Village Squire, 1978-02, Page 5C� Cline looks o%er a collectors' magazine seated at his beautiful old desk in the midst of his antique
shop.
A ntiques
are
a serious
b us'in ess
Many are the people who have good ideas but few are the ones
who are willing to put their money where their mouths are.
Cy Cline has proved to be one of the latter group. His
Stonetown Antiques in St. Marys has been in operation only two
years, but he's no stranger to the local business community, or to
the world of antiques either. He has been in continuous business
on the main street of the town for 38 years, longer than anyone
else. For the first 36 years he was in the men's and boys' clothing
business until there was a fire in the building next door that also
caused damage in his store. The other building was gutted. Mr.
Cline had a chance to sell and so got out of the clothing business.
He was prepared to make the jump because of a belief he had
always held. "1 had always maintained," he says, "that if the
same investment and effort was put into antiques as any other
business, you could make a good living at it." He'd been an
antique collector for many years as a hobby and had a good
background in the business and so he was ready to give it a try.
His determination to treat antiques like any other business
started with his decision to take a downtown location, away from
his home. He likes dealing with the public, he says, (and after 38
years he'd have to) but he also wants some time to himself, so he
didn't want to operate out of his home as had been the trend of
VILLAGE SQUIRE/FEBRUARY 1978, 3.