Rusty Mammoth sale
MOSES LAKE — The “Rusty Mammoth” sale drew a number of interested shoppers to the tables in the hallway outside the Moses Lake Museum & Art Center Friday and Saturday.
“We’ve had a steady stream of visitors,” said museum director Freya Liggett Friday morning, drawn by original artwork, collectible glass, silver, classic and art furniture, posters and books, among other things.
The idea for a curated yard sale began with a call from longtime Moses Lake artist Kim Matthews Wheaton, Liggett said. Wheaton is moving from the area and was cleaning out her studio, Liggett said, and called the museum to donate some of her canvases. “That’s really what got the ball rolling. She really primed the pump for our donations the last couple months.”
Donations came in from the community, and Liggett added pieces from her extensive collection of Depression glass. (Depression glass dates to, yes, the Depression of the 1930s, but started in the 1920s and extended into the 1940s. It was given away at movie theaters and with merchandise or food purchases.)
Ligget said she and her mom formed a Depression glass collecting team when she was a kid – they loved to go antiquing, and Mom was always looking for the clear green Depression glass. Freya, however, liked the opaque green glass (called jadeite), she said, and her mom encouraged her to start a collection of her own.
When her mom died Liggett inherited the clear green glass to go with her own extensive collection of jadite, and it was a lot of glass. “I chose the pieces that meant something to me,” and put some of the other pieces in the Rusty Mammoth sale.
The sale was built around that idea, she said, that everybody has stuff they don’t need or want or don’t have room for, that’s not really thrift store material.
Proceeds go to the museum’s community programs, which are funded entirely by donations and museum memberships. Museum officials are bringing the Pacific Science Center to Moses Lake in October as part of the Free Family Saturday program. “We needed to ramp up some extra fundraising for that.” The science center will bring both interactive exhibits, which will be set up in the hallway outside the museum at Moses Lake City Hall, and a science program.
Cheryl Schweizer can be reached via email at education@columbiabasinherald.com.