"The High-Mileage," "Well-Used, Must-Sell," "Best-Offer Magazine"
Augusta - Wedding gowns and bowling balls, engine blocks and wagon wheels, submarines, snowmobiles, stained glass windows, cemetery lots, a Sicilian donkey and an androgynous pig (really). You name it, the ever-prodigious Uncle Henry's got it, or will next week. Across Maine, especially in the kind of one-horse community where the grapevine is the loudest sound in town, Uncle Henry's Swap or Sell It Guide is part of the gracious but often just-getting-by landscape. Each Thursday, it beckons anew on every mom-and-pop store counter, next to the beef jerky and the pickled eggs. And is promptly devoured by every budding buyer, seller, huckster, dreamer, wide-eyed bride and burned-out trucker for miles around, usually over the morning's third cup of coffee. For 95 cents, say brothers Justin and Jason Sutton, co-owners with their father Joe, Uncle Henry's offers something for most everyone. For those involved in the exchange of worldly (if slightly rusty) goods, it offers a bargain that can't be beat. And for those who never buy or sell anything but are simply browsing - as their ancestors once pored over the Sears Catalogue - it offers cheap thrills and endless diversion. "People are shoppers," says Justin, "and this is a wish list." "People," adds Jason, "love a deal."Maine's self-proclaimed "Number one inflation fighter" began life in Rockland in 1964 as a local swap-and-sellsheet. It was started by a print-shop owner named Henry, also the middle name of Justin, Jason, and Joe. When Jason, 23, and Justin, 25, took over five years ago, they went statewide and beyond. Uncle Henry's is now sold in 2,500 stores from Madawaska to New Hampshire and gets mailed to 20 states and Canada. The owners claim 200,000 readers, but they decline to specify how many \ copies are actually printed. The weekly ads are free and are broken up into 40 categories, including the new computers, airplanes, and antique cars. The categories, chosen by the ad-placer, can get a little strange: a recent Antiques listing included deals on a sheared beaver coat, a 1932 outboard motor and a Mickey Mouse watch. According to the Suttons, Uncle Henry's transcends the economy. In good times, people sell their stuff to get new; in tough times, they sell to make it through, and somebody, somewhere, is looking to buy. In fact, they say, somebody, somewhere, is always looking to buy something, sometime, an ineluctable process much like the tumbling of the durable earth. Which is why they say 95 percent of the ads only need one week to hit pay dirt. "The selling power of the book," says Justin, "is phenomenal."Nods Jason, "It's scary." And what, exactly, gets sold? Everything. In the past, deals ranged from a bone crusher to a homestead in Alaska, to a spanking new Mercedes Benz a woman sold for $200. Yes, $200. Seems her husband ran off with his secretary, and called up and said "Sell the Benz and send me the money," and the wife did. $200. This week, the Animals section offered five geese in Etna, "not tame but not ugly"; a miniature Sicilian donkey with "excellent stable manners"; a 1-year-old male guinea pig named Otis who is "friendly, once he gets to know you"; and an androgynous pig with "multi-sexed visible external organs." We are advised the pig, at $8000, cannot be used for breeding but is "great for show." Under Antique Cars, a guy in Camden seeks a '55-64' Chevy or "parts, pieces, miscellaneous accessories or whole car or info leading to"; and a '67 VW convertible is declared "ready for restoration, lots of new parts waiting to be installed, great winter project." Knuckles, beware. Under Miscellaneous: a Victorian baby carriage, an electric wheelchair, a trumpet with case, a bowling ball with bag, Three Stooges items, two Coke machines (one can, one bottle), and 40,000 books. Under Swap and Trade: a guitar for a canoe, a chainsaw for a pistol, front fenders and other (dented) parts from an '81 pickup for "just about anything." Under Wanted: Juke boxes, canning jars, toy trains, moose horns, an engine block for a '48 Farmall tractor and a lunch counter, with stools. There are also ice cream coolers and carpeting, tanning units and printing presses, school buses, shingle mills, skidders, stoves, freezers, cameras, plows, saws, a barn to be taken down in Lincolnville, and cars, cars, cars. Herein, says Jason, lies the old true Maine - frugal, honest, full of initiative - and Uncle Henry's "takes its pulse." It is, all in one, community newsletter, weekly grapevine, and textbook for every amateur sociologist-in-the-sticks. And then there are deals, which Justin - in a baseball cap that reads, "Everything I own, I found in Uncle Henry's" - says work in mysterious ways. He tells about the guy who couldn't sell his boat, till Justin suggested he raise the price; it sold "in a heartbeat." Mostly, though, he finds people eager for a good buy, and happy to drive the length of Maine, on a slow Saturday afternoon, to get one: "To me, that says a deal's always a deal," Justin says. Business is clearly booming here. The Suttons are moving into the Beef Jerky business, have a weekly TV show, and plan a Yuppie listing for Uncle Henry's. They may also add a Personals category, having gotten what Justin calls "a fair number of offers" for wife swapping. And sure, he shrugs, a decent share of husbands have likewise been offered on the block. "Isn't a day goes by," he says, "when someone doesn't want to get rid of someone." There is, it seems, nothing new under the swap-or-sell-it sun. Bangor Daily News
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