostly with items bought in Flomaton.
Some of the most exciting stories are of the merchandise itself, one being President Zachary Taylor’s canopy bed selling to a Taylor descendant who owns the largest farm east of the Mississippi River. She purchased the bed for thirty thousand dollars with plans for a museum to be done somewhere on her twelve thousand acre Virginia farm. Another memory was of a consignment of deaccessioned items from the Alabama Museum of Art of many guns, and included a hat used by a member of the 123rd Tennessee Confederate Regiment that sold for 16,000 dollars. This rare Ranger type hat was sold immediately to someone spending $7,000 on its restoration. Now some 15 years later it is on the market – any buyers…for $52,000? Another item we received a call on was about an item from a house trailer in the Montgomery area; an 1860 rosewood étagère that was sold for $34,000. About four years later, I received a call on my cell phone with an offer to pay $75,000 for that same étagère. The offer was turned down, along with the quote “my wife would kill me if I sold that”. This same Chicago area couple sits on Victorian sofas purchased in Flomaton over the course of several years, for the handsome sum of ten thousand dollars each. Another customer from Nashville, Tennessee, purchased his bedroom furniture at one of our auctions, paying $52,000 for almost a roomful of furniture. One other interesting story of local interest is of a cast iron boar that had been sitting in a Brewton area yard. It had a provenance including the famed Flagler Mansion collection and the crest of a Florida Indian mound. It went to an excited buyer from Ireland for $13,000.
Many of our customers are filling their antebellum homes, live-in museums and bed and breakfast inns with these fine period antiques. One currently being filled is an exquisite 1860 home with six large classical fluted columns across the front. The panorama from the rear of the house includes a view across eleven miles of beautiful central Alabama hills. Alabama, by the way, has more antebellum homes then any other state, due to easy street access during the early and mid 1800’s – streets??…did I say streets?…they actually were the waterways. These were the highways of the 1800’s; with Alabama topping the list of navigable waterways in the United States it made the development of plantations and farms achievable. While stories of fine furniture and collections such as these are exciting and interesting, they involve more dollars than the average person has for furnishing their home. We sell many fine quality items at a nominal amount for the modern home and for the price conscious buyer. These are good usable items for today’s home and are sensible investments, while at the same time are being preserved for future generations. I will end with the qualifications that should be considered when purchasing an investment quality or fine antique item – 1) quality, 2) condition, 3) maker, 4) provenance and 5) age.
Who will give me…‘65…’66…19…1967…September of that year, to be exact, was the first production of Flomaton Antique Auction. In a building that was located where the cash registers of Piggly Wiggly currently stand, was where on a Friday evening Mr. Herbert Heller, along with his wife Dorothy, rang up their first total of $1465.00. Going back before the beginnings of the auction company, Herbert Heller, with his wife, moved to this small town of Flomaton, Alabama in 1961 to pastor a Mennonite church in the community. Having moved here from Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, Herbert was aware of the fine antiques made in America and especially those produced in the population and manufacturing centers of the Northeastern area of the country. After a phone call from a third cousin, Dave Lehman, Herbert accepted his proposal; if Herbert would set up an auction company, Dave, being a fulltime buyer/picker would supply the merchandise. In 1967 Flomaton Antique Auction began having bi-weekly auctions on Friday evenings. By the third auction, Chiquita’s Department Store building was chosen to be the site of the early auctions. In 1972, a new block building with ample parking was built to accommodate the auction company. Both of these buildings are located one mile south of the Alabama/Florida state line, along Highway 29 and currently accommodate Wallace Paint and Body Shop.
Then in 1977 Mr. Heller purchased the Jackson Theatre building in downtown Flomaton giving additional space of 6,000 square feet, along with the adjacent parking lot. In 1981 a showroom was added across the back of the building. Then an additional warehouse was built in 1987 bringing the total square footage to around eleven thousand. In 2002 the town created a parking lot to the south of the building, giving plenty of parking nearby.
About a year after the first auction, the decision was made to open a satellite business in Lyman, nine miles north of Gulfport, Mississippi. Several auctions were held at this location and were supplied by Dave and Bill Hughes. The strong gusts of Hurricane Camille destroyed the building and ended this function of the antique business. Thereafter, some customers from that area were pulled in and did come to Flomaton for their purchases. The 70’s saw the end of biweekly auctions and the beginning of monthly Saturday “day” sales. These auctions had more items being sold and a small 8” X 5” catalog was produced with around 200 items advertised. In 1971, a New Year’s Day sale was begun which has developed into the largest annual auction day for the company, some years having as many as 600 in attendance and includes a record breaking sale of $700,000.00. The average attendance over the years has been around one to three hundred patrons for each auction. During the 70’s each of the Heller’s six children performed some chore around the operation while also becoming acquainted with an entrepreneur’s life and gaining knowledge of the quality antiques that they handled for years as they grew up. In 1980 their son Nevin entered the operations. It was during this time that a truck was purchased for buying trips to Pennsylvania, with Dave Lehman continuing to be a buyer till he passed away in 1982. By this time many local estates and collections as well as complete antique shops were becoming a fascinating source of merchandise to sell, such as the Zeigler family home in Central Alabama. In the early 1980’s Tom and Julianne Gardiner, after retiring from The Brewton Standard, became involved with Nevin in buying trips to the Northeast. In 1983, both sons, Nevin and Lamar, became partners in the business. In 1981 a satellite auction was opened in Opelousas and later Plaquemine, Louisiana, holding quarterly auctions there until 1984. The early 80’s saw single day Saturday auctions being held every three to four weeks, with promotions of illustrated black and white catalogs. In 1989 Lamar left the business for a more “lucrative” job in computer program design and management. In 1990, with the company going from thirteen single day sales to six bi-monthly two-day auctions there was an increase to over 1.5 million dollars in sales. With suppliers/buyers in Pennsylvania, New York, and Massachusetts, the focus was on finer American antiques from 1780 to the Civil War era. In 1993, daughter Sharon joined the business becoming a partner four years later. In early 1996 Herbert and son, Nevin made their first trip to England that developed into the sale of items from there for the next four years. There was a successful mix of European items to sell alongside of the American antiques that their clientele was purchasing.
In January of 2001, Herbert and Dorothy made the decision to retire and by April of that year the business was incorporated and their son, Nevin Heller took over operations. During that year, the catalogs were changed to full color and a website was developed. At the beginning of 2003, after thirty years of mailing over seven thousand of our sixteen to twenty page catalogs across the country, they were changed to a four-page color brochure and customers are now directed to the fully cataloged website with between one and two thousand photographs. Our last May 2005 auction had one million hits on the website the two weeks prior to the sale. In August 2004 we began posting the full auction on Ebay/Live Auctioneers, making it possible to interactively bid against someone in audience while sitting in your living room. This was in addition to the phone call and absentee bidding that the customers had been doing for many years. During the first year on Ebay, we have sold $140,000 of merchandise thru that venue. Our total yearly sales are holding at under two million dollars. We have currently changed our auction schedule and are having them every month on the first weekend – Friday evening auctions on the even months and Saturday day auctions on the odd months. The Saturday auctions have the same fine American antiques that we have been known to offer for many years, items and their accessories dating from the late 1700’s to the 1880’s. In the Friday auctions we are branching out to the ever-popular Oak and Colonial Revival periods of the late 1800’s and up to the mid 1900’s.
The customer base is largely from the Southeastern United States, with the largest percentage being dealers buying for their antique shops or a client. There are also considerable amounts of items going into the Northeast and West Coast areas. Some of our best customers over the years have been – Bob Snow (Rosie ‘O Gradies), Cook Cleland/Pensacola, Dacy Espy/Jackson, Doc Murray/Mobile, Richard Avery/Marion, Wesley Cooper/Natchez, MS, Joyce Bellows/Thomasville, GA and a multitude of others that could be mentioned. Another memorable purchaser was Arlin Dease, who restored Nottoway Plantation Home south of Baton Rouge, Louisiana. It is the largest of all southern antebellum homes with 64 rooms and a total of 53,000 square feet of living area. We sold approximately eighty percent of the furnishings currently in this fine home, called “White Castle”, while it was being restored during the early 1980’s. Another customer has built a large contemporary underground home covered by the plains of Texas, filling it mostly with items bought in Flomaton.
Some of the most exciting stories are of the merchandise itself, one being President Zachary Taylor’s canopy bed selling to a Taylor descendant who owns the largest farm east of the Mississippi River. She purchased the bed for thirty thousand dollars with plans for a museum to be done somewhere on her twelve thousand acre Virginia farm. Another memory was of a consignment of deaccessioned items from the Alabama Museum of Art of many guns, and included a hat used by a member of the 123rd Tennessee Confederate Regiment that sold for 16,000 dollars. This rare Ranger type hat was sold immediately to someone spending $7,000 on its restoration. Now some 15 years later it is on the market – any buyers…for $52,000? Another item we received a call on was about an item from a house trailer in the Montgomery area; an 1860 rosewood étagère that was sold for $34,000. About four years later, I received a call on my cell phone with an offer to pay $75,000 for that same étagère. The offer was turned down, along with the quote “my wife would kill me if I sold that”. This same Chicago area couple sits on Victorian sofas purchased in Flomaton over the course of several years, for the handsome sum of ten thousand dollars each. Another customer from Nashville, Tennessee, purchased his bedroom furniture at one of our auctions, paying $52,000 for almost a roomful of furniture. One other interesting story of local interest is of a cast iron boar that had been sitting in a Brewton area yard. It had a provenance including the famed Flagler Mansion collection and the crest of a Florida Indian mound. It went to an excited buyer from Ireland for $13,000.
Many of our customers are filling their antebellum homes, live-in museums and bed and breakfast inns with these fine period antiques. One currently being filled is an exquisite 1860 home with six large classical fluted columns across the front. The panorama from the rear of the house includes a view across eleven miles of beautiful central Alabama hills. Alabama, by the way, has more antebellum homes then any other state, due to easy street access during the early and mid 1800’s – streets??…did I say streets?…they actually were the waterways. These were the highways of the 1800’s; with Alabama topping the list of navigable waterways in the United States it made the development of plantations and farms achievable. While stories of fine furniture and collections such as these are exciting and interesting, they involve more dollars than the average person has for furnishing their home. We sell many fine quality items at a nominal amount for the modern home and for the price conscious buyer. These are good usable items for today’s home and are sensible investments, while at the same time are being preserved for future generations. I will end with the qualifications that should be considered when purchasing an investment quality or fine antique item – 1) quality, 2) condition, 3) maker, 4) provenance and 5) age.