THE PICKIN ’
PLACE
WHERE THERE ’ S SOMETHING
FOR EVERYONE
STORY AND PHOTOS BY CHARLENE BELEW
Anything vintage is classic and timeless . A love for vintage and all things antique puts the passion into work for local couple Alan and Nina Downey , who recently opened The Pickin ’ Place right here in Duncan .
The Pickin ’ Place , home to vintage items and the brainchild of Alan , opened Feb . 26 , 2022 , but the work into obtaining the inventory to host a store has taken much longer .
Starting as just a hobby for the Downeys , they first frequented flea markets and trade shows , but eventually , that led to the want for something greater .
“ I ’ ve been a collector of old fishing lures and pockets knives all my life , and I had a pretty substantial collection of them . We started going to flea markets years ago and that ’ s where we ’ d pick up some of these items ,” Alan said . “ I told my wife , ‘ I ’ d kind of like to do that ,’ and so we started getting things around to where we could set up at the Sulphur Dog Trade Show , I did all the local flea markets around here for years . Got that going , it was something we enjoyed it was a good supplement income . Later on , about two years ago , we actually acquired three booths up at Forget Me Not Antiques . We started dealing in antiques and we still have a booth up there as well . It ’ s mainly my wife ’ s , I ’ ve pulled most of mine down to our store .”
Nina , who stocks paintings and antiques such as silverware in her booth at Forget Me Not , said the pair ’ s passion grew naturally together .
“ It ’ s something we developed together ,” she said . “ I especially love the paintings . I have a hard time seeing those in the trash — that was somebody ’ s art .”
And the building , available from Alan ’ s daughter-in-law , came at the right time .
Alan said , “ I ’ ve wanted to do this for a long time and thought , ‘ well , we ’ ve got the inventory , let ’ s try it .’ So we ’ re gonna give it a stab and see what happens .”
The store on Highway 81 is filled with tools , which Nina said was Alan ’ s cornerstone , along with vintage pocket knives , which Nina said was
Alan ’ s pride and joy , and other items such as furniture , paintings , vintage knickknacks , fishing lures and more .
According to Alan , “ my logo is something for everyone .”
“ I deal in mainly vintage and some antique but we also have modern stuff in there as well ,” he said . “ A lot of home decor , lot of oil pictures and paintings , vintage fishing lures . I deal in vintage pocket knives and got a lot of old tins . A lot vintage stuff . A lot of petroleum vintage . Since we ’ ve opened I ’ ve had a few people come to me , but primarily , me and my wife , we do the flea market circuit , have for years , and we accumulated all of this over the years from auctions , estates sales and now I ’ m actually into storage units .”
His best selling items , though , are the knives and lures .
“ I ’ ve got some old pocket knives that took me about 45 years to get this collection . I deal in the old vintage stock and I ’ ve got a lot of them from the 1800s . Some of them are actually in mint condition ,” Alan said . “ The pockets knives — there ’ s kind of a generation gap there . The older generation appreciate them and know the value and the quality of them and the history of them . The younger generation are more into the tactical knives , stuffs like that . The old vintage lures , it seems like everybody likes them . They use them for fixing up their man cave , doing different little things like that with them , and its probably one of my best sellers .”
While both Alan and his customers have their favorites , one of the most interesting items he ’ s come across is an anchor dating back to Pre- Depression times .
“ I ’ ve come across quite a few interesting things . We ’ ve come across some stuff , my wife is really into doing research on it and Googling and Ebay and I ’ m not so much , but I think one of the most interesting things I ’ ve run across was a boat anchor . It was made out of cast steel . It was made in Dallas , Texas , and it had paddles on it . The engineering of it , the design of it was just really unique . It was designed to be able to catch brush