Sideboards

When I was growing up in the 1950's and 60's I didn't know about the existence of antique shops – in fact most people's houses looked a bit like an antiques collection with old substantial furniture, pretty cabinets housing best china and glasses, and usually a number of pictures and books. All very interesting to me as a child and probably whetted my later appetite for browsing and discovery amongst old discarded treasures and effects. In those days people inherited things 'passed down' and very seldom bought anything new.
But an area I was familiar with was the second hand furniture store or 'sale room'..... We had such a one in our nearby town Wincanton, presided over, assembled and proudly bearing the name of the owner, a very Dickensian figure, and known locally as 'Scammells Sale Rooms'. This was a 2 storey building down near the old railway line, now posh houses - the upper level was kept for recent acquisitions and more eye catching furniture, the lower level, really a basement, was where the old stock resided and accumulated, coated with dust and squeezed in higgledy-piggledy. You had to be quite brave to find your way around down there and be prepared to see the odd rat scurrying into a corner...
My father used to visit Scammells most weeks with an eye for a 'bargain', mainly to trade in an item and buy a replacement, occasionally to buy something 'new'. Pianos were swapped from time to time – for better or worse – but the most frequent exchanges came with sideboards. They were transported to and from Wincanton in the small trailer used for taking calves to market which happened to be just the right size for upright pianos and sideboards too. Earlier in the week I would often return from school to find the dining room floor stacked with piles of plates, dishes and china where the sideboard had stood, and then on Friday (sale day), a different sideboard was installed and Mummy would be down on hands and knees cleaning and polishing it.
Every dining room seemed to have a sideboard in the 1960's – I still find mine extremely useful and certainly wouldn't swap it! Although of Art Deco design we bought it from a Gallery in Colchester about 20 years ago – I'll attach a couple of pictures showing both interior and exterior. The other photo is of a small oak side table – the only item of furniture I have remaining from the old Scammells sale rooms – bought by my father 60 years ago.

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