Village Squire, 1973-09, Page 51
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abandoned. Mr. Harrison and his wife
were back in Ontario from their home in
Vancouver to sell some property they
owned in Niagara -on -the -lake. Mr.
Harrison had grown up there and his
wife had been educated there. He had
been in the lumber and hardware busi-
ness with his father and brothers in
Niagara -on -the -lake until 1960 when
he and Mrs. Harrison moved to Vanco-
uver. He eventually began to sell real
estate there after working at a few odd
jobs for the first year. He did well, he
says, and liked the work and he dabbled
in antiques as a sideline. They came
back to Ontario only to sell their prop-
erty and were on their way west again
but stopped to look in at a Goderich
real estate office.
Mrs. Harrison says they had figured
that the only place they would 1Bce to
live in Ontario would be near Lake
Huron so they checked the real estate
offices on their way through western
Ontario. They fell in love with the
little stone house and bought it and
settled in. Mr. Harrison admits he
didn't know what he was going to do,
but he didn't expect it would be work-
ing in antiques. He started refinishing
early Canadian furniture, however
and soon ran into a problem that he
couldn't get enough good furniture to
keep him busy. Meanwhile James had
been dabbling in the antique business
and had done enough business to keep
himself alive, but not enough to make
much money. So they arrived at the
idea of James heading for Europ'g to buys
the old furniture and ship it to Canada
where they would sell it and keep up
the refinishing business.
Now, Mr. Harrison says quietly, the
business is starting to boom. He didn't
want to boast, but he said only two
retail businesses in Clinton had done
more volume during the summer. Both
were supermarkets.
While a good deal of business is done
4.ith people looking for antiques, the
bulk (he estimates 80 per cent) is in
selling to other dealers. He has dealer -
customers from as far away as Montreal
and Calgary and into the U.S. From
20 to 25 per cent of his business comes
from Toronto he says.
One of the drawing cards is the furn-
iture. Most dealers, Mr. Harrison says,
don't carry a large stock of furniture
because it takes up so much room, and
room, particularly at city rent scales,
is expensive.
While volume at the barn is high, a
trip through the building with the owner
lets you know quickly that he isn't just
a supermarket of antiques. Mr. Har-
rison has a great deal of enthusiasm for
individual pieces in the stock and knows
a good deal about the history of different
styles of furniture. He says he can
place a piece of furniture within about
10 years either way of its time of
manufacture. Most furniture, he says,
had a style life -span of about 20 years
so it can be placed in a particular 20 -
year period whether Edwardian or Vic-
torian or whatever.
He is very fond of early Canadian
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Johnstone & Son
Furniture,
Lucknow
Established 1894
has two floors
of furniture for you.
furniture but has very little because he
can't find the time any more to get
out to auctions. Last year, he says,
he bought about $3000 worth of furn-
iture at auctions but nearly every
piece is gone now.
But never fear. If you've got some-
thing in mind Harrison's don't have,
he may just build it for you. He's
just finished a long, low pine table
for a family with eight children. It
is made out of old pine planking re-
moved from the old rectory in Dublin
which was torn down last year. The
old wood has much more beauty than
new wood so Mr. Harrison tries to find
old wood for all his building.
At present, he is in the midst of bu-
ilding a copy of an ancient table seen
in a Copenhagen museum. The table
was supposedly used by Lief Erickson,
the faiaous Viking explorer of 1000
years ago. The table top is again
made of old wood and the legs while
new wood, are wood that was originally
sawn close to 30 years ago but never
used.
This love of things old extends from
the business life into the personal lift
of the family. Gradually they are
restoring their old farm house dating
from the 1850's to as close to its ori-
ginal condition (Mr. Harrison says he
doesn't go for two seaters in the back
yard). Coming this year will be a new
kitchen on the rear of board and batten
because stonework is just too expensive
these days. While the kitchen will be
modern, it will be furnished in period
0 ENJOY MODERN
LIVING FROM
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Admiral
"CLEAN•
A :MATIC"
30"
ELECTRIC
RANGE
* 2 large and 2 small elements.
* Fluorescent light.
* Rotisserie.
* Clock controlled.
GROVES & SON
ELECTRIC
10 HURON ST. CLINTON
PHONE 482-9414