Granddaddy’s Antiques aka The Mall of Nightmares

Granddaddy’s Antiques aka The Mall of Nightmares

by Serendipitous | Published on July 25th, 2009, 4:15 pm | Greensboro

My kids and I spent part of this afternoon wandering through Granddaddy’s Antiques. It’s on Maple Avenue in Burlington. For folks familiar with the area, it occupies the old Kmart building. Needless to say, this place is HUGE. The mall is wide open, set up in “booths” to accommodate what they note is more than 300 dealers.

I spent more than an hour there and didn't get to see everything. You just have to go and check it out for yourself to see the variety of “antiques”. I saw a few items that I thought were really amazing (phonograph, radios, cameras) whereas other items seem like someone brought them there under the delusion that they could still get cash for their junk (as opposed to the tax benefit for donating to Good Will).

But imagine yourself in a building that is inhabited by old stuff. Not just old stuff, but really old stuff. And a lot of really old books. Imagine what that smells like. It’s not overwhelming, but that musty smell sort of follows you around.

And around every turn, you’re bound to find something interesting… or amazing… or not much to speak of. I swear, you will probably find something that reminds you of your childhood. For me, there were E.T. lunchboxes, Pizza Hut promo drinking glasses, posters, vinyl records, kitchen wares, musical instruments… great memories.

And then there was this…

I guess every cymbals monkey needs a drummer buddy.

And this….

THEY'RE the whole reason I slept with my bedroom closet door completely closed (and sometimes blocked) when I was a child. (Okay, two years ago was the first time I finally was able to sleep without ensuring the closet door was shut!) :oops:

I stopped long enough to take pictures, and could only imagine what kind of anxiety attack I would have if I got locked in this place overnight. I bet the Poltergeist clown would show up someway, somehow.

But of everything I saw today, Robot may have been the coolest.

By all means, go and check this place out if you just need somewhere to roam… it’s sort of like museum meets yardsale! I just hope you don’t run into any of your nightmares.

Complete coolness...

Must go relive childhood and all the toys I never could have had!

Liv wrote:Complete coolness...

Must go relive childhood and all the toys I never could have had!

You could make a day of it on Maple Avenue! Granddaddy's Antiques for childhood toys, the outlets (A&E store for adult toys!)... Sam's Cheeseburgers (or the heart attack strip right in front of G'daddy's... KFC, BK, Hardees).

I forgot to mention, Uncle Bud's Foam and Fabric is adjacent to Granddaddy's, so if you're making window treatments or reupholstering dining chairs, this might be worthy of checking out.

Burlington is just a happening place these days...

They should film Footloose 2 there.

This has to be the funniest post I've read in a long time. I wish I could have gone with you.
That et lunchbox you saw was probably the same one from 5 yrs ago when i was there.

Liv: if you go, please let us know so we can join you!

Will do. We're actually trying to get out of town this next week, hoping to get Ren to her rollercoaster.

Sanjuro wrote:This has to be the funniest post I've read in a long time. I wish I could have gone with you.
That et lunchbox you saw was probably the same one from 5 yrs ago when i was there.

Thanks! You were missed... hence the pics. There was a ton of stuff that I didn't take pics of... Not that they weren't camera worthy, but I was a little more selective, seeing that my battery was "down to one bar."

There were actually two E.T. lunchboxes! I also saw two Rambo lunchboxes! LOL

The promo drinking glasses really brought back a lot of memories. There was a Petunia Pig that I had. I saw a Sylvester somewhere in there. A few Strawberry Shortcake ones...

There were a couple of 45s that I had in my hand but put down because I don't really need them, but frak! now I'm thinking of going back to get them. I don't even care if they're skip free... I'd just like to have them.

There were a few of the Fisher-Price pull toys in their wooden and litho glory! Now they've been replaced by "safer" plastic versions. :roll:

OH! And there was a USS Enterprise 1701-D! I think it was a 1:24 scale.

Yeah, it occupied the whole building...

Liv wrote:
Sanjuro wrote:Liv: if you go, please let us know so we can join you!

Will do. We're actually trying to get out of town this next week, hoping to get Ren to her rollercoaster.

Gboring day at Granddaddy's! I think we need to get some t-shirts for this occasion.

I sometimes enjoy wandering through antique shops. Like you say, lots of it is just crap that no one in their right mind would take home with them these days -- your Raggedy Ann/Andy display leaps to mind... <shudder!> -- but it's amusing to see them anyway. And to wonder what life could have been like with this stuff as part of "everyday life."

I often wonder what happens with stuff that is deemed to have been on the shelves too long. Do they give the losers a decent burial in the local landfill? Do they live on forever, being shuffled from one store to another in increasingly desperate searches for anyone who'll pay cash for crap? Do they hand stuff over to Goodwill, and let THEM throw it away for them?

:think:

SouthernFriedInfidel wrote:I sometimes enjoy wandering through antique shops.

You should come down here to the ghetto-burbs when they to the Liberty Antiques Festival... I've never been, but supposedly it's quite the thing... Even Julia Roberts shows up on occasion.

The cold rainy weather got me thinking about indoor "attractions". It's been a few months. I may head back to Granddaddy's and see what's new and what notables from my original post are no longer there. Of course, that will only lead my mind to wander to new homes where those items may have gone.

~singing~ "I'm fixing a hole where the rain gets in and stops my mind from wandering where it will gooooooooooooooo"

If that monkey is gone, could someone please go and do a complete search of Sanjuro's and SFI's homes and cars? Paranoid much? Uh, yeah... :oops:

SouthernFriedInfidel wrote:I sometimes enjoy wandering through antique shops. Like you say, lots of it is just crap that no one in their right mind would take home with them these days -- your Raggedy Ann/Andy display leaps to mind... <shudder!> -- but it's amusing to see them anyway. And to wonder what life could have been like with this stuff as part of "everyday life."

This gets me thinking about Chinqua-Penn Plantation. For those who never got out there, it's sort of a "ghetto-burb" version of Biltmore... only built with tobacco riches rather than train riches. And the Penns seemed determined to stuff their place to the rafters with obscenely rare and expensive stuff for everyday use. Like lounging around on Louis XIV furniture right after having breakfast on ancient Roman dinner plates. A totally jumbled up mess of a museum... only it was used for everyday life.

Some people... :confusion-shrug:

Serendipitous wrote: If that monkey is gone, could someone please go and do a complete search of Sanjuro's and SFI's homes and cars? Paranoid much? Uh, yeah...

The monkey? No chance. The Lost In Space robot, however.... :think:

Serendipitous wrote:I guess every cymbals monkey needs a drummer buddy.

I saw something worse...