Vintage TV Hoard
 

What a day! Got a line on the estate of a deceased collector coming up for sale locally. Some of you might remember my post on here in remembrance of a Mr. Vann of Sacramento; this was his estate. Visiting his house years ago I remember how he was what one might consider to be a TV hoarder. Narrow walkways through all the TVs in the living room and bedrooms overflowing with them. I had made an attempt to get in touch with the family by leaving a note on the door of the house to no avail.

An ad pops up on Craigslist Thursday "VINTAGE ELECTRONICS SALE!" Wow! I check it out and immediately recognize the contents as that of Mr. Vann's.

If anyone here has ever been to a proper estate sale (and I never have, this was my first time and I had a 'coach' with me) then you know what a stampede it can be when the gates open. I had about 30 tags with my initials ripped off and taped to my left arm ready to go, 4th in line. Doors open, fortunately everybody ran over to the audio equipment! I tagged about 20 electrostatic TV sets, an RCA projection and a Spartan mirror-lid, as well as a couple CRTs. :) My friend and I loaded up the trailer full of TVs and still have to go back tomorrow to look through a storage unit, which has even more TVs, CRTs, and camera tubes. Should be interesting.

Here's the fun:

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Very exciting, and my head's still spinning. Nobody else there was interested in the TVs, though there was another buyer who ended up making out with a nice moderne Zenith Porthole and a petite 10" Admiral bakelite floor model.

Now, what to do with them? I don't know yet, but they didn't need to end up in the recycling truck.

OH......MY.......GOD!!!!!

:eek:

WOWOWOWOOWOWOWOWOOWOWOWOOWOWOWWOWOWW!!!!!!

Outstanding! You were well prepared, and had he right vehicle, to save a lot of beautiful sets! Once you've figured out which ones you don't want to keep, maybe some of us local CHRS members can purchase some from you.

Holy Crap!!!! You hit the motherlode :-) ��with that one.

The Hell-O Fuzzy... Talk about "The Motherlode"...

WOW! Nice score. If that happened around here, I'd be forced into renting a storage space. Any roundie color sets in the mix?

Nice save, good job. :thmbsp:

I see a couple of Philco Safari's. If any are for parts, I'd be very interested

that would be nice to be in my area. i would probley have to build another outbuilding, im packed as it is now.

I would love to have one of those Admiral wooden electrostatic sets.

I could use knobs for my brown one...

Sales like that can happen once in a lifetime! Lucky you!!
They really look like prime vintage TV's. I had a situation like that happen before I was serious collector. A garage full of many vintage TV's and radios including an AK breadboard, a mint AK 82 cathedral, and an NOS teal Emerson Vanguard transistor mint it's original opened box - all priced to sell. I was not yet willing to spend much on the hobby and let it all slip through my hands!! :(

I've never seen one "In Poison". The Bakelite models must have been cheaper, maybe that's why you rarely see the wooden ones today.

In the last picture in the OP; could somebody be so kind as to identify the sloping top set sitting on a VT-71, above and right of two 3" Pilots, at the right side of the picture?
jr

That one had me guessing too. At first I thought of a 7" Raytheon Belmont, but that's not it. I'm assuming it's some kind of 10" set. I don't know of any other 7" that has that cabinet.
Joe

That's an Emerson 571 10" http://www.vintagetvsets.com/emerson571.htm

Day 2 of the actual estate sale, and we still haven't gotten to the last of the storage unit! Lots of CRTs in this lot, and I understand there are more. Snapped some more photos before the barn doors were actually opened and the mad rush began. I ran right over to the boxed CRTs, my friends tagged all of the TVs. We ended up missing out on the Teletone wooden cabinet and the Locomotive next to it, which had a huge hole in the side and a damaged top, but which did end up in good hands with another fellow VK member. :)

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Pretty incredible! Can't wait to see what Day 3 produces.

Hey Tom, definitely. Right now there are so many sets in my possession which I have not cataloged yet I'm having trouble even remembering what all is there. I'm going to definitely make some complete sets available, and part out some of the rougher ones. I know there are going to be a handful of 7JP4s after all's said and done. Duplicates will either be combined to make good complete sets or parted out of too far gone, and there are definitely a few of the latter.

No color sets at all. I remember asking him about that before he died and he'd said that he got rid of his color TVs years ago.

Ok, I'll see what we end up with. One of them is missing it's cover and might end up as a parts set.

PM me. Couple of nice ones.

If you have a pic I'll see what I end up getting. Like I mentioned, some of these sets with rotten cabinets or bad tolex will end up as parts units.

Ah HATE Yew !.. -Yosemite Sam, Esq. (grin)

Very nice find, Justin!

Wow, what fun. I think I have had dreams like that!

Phil Nelson
Phil's Old Radios
http://antiqueradio.org/index.html

Wow I'm jealous. Great score. Glad to see they will go to a good home instead of the dump.

Don't tell me that they were priced with fire sale prices or I would be green with envy :-)

Carl

The 7 inch Ratheon pretty rare.

Did you spot a 7" Raytheon? I didn't.
If the cloth front one with the continuous tuner was there I would've just took that and walked off with a smile!

Awesome score! I'd certainly be interested in a strong 7JP4 for my Admiral 19A11.

Suitcase style... last pix on the OP between the Airline and Silvertone? suitcase sets, with a Pilot 3" (upside down) on top of it.

jr

Oh yes. That is probably one of the least often seen 7" cloth covered portables. I just noticed in one pic, under the 7" Philco, is what appears to be a 7" Automatic Radio TV. It looks like it may be rough, but that just may be the rarest set there. That one restored can bring a sizable sum. It's about as rare as some pre-wars.
Joe

Need a new 17BP4 does the lot have one
I need for a Hallicafters table set
Need a new 21E OR FP4A CRT for a Bendix console model
HM21CU

.


I would like a sale like that near me please........


.

No Kiddin'...

Well, there was definitely some leniency in pricing due to the fact that we were taking pretty much everything.

I'll have a bunch of 7JP4s available, I already have some tested and set aside so there ought to be plenty to go around. PM me.

That one set is one I don't know a lot about, but definitely caught my eye even from the sidewalk. I love it. It's complete except for one of the sides which had gotten wet and was pretty much missing. I've already dismantled it and prepped it for my cabinet guy to restore. :)

I'll keep my eyes open, largest CRT in the lot so far is a 16WP4... but I'll be checking out more CRTs on Wednesday.

Anything's possible! :)

Justin, if you find a 16EP4 or 16AP4 or 19AP4 CRT that you want to part with, let me know.

Thanks

Carl

Oh my goodness!
I think I'd have an anxiety attack and it would all be over. :D

Aside from the tuning knob, and the time knob on the bottom of the right side (both of which I could use), all the knobs on a Philco Safari are identical. What I'm looking for is the tuning knob, the time knob, three of the side adjustment knobs and the screen hood for a brown Philco Safari.

HOLY S@@T!!!!

The week my gal has the van!! and im not too far away....

Looks like ebay blew up over there... :D

Any Motos like the one in my avatar?? Is the Dumont RA 103 gone???


SR

Final day! The entire rear of the storage unit was solid CRTs and I was able to take 80% of them. Mostly 7JP4, 10BP4, and 12LP4s, but I'll be going back Monday to pick up the larger boxes which wouldn't fit in the Jeep.

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Most unusual are these Image Orthicons. I have no idea of their usefulness, but there sure are a lot of them!

Also not pictured, is a 7" "Meck" TV. I've never heard of it.

Hey Carl, I haven't come across any of those yet, but as I mentioned in the above post I still have to go back for some larger CRT boxes whose contents are unknown.

Ok, it'll be a few days before I can get to the Safaris, but one I know is going to be relegated to parts so I'll check on it.

Hey, you should come visit the shop if you have some time, always cool to hang out and talk vintage electronics. :) The RA-103 is available. There's a scratch on the front but beyond that it's in great shape.

Wow. This is the opportunity of a lifetime.
Clean it out - don't feel you have too much and let some
good stuff go to the dump.

Carl

if you don't need the 16WP4 i might need one , also if there are any you think are too far gone put pics up before parting them or tossing , you never know someone might want to restore it.