An old favorite returns to Lincoln City

Lincoln City was formed in 1965, when the five pioneer towns of Oceanlake, Taft, Cutler City, DeLake and Nelscott united. Reminders of these coastal towns can be found all along the more-than-seven-mile length of present-day Lincoln City, a place now home to numerous vintage shops and used bookstores. Learn more about the town while scoring some treasures during Antique & Collectibles Week, which takes place Saturday, Feb. 17, through Saturday, Feb. 24.

The event features citywide sales at antique shops and used book stores and a special installment of the Finders Keepers program. One hundred special antique-style Japanese glass floats made by local artisans will be placed above the high tide line and below the beach embankment from Roads End in the north to Siletz Bay in the south.

"Our annual Antique & Collectibles Week celebrates Lincoln City’s enduring legacy as the Oregon Coast's premier antique destination," said Kim Cooper Findling, director of Explore Lincoln City. "From uncovering hidden gems in our charming vintage shops to glimpsing into bygone eras at the North Lincoln County Historical Museum, visitors can take in the rich stories of our past. And those looking to make their own exciting discoveries can try their luck by hunting for antique-style Japanese glass floats we've sprinkled along our beautiful shoreline."

For more information about Antique & Collectibles Week, including a list and map of participating stores, go to oregoncoast.org/events.

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In celebration of this year’s Antique & Collectibles Week, North Lincoln County Historical Museum is featuring two float-forward events.

On Saturday, Feb. 17, the museum will unveil a display from the collection of Jim Watson, one of the world’s leading collectors of Japanese glass fishing floats.

Watson traveled throughout the world meeting fishermen, artisans and collectors, seeking out the most unique pieces he could find. He taught many people about the history and beauty of these attractive working objects.

Saturday’s reception, running from 1 to 3:30 pm, will include the screening of a recorded presentation Watson gave at the museum in 2000.

On Saturday, Feb. 24, from noon to 3 pm, the museum will also feature “Float ID Day.” People will be invited to bring their own floats to get help identifying them from glass float specialists. Participants will also have an opportunity to get hands-on experience and learn about the different clues around the identification of fishing floats.

North Lincoln County Historical Museum is located at 4907 SW Hwy. 101 in Lincoln City. For more information, go to northlincolncountyhistoricalmuseum.org.

Witnesses in Wood

Commentary by Dana Grae Kane

For the TODAY

My well-worn furniture was crafted between 209 and 84 years ago. Can't afford older; can't abide younger. My battered family dresser (1815), typewriter stand with whittled wooden wheels (1880), Globe-Wernicke filing cabinet (1888) and drop-front writing desk with built-in leaded glass bookcases (1940) are beloved old friends. However, my deepest affection is for a stray farmhouse kitchen chair, rescued from a muck-pile of sagging, plastic-coated pressboard purchased by innocent young people who imagined it to be actual furniture.

This dignified old dark oak straightback (1920-30) now greets my guests in my entry hall, uttering not a creak or groan as they plop down to shed muddy shoes. Although such old kitchen chairs are rapidly becoming rare, you might still find a few in antique shops, orphans of long vanished sets of four or six that once ringed solid scrubbed wood tables in country kitchens.

When I was constructed (1945) in what was then rural Bend, Oregon, these massive slabs, grounded on thick stumps of pedestals or legs fit to break your foot, were still the steadfast heart of many homes, as they had been throughout as many as 100 years of family life.

The chairs surrounding these tables were often pressbacks, decorated with raised patterns of fruit, flowers, vegetables and sheaves of grain. Over time, the backs of many were scorched having been close to the woodstove on freezing winter evenings. Some suffered scarring of heavy work boots and others were the chew sticks of teething puppies on their way to becoming champion herding dogs. The worst-worn chairs were those that spent their after-table lives in all weathers on the front stoop and back porch.

If you feel as intensely as I do the presence of past people in the objects that shared their daily lives, these 'defects' are essential to the personality of the piece and enhance rather than detract from value. There is a saga, a song, a film, a poem or a novel waiting to be discovered in every one of these historical repositories. The novelist D.H Lawrence (1880-1930) felt this deeply:

“Things men have made with wakened hands, and put soft life into, are awake through the years with transferred touch and go on flowing for long years,” he wrote. “And for this reason, some old things are lovely, warm still with the life of forgotten men who made them.”

It was seated on such stalwart chairs around such immutable tables that the most significant parts of family life were lived. Here the serious discussions took place, the hard choices were made, the crucial decisions taken and griefs and joys shared in equal measure.  Cradling thick crockery mugs of steaming coffee stewed in stovetop graniteware pots, a brew as strong as the backs of those who bore the brunt of incessant labor, as many as four generations gathered.

The conversation was seldom trivial. Would an unseasonable storm devastate the crops? Would the bank foreclose? Would that new disease wipe out the herd, would the doctor make it in time and if he did, how would they pay him?

Counterbalancing were the splendors centered on the table. Here the dough was kneaded for fresh morning bread, here was fabric cut and sewn for dresses to wear to the county fair and where quilts were pieced together from family clothing and flour sacking. Wedding feasts and birthday celebrations were held here. And here was the earnest studying done toward a scholarship to launch the education to carry the farm into the next century.

Today we face our own great personal uncertainties, many of us without the support of loving family and are confronted with life-threatening global challenges. There is comfort in the wooden witnesses, bespeaking the courage and commitment to each other of those who faced up to the worst the past had to offer.

When my maternal great-great-grandparents climbed down from their wagon in Bend (1909) and my paternal great-great-grandparents walked the 1,300 miles from Illinois to Utah (1846-1850), the requisites for survival were guts, grit, ingenuity and teamwork. Same with us, by any name.