PORT HENRY — Dawn Larmore walks through room after room of collectibles and antiques in her Treasures from the Past shop in Port Henry, past vintage paperbacks and old-time watches and Batman jigsaw puzzles.
“It’s all here,” she said. “People come in and spend hours looking for something. We get new stock all the time.”
The new inventory comes thanks to her husband, Merton “Mert” Larmore III, who’s spent a lifetime looking for trinkets and treasures.
Like the cast of the “American Pickers” television series, Mert travels across America in search of rare collectibles and antique treasures he can buy and sell in the shop.
Dawn takes care of everything inside the store and juggles sales with displaying the new items Mert brings in.
She and Mert met on the Northeast resale circuit and became business and life partners, Dawn said. The couple opened their first store in Connecticut in 2007, before moving to Port Henry a couple years ago.
“Treasures from the Past offers area residents a much-needed service,” she said. “Many people stop in every week, looking to see the new things that are coming in. Old and new household and decorative items, tools, artwork, records and lighting are among the top sellers.”
Dawn is a former banker and a buyer for a national retail store, but said she found herself sick of corporate America.
“I often worried about layoffs as the banking industry slowed, so I turned to running estate sales as a new source of income,” she said.
Then she met Mert at one of her auctions.
“I would visit a weekly estate sale looking to collect and buy, mostly tools,” Mert said by email. “We just hit it off and clicked. I then started helping her with estate sales. I needed to find another way to earn a living because the building industry was dead.”
Mert was a contractor who did painting and drywall installation. They have been married nearly 10 years.
“Once I married Dawn, she made me sell all my stuff,” he said. “This is when I really started making decent money from the things that I was collecting all my life.”
Much of Treasure from the Past’s inventory comes from estate auctions and private collectors.
“We bring everything back to the store, research the items and try to get market value for our clients,” Mert explained.
The Lamore’s say they love their new way of life.
“I get the most satisfaction from helping out the elderly, who don’t have the capability to get rid of stuff on their own,” Mert said. “They know that when I take what they’ve collected over a lifetime it’s not going to go into the dumpster or a landfill, which would break their hearts.”
The Treasures from the Past shop at 4301 Main St. in Port Henry is cash only and open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Tuesday through Sunday. Weather permitting, the item-filled exterior is open on weekends and major holidays.
The store is in the former Hyatt’s Barber Shop building that the couple purchased and expanded.
The shop just had its official grand opening on Friday.