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Susan Goulding column mug for OCHOME magazine 


ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ///////	Susan Goulding column mug for OCHOME magazine  4/21/16 Photo by Nick Koon / Staff Photographer.

FOUNTAIN VALLEY Rita Vysma sat cradling her treasure box in the third row of chairs, patiently awaiting her turn to lay out its contents.

Her goodies included a dozen “Indiana Jones” pins commemorating the ride’s debut at Disneyland in 1995.

“Maybe that’s too recent for them to be valuable,” the 76-year-old Westminster resident said. “Oh, well. I can just bring ’em back in 10 years. Problem is, I’ll be 10 years older, too. Maybe by then I won’t give a hoot.”

As is it turned out, the limited-edition pins were worth a little something – $20 for the set.

However, her cute Morton Salt coffee mugs, made in Japan some 50 years ago, attracted nada.

“There’s no market for them,” explained their appraiser Joel Magee, founder of America’s Toy Scout. “Young people aren’t interested in vintage dishes.”

Wrapping up her rejects, Vysma cheerfully conceded, “Back to the garage they go!”

She was one of a constant stream of hopefuls on Monday filing through a conference room at the Courtyard Marriott in Fountain Valley. They each toted their own boxes and bags of nostalgia – from Barbie dolls to Hummel figurines to B.B. guns – hankering to discover a diamond in the rough.

Florida-based America’s Toy Scout is making its semiannual visit to Southern California this week, moving on to Anaheim Tuesday and Wednesday.

Magee, 58, launched his company three decades ago after coming across the GI Joe lunchbox of his childhood at a flea market.

“I was transported back to my elementary school,” he recalled. “I literally could feel myself sitting across from my friends at the lunch table.”

That moment of time travel sent Magee on a “mission” to unearth other representations of the past warmly lodged in his memory. Ultimately, he turned his mission into a career.

Toy Scout travels the country seeking out vintage toys and knickknacks to peddle at conventions and online. Disney items – jewelry, old-fashioned ticket books, games, clothing, posters – make for some of the best sellers.

Magee’s pride and joy is a 1967 Tomorrowland costume designed for the now-defunct PeopleMover. Purchased for $14,000 – yes, thousand – the blue and gold Space Age outfit is for bragging rights only, not for sale.

Barbies, so long as they have aged well, also are in high demand. Mindy Miller, 65, a retired Realtor in Newport Beach, scored $400 for several early 1960s Barbies and a tangerine-and-turquoise convertible.

“I saved my pennies for this Barbie,” she reminisced, handing the doll over. “It was $1.50. I still distinctly remember the toy store.”

Miller still had all the accessories that came with each doll, from miniature tennis rackets to tiny hairbrushes to the little fashion booklets enclosed to entice girls to beg for another dress or swimsuit.

She also offered an array of clothing – which, back in the day, was of remarkably high quality.

“Look at the lining in the vest,” Miller said.

A balding Ken was not as perfectly preserved as his female counterparts. Magee remarked that kids tended to find Ken’s fuzzy hair too tempting not to pick.

“No, it fell out on its own,” Miller assured. “I took great care of my dolls!”

Newport Beach resident Ruth Faer, 72, a retired teacher, self-consciously arrived with a long bag that hid two vintage B.B. guns.

“Do I look like a terrorist?” she said. “My son is 43 now. It’s way past time to get these things out of the house.”

She unloaded them, so to speak, for $50 each.

Gary Einck of Huntington Beach sold a ’60s era Thumbelina – the slow-moving doll with the crank on its back – for $20.

But his much more beautiful offering, an American Girl-sized doll sporting a mink stole and blue eyes that shifted sideways, did not make the cut.

Einck, 80, bought her in Yemen 60 years ago when he was there serving in the Navy. Magee said that foreign-made dolls have little resale value because Americans don’t connect to them emotionally.

The event caught Einck’s eye as an opportunity “to get rid of stuff.”

“Our kids don’t want our stuff – they don’t even want our silverware,” he said. “Everyone is too mobile today to want other people’s stuff.”

America’s Toy Scout will be at Howard Johnson hotel, 1380 S. Harbor Drive, in Anaheim Tuesday and Wednesday. Information: 561-628-1990.