The greatest thing in the business of buying and selling antiques is the “discovery” of an item. Be it a lamp, a painting, a chair, a chest of drawers, an old coin, whatever the category, the “discovery” of an item is the most exciting part of being an antique dealer.    And today with all the internet commerce and images available in our respective fields, it makes discovering an item a lot more difficult to do.
   And because of the internet, everyone can sit at home and see it all (or so you would think) on the net!
   And that's not a bad thing sometimes because you would not be reading this otherwise either!
   But once you discover an item in the field of your searches, you now have to validate it so to speak. Kind of like the characters did in a Dashiell Hammett movie as the detectives Nick & Nora from the “Thin Man” series or Sam Spade (portrayed by Humphrey Bogart) the private eye did.
   The detective work on your discovery begins! And so does the fun!
   As did mine on the two items shown here today.

Discovered in the 4th floor attic of an Elks Lodge, in Maine, that had been closed for 70 years.

Carnival Dart Board, 6 X 6 feet square. Hand painted

Discovered a few weeks later in the same village as the larger dart board shown above, in a large Victorian home’s basement hung on the back of a door.

3 X 3 feet square. Hand painted

   One spring afternoon I got a phone call from a woman in Maine who found me through a friend of hers who knew a person that knew a person who knew me (networking!). She was interested in selling the contents of an old Elks lodge that she had just purchased and wanted to renovate. We made an appointment to meet at her location in Maine. The majority of items she had to offer were not of great interest until we got to the attic on the 4th floor and lo and behold covered with an eighth of an inch dirt/dust and debris laid the 6 x 6 ft. dartboard and the only item I purchased from her that day.
   I put the large dartboard in the back of my pickup truck parked out front and went for breakfast across the street. Half way through breakfast a gentleman asked me if that was my truck outside and he started to tell me the story of all the Lodges in the village, historically there were the Masons, the Redman, the Elks Lodge and one other he could not remember. Every summer all the lodges would hold a carnival in the downtown village and each lodge would make their own games of chance or entertainment to raise monies for their respective lodges. This gentleman also told me about some of the other games they had made. One lodge made a life-size camel on wheels with two humps that they would pull around on Main Street for 10 cents a ride. Back to the baseball dart board. The gentleman told me that the dartball board was the Elks Lodge’s game of chance and that you would throw large over-sized darts at it from a distance of about 30’. He didn’t know if there were any prizes awarded for playing the game, but he remembered playing the game as a young boy. This gentleman was 84 years old when he told me this story and he remembers playing the game in or about 1915 when Main Street in the village was still a dirt road.
   Apparently, the woman I bought the dartboard from was quite happy with what I had paid her for the dartboard and told all her friends. A month later I receive a call from an individual who was the last original resident of a home built in 1890 in the same village inquiring if I have an interest in buying the contents of her old Victorian home just up the street from the Elks Lodge I had visited. Well…..off to Maine again. I ended up purchasing the majority of the furnishings in the house and some odds and ends from the barn and out buildings. But the most exciting piece I purchased was a smaller rendition of the larger dartboard I had purchased a month earlier here in the same village. I asked the owner of the home how long she thought that this had been in the basement and quick as a wink she replied since she was a small child. My father painted it for my older brother to use. This lady was in her late 80s.
   Now having two great examples created by two separate hands I noticed the difference in the layouts of the baseball diamond and the markings and colors. It would appear that from memory the father had recreated a game they had played and thought fondly of at the carnival in the village and most likely played it throughout the winter and got better at the game making them better players next summer.
   Because of the stories I was told from other residents who were born and raised in the village and knew more stories about the carnival and its history, my belief is that the game of dartball was invented way before 1923 (see Wikipedia reference below) and that it was played rurally throughout the country in varying designs and rules. New England and for that matter Maine is not known to have been a hot bed of “Dartball” players! At least according to Wikipedia.
    So, the internet is a great resource and tool, but in no way can it replace the journey of discovery….the people you meet, the places you go and the stories you hear!

wikipedia: The first Dartball board was introduced by the Apex Company in 1923. The game travelled quickly with Dartball Leagues established as early as 1928 (Mon Yough Church Dartball League). It is reported by the president of Apex that "the sport of Dartball was spread around the country by Johnny Appleseed types, such as Lutheran ministers who would bring their dartboards and their bibles as they moved from one congregation to the next.


Respectfully submitted:
Thomas McCarthy
ANTIQ’S LLC
www.antiqs.com