The Paul Jr. Podcast - Episode 6 "Jersey" Jon Szalay

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Well, welcome back to the Paul Junior Podcast. I got
a good friend of mine here today, John Zila aka
Jersey John, and we go way back, and I'm really
looking forward to having this conversation. I've learned a lot

(00:25):
from this guy, and through the years I've consulted with him.
I've known him for many years now. Now that we're
in Long Beach Island, yeah we're locals. Yeah, we're neighbor now. Yeah. Yeah,
so I've und a corner. Yeah, so let's get into it. Man,
we go shoot, Man, we go way back. And I

(00:46):
got to tell you, since the day we met, I
was always very impressed with your skill set. I've seen
a lot of people who are good at things. Through
the years, I've worked with a lot of creative people.
I enjoy surrounding myself with people who have a skill
set all different kinds. Engraving, welding, grinding, machining, you name it, painting,

(01:09):
you know, everything and anything. And I remember the first
time I went to your place and you were like
nickel plating in his little box in the basement and
refinishing furniture, and you had all these old bikes and
everything like that, and I just wonder if maybe we
could talk about that aspect of your life. I wonder,
where did you learn to become I knew I grew

(01:30):
up in the steel business, and so I feel like,
you know, I have a creative gift. Yeah, so obviously,
but the mechanical side of it really came from working
for my father in the steel business and being given
that opportunity. So I just always wondered from that day on,
and I never really asked you about it, like where
did you learn your trade or your skill set? You know,

(01:52):
I mean mostly I'm self taught. That's the reality situation.
My dad was a lawnmower mechanic and a really pretty
big lawnwar this uh and repair shop called Stelton Mowers
and Piscataway, New Jersey, And that was in the late
fifties through the sixties and into the seventies. And you know,
he got out of the Korean War and started as
his business to raise the family. Guys, we have six
kids in our family. You know, well they all got

(02:14):
to eat, you know, Plus we went to Catholic school
and you know, tuition and stuff like that to pay.
So and he's and he did wonderful. He had At
one time he had six employees. He carried the Huffy
brand of lawnmowers, and also it was cool because they
also had a brand of like there was he would
go to Italy every year with my mom and they
would bring the bike, these Italian bike to the I
remember there was like Huffey had these small mini bikes

(02:36):
that they that they sold. It was motorized. Yeah, their motorized.
There were mini bikes and little motorcycles and they actually
had big bikes that Renegade was kind of the big
dirt bike. There's all the sixties and seventies. It was
like the Italian you know, Fantic brand. Yeah. Yeah, so
they probably licensed the name Huffy. Yeah, well, yes, exactly so,
but they were mostly all Italian, uh like little maid

(02:57):
all them little mini Yeah, there's so many who always
had a motorcycle. Yeah. I mean from time I was
six years old, I had a little bike called a
fantic Chino is a fantic Chino but it was little.
It was like a lime green and it had orange.
It was so bright. It was like a little sport
bike and I rode that thing around in my yard.
It was so much fun. It was so cool and
that's my first memory of getting at the motorcycling and
my dad had the lawn war shop. So I did

(03:18):
learn that trade at a very young Hey what like
more like ranching, but long lawnmowers with gasoline. That's the
way we did. He had to get a old the
junk out, he wipe him down, wiping them down. But
he also told me how to do a valve job
on a lawnmower. How to, so you started to get
your basic mechanics. Basically I wasn't even really that interest
at the time, so weird, that's not where my focus was.

(03:40):
My focus, like he taught me all that because like
you know, it was just something we did, you know,
as father and son. It was wonderful being a shop.
But I was young. I mean we moved out of that.
I was out of that when I was in like
third grade, and then we moved down to the shore
and he basically closed up the lawn war shop and
after that. So I don't have that much experience with lawnmowers. Actually,
how about I do have. I remember the grease and

(04:01):
the smoke, and it had an impact, yes, a little bit, absolutely, Yeah,
And then basically what I started doing was when I
moved down here. Through high school, I was very involved
with woodworking through through the wood shopping school. Mister Holst
was one of my best woodworking teachers, wood shop teachers,
and that was going through seventh grade, eighth grade, ninth
all through my high school years. And that was a

(04:21):
big inspiration for me. I mean, that was something I
really enjoyed doing. When when and I was an avid
book reader, I bought every damn book that was involved
with like any kind of woodworking or folk art. The
fox Fire series from from Elliott Wellington Elliott, Yeah, from
he was a teacher in Georgia, Okay, and he had

(04:42):
like a books he had an ear to what I
called the fox Fire Books. And I got that books
when I was probably like twelve years old. Wow. And
it was all about early America and at the Appalachian Mountains, yeah,
and folk art and how they did things all by
hand of being self sufficient, and to me, that just
struck a chord with me. Yeah, I mean I was
very interested in that whole genre, the whole like the

(05:03):
folk life, the folk art, the way that things were
made in America. And I tried my dream what's become
you know, a cabinet maker and bill Folk art and
do things like that. But it was hard because I'm
in South Jersey, right, you know, And so what I
did through high school was I was trying, you know,
started my own business. Mister Grayson, my math teacher, uh

(05:27):
in ninth grade, you know that they had a they
had arcades over seaside heights, and he needed a bunch
of cabinets made for his arcades. So you pulled a
little you know, tchashka's in the toys that you want
from playing ski ball. So he needed all these cabinets
made and it's all from Micah work. And I was like,
this is no problems, It's like easy. And I had
a shop at my at my house, you know, it

(05:47):
was actually in my in my well, like a little
wood shop. I had a little wood shop in my
I moved out of my bedroom, I moved it to
my brother's bedroom and turned my bedroom into a wood shop.
So I had I had a table saw on air.
My dad was always bringing home a piece of equipment
for me. Brought me a band, so they were very
very supportive. I was making cabinets in my bedroom at
the time, in year old day in my own. Oh
my god, that's how it started. Wow. And then when

(06:08):
I started doing, like really started making a living. My
dad had another lawnmower shop in Wells Mills Road. He
opened anup called Star Mower and above it was a loft.
I moved all my equipment in there, and that was
the start of my business. And I was fifteen years old. Wow.
So when I'm fifteen, I'm making cabinets, you know, actually,
fourteen years old, I'm actually building cabins. I did all
the old stuff from Mistigration for his for his arcade,

(06:30):
did all the framca work, installed it, and it was
like a lot of money. I'm like, he's great, you know, yeah,
I love you were loving life and making money. I
was making money all through high school instead of going
and getting a job somewhere. You know, I was right
working at this. I was so self employed, right, you know,
and and doing I'm like, this is great working above
my dad's shop and with his support, and that's kind
of like. I kept reading about things, kept doing things

(06:53):
with woodworking and trying to elevate my skill set. And
I did that through reading, you know, and and just
there was Fine Woodworking magazine was a big inspiration of me.
I had like issue one, number one, like nineteen seventy two.
Wow when it first came out, and you know, it's
just like that was inspiration. That was really fine craft.
And it was hard to do fine craft in South

(07:15):
Jerusy because you had no place to sell it. You know,
I wasn't it wasn't close up to New York then
had that you know, you know that that. Yeah, the
money wasn't there. The money was there, right, right, But
I did have enough skills to do like for Michael
work and I did. I did a Suffer Ocean Candy library.
I did a bunch of doctors and lawyers around the town,
and did a lot of commercial cabinetry just so I

(07:35):
could buy more equipment and like grow keeping business. You know,
pay five subscription to to Butt and Working Magazine and
Wooden Boat Magazine. Everything. I was totally nerd. Yeah, that
was I just worked my ass off to develop my skills, wow,
and get it and get involved with it. It was fascinating.
It still is. Yeah, you're still loving it. Oh yeah,

(07:56):
So when did the restoration ask that kick in? Because
you would you started to restore yeah, fine furniture over time, right, yeah. Yeah.
So this is nineteenth hours of nineteen seventy eight, and
I'm you know, I'm a you know, going through high school.
I'm in tenth grade, eleventh grade. I'm like, I need

(08:19):
a bigger shop. I got to figure something out. And
my dad knew it too. He knows how busy I was.
And I'm hauling all this wood up these stairs, taking
all this stuff out this little barn door in the front.
We're pushing it out the front and hopefully not crashing.
It was nuts working where I was working. It's a
little yeah, it was tight. It was tight. And so
what happened was We're sitting there on Saturday morning and
I'm in you know, I'm in eleventh grade, you know, Saturday,

(08:42):
working at my dad's shop, you know, my shop, and
we're reading the paper every morning at just seven o'clock
in the morning, reading the paper like das big part press.
He's say, John, that old bank building in Barnegat is
going up for auction this morning. I'm like, I know
that bank. It's a nineteen fourteen bank building. Beautiful built
bank building. I said, Dad, let's go look at he said,

(09:03):
all right. My dad was up for anything. He was
like he was. You know, he would get he was
down for he was always going to flea market selling stuff.
I mean we were vend at flea markets. He'd go
to auctions with me. We went to we went to
Fort Mott when I was like thirteen years old, was
the first antique motorcycle meet. You know. We went all
over place. So my dad was totally cool about supporting
what I was doing. So I could. We go down there,
and I'm looking at this bank buildings and the place

(09:25):
is open, the parking lots packed with people, and the
guy's like selling the bank, he's selling the drug store
across the street, he's selling the parking lot, and an
and another property upstream. And how old were you at
the time. I was seventeen, Wow, you know, and I
had some money. I mean I had some money in there,
and you were already fully in business. I was in business.
I'm like and my dad was like, all right, let's go.
I'm like, Dad, no, on the way, wait, wait, let's
let's hang out and check the place out. So it's

(09:46):
ten o'clock in the morning, the auctions start and the
auctioneers there, my dad registers to bid. I'm like, cool,
all right, he's got a bit number right, and I'm
what he's up to. Was it run down pretty good? Oh?
My god, the place was a mess. I mean this
guy who had bought it. The bank closed in like
nineteen seventy four, seventy five, and the guy had bought
it and just used it as store. She put tons
of stuff in her The roof was pouring water in

(10:06):
a roof that the bank didn't put any money instead
of play. Yeah, I think you told me there was
like a tree growing out. There was a tree grown
out of the freaking roof. I one of the windows.
I mean, it was ridiculous how bad it was. Broken windows,
the new plumbing, new heated, new electric, needed everything. Wow.
So and everything in the whole place with it had
beautiful oak trim and these round top windows. And I
fell in love. Yeah, And I'm like, wow, it's really

(10:27):
unusual to be that at that age, to see that,
to see the value in something like that. Most seventeen
year olds, I don't care what area you're in, have
no idea of you know, no have no vision or
foresight or anything like that. Yeah. I mean, I was
like looking at all these magazines that I had a

(10:47):
lot of inspiration from other people. Yeah, to think about
what people were other shop owners were doing and seeing
what they had. First, you need square footage, yeah, and
you need a good cool building. And the other thing
that I looked at his building was like, it's in
the downtown area and there's like twenty five antique shops
at this time in Barnegut. Literally, really there's like twenty
five different Now there's only like two or three. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

(11:09):
So it boiled down and there was a couple of
co ops there and I'm like, it's just kind of
started clicking in my head, what's gonna go on? This
might be I could have a cabin shopping here. And
I wasn't even think about antique furniture at the time.
It wasn't even in the back of my back of
my mind. I knew how to build furniture, right, but
you hadn't restored it. But I hadn't restored a dancing
in my life life at that point. And I'm like, okay,

(11:31):
so we go off. The auctioneer's going off, you know,
they start high, starts off like one hundred fifty thousand dollars.
Nobody's been nobody's been go down to sixty, goes down
to thirty, goes down to twenties. Out of fifteen fifteen
grand my dad. I was like, tooking my dad and
he's put the hand up. I'm like, I got fifteen
grand in the bank of this how I was seventeen.
I got fifteen grand in my bed right, you can
know in that gallon right now, all of a sudden,

(11:53):
the lights are going off. I'm like freaking out. I
had no idea the place was gonna got that cheap.
So anyway, it went up more than the Beden against us.
I got to Billy for like thirty seven thousand and
five dollars. I'm like, oh, now, I'm freaking out. We're
gonna come to the rest of money, and my dad'sid
don't worry. That's so we'll figure it out. And he
and we did it. I was sevent I couldn't even
sign it a legal contract. I wasn't even so he
had to sign for you. My dad signed. Wow, he

(12:14):
had such confidence. Oh yeah, my dad had. My dad
and my mom were great supporters. My whole family was,
I mean, everybody kind of knew this, kind of let
me do my thing, you know, and my my mom
and dad were like my mom was like, he's kinda
cut all his fingers off on a saw. I'm like,
don worry about my I'll be okay, you know. Yeah.
But it was so cool that they that they supported
me that way. Yes, And then my dad we got
a loan he co signed for me, and we were

(12:37):
able to pay it. You paid off and I had
something paid off for in a couple of years. You know,
it was like nope, no brainer. And then I went
to work. As soon as I bought that build, like
we started working on Oh, I had to do something.
It was in May or April that the that the
auction was and so I had to like gut the upstairs.
I had one to make it living quarters up there,
and so I wanted to strip down all the woodwork,
take all the pain off it. So you know, read

(12:59):
devil Pace twenty seven was the only trip you to
buy and it's right at the hardware store and I'm
just buying cases. Yeah yeah, yeah, you know, And I
was like putting on there and the pace remover and
you know, in summertime and by September I had the upstairs.
I had the upstairs all done ready to ready to
basically live and had you know, I had to get
a full bath in there, a full kitchen, but I

(13:19):
had a fireplace in it too. This place is so
cool and I just loved I fell in love with
the building. I mean, I started pulling the windows apart,
put them back together again. And you know, by I
think December or January, I think I moved in there,
got a co to live in there by bike. So
you moved now by time you were what eighteen, yeah,
seventeen eighteen, Yeah, wow, you were living in there. Yeah yeah.

(13:41):
And so then what you started working out of there? Yeah,
they started doing your would work out of there. The
first thing I did was that the basement was the
best place to start because the basement was all office
space down there, so they had finished it off, they
had electricity down there. It was the most useful space. Yeah,
that was I put. I hired an electrical company to
come in and put new new sub paneling, to get
new electric in there and wire up my shop. So

(14:03):
all that stuff was done right away. And the first
thing I did was concentrated on a workspace so I
could move out of my my dad's shop above right
and get Yeah, worse. Yeah, because I'm shaking in my shoes,
like I'm got to pay a mortgage there right right,
you know, I'm yeah, responsibility taking in and reality. I'm
having the biggest panic attack in my life. I'm like, damn,
this is freaking nuts. Yeah, but it was a good motivator.

(14:24):
I tell you what, dude. That was the best thing
I ever did in my life. And that was aou
forty five years ago. Yeah, you know, yeah, that's crazy.
Sixty two now yeah. Wow, I'm going to look conor.
I think I'm to be sixty two in the next
week and then I am going to meet hyple birthday.
Most thank you. That's great. Oh you'll go see all
those guys at the auction then, huh all the camel
your buddies, all the canniball guys. Yeah, yeah, from the

(14:45):
rider of Coast to Coast this year. It's kind of
a gathering point for us. Yeah. And the plus it's
a great but Urban Hirsch's collection is going off at
this auction. Oh nice, And that's a huge collection of antique,
really super rare antique motorcycles, really so's and there's some
some stuff there I want to buy. Nice. You know
absolutely so good looking forward to it. All right, So
you you build this place out, you start doing the furniture.

(15:06):
At what point in time did restoration come in? People
started bringing you furniture, Hey, can you fix my right
having the cabinet making background because I could, I mean
build pretty much anything at this point. Eight piece of
furniture and dovetails on drawers and you know builder. So
these antique dealers for bringing me stuff and it's like
they're bringing me a you know, a chest of drawers
was missing a drawer and can you can you asn't
match it? And I'm like, yeah, no problem, man, this

(15:28):
is like easy. And then like you know, how much
can I charge you do this? I was making more
money refinishing stuff than I was doking it from scratch. Yeah,
I mean it was. It would be like there was
a beautiful piece of furniture five George tall oak Chester
to drawers. This is like the bitting Gia of the eighties.
Furniture was starting to ramp up and get yeah that
were he caught. There was a hot rum there. Furniture Now,
furniture is kind of dead. It's dead now. I thinks

(15:48):
back then in eg dude, I stelling stuff to Bruce Springsteen.
Really yeah, I mean it was crazy, that's how good
it was. It was nuts. I was getting, you know,
for a round oak table cloth feet you can get
like five grand for a really good I mean, you
can't get that stuff away now, No, you can't give
any of that. I know, it's so weird and special.
It might. Yeah, I feel like that's cyclical that that

(16:09):
and the country stuff and some toys have kind of
fallen off, you know, I mean right now, I mean
this your showroom is beautiful. Here, it's sounded, but it's amazing.
Piece of advertising. Signage is really hot, yeah, you know,
and then that allows this stuff exactly. But at that time,
furniture was hot and I knew it, and things were
going nuts, and I had the ability. I didn't open
my antique shop up then, but I knew what I

(16:30):
was going to do. Tucked the lobby and the gutted
the lobby. After I was done with the apartment up
there and got my shop in there, the next focus
was getting the lobby. The bank like the lobby, the lobby, lobby,
round oak windows. I mean, it's gorgeous, and I'll tell
you it's one of my favorite buildings in this in
ocean came like one hundred mile radius, you know, it

(16:51):
really is. It's got the look, you know it. It
captivated me. I loved the building. I loved the windows
got me, you know, the brick work, I mean, the structure.
And then I found those a little booklet that came
with the building, and it was like, and it's they said,
in nineteen fourteen, they paid eighty five thousand dollars they
have that building built. Wow in nineteen fourteen. Yeah think

(17:12):
about that, right, you paid a third of that when
you got it, yes, and yeah, yeah, yeah, that was
a lot of money back then. The quality of the
building is so good. It's a First National Areay National Bank,
and so I and so I opened up the lobby,
made it all beautiful, and I opened up an antique
shop called First National Antiques, you know. And that way
I made a sign, hand carved a sign, Hutch touch

(17:32):
sign to the pounds pattern for the sign and his
old sign painter and Forward River and he did that,
and I hand carved a sign like actually incised the
letters into the pine boards, painted all up with gold leaf,
and you know it hung out there. I'd had an
antique shop in there for like twenty five years. Yeah,
you know, until furniture and people would come in and yeah,
and I brug every other antique shop huh we mee.
And as I know, now it's like Fort Knox. You

(17:53):
can't even get on that. You can't even pull into
the parking lot. Now you don't want anyone though, I
don't want anybody there. Let's just be clear, right, Yeah,
I'm not. I'm not shopped out over the public anymore.
I can't do it. Yeah, yeah, I just I've got it,
like because I you know, it's my life has changed
less since then. Yeah. So, but back then it was
really good. I mean I was telling dude some I
was sounding like ten grand on a weekend, on the
summer weekend of furniture, and you were living and working

(18:16):
in the same city Ace and it was ice was right,
the price was right, and also it was just like
I was just like really into it. I was in
a good groove. Furniture was like really coming up. Oak
Furniture was we were I was buying it for like
at auctions down in Maryland, Crompton's for nothing. We were
getting some stuff out of the cities you know, abandoned building.
So would you sometimes buy it, restore it, and then

(18:36):
just put it out there to sell it? Oh ya,
all ready to go? Let's say that would be I
would well the game, that was the game. I would
get it, get a dresser in, strip it down, take
it all apart, reglue, make all the drawers work right,
put you know, put like, you know, forty fifty hours
into a dresser and then put it to make all
your money and then make and then make every every
last dime of it, you know, in the shop. And
the people are coming from Philly. My reputation was coming

(18:57):
from uh was reaching Philly, was reaching New York. So
I was getting designers into the shop, buyings the use,
getting you know, arts and crafts furniture in there. And
then because I had the ability to, like if if
a mirror harp was missing, I could reproduce it exactly
the way and then using antique woods, you know, and
then making right before authenticity purpose just that. But it

(19:18):
it looked right, yeah, yeah, looks right. It was an
aged wood hold. Yes, yeah, So that's pretty that's pretty awesome,
and that that's kind of like what I got How
I got into the restoration trade and doing veneer work
and doing marketry, doing bull or heirlooms like fam would
in family early people this is yeah, and in our
family that's who haddy. Later that started, I started taking
the like people's furniture and doing their their bedroom sets

(19:41):
all that stuff. Later, once the furniture market died, I
kind of switch changed my business to like doing you know,
restoring memories. And we had a lot of people from
North Jersey moving down to South Jersey and they're bringing
their mother's furniture with them, so they'll doing a lot
of nineteen thirty forties dining room sets, bedroom sets, and
that was That was for good ten years and just
really hitting that really hard because there was a lot

(20:04):
of a lot of influx of business coming in and
you do a really if do a really nice job,
people coming through and I people working for me here
and there, you know, not as hard. It's hard to
find somebody who had that skill. Which if they're that skilled,
they're gonna have their own right, They're gonna work for themselves. Yes,
So it's in any trade d about. So I had
people like helping me out, you know, move the furniture
mainly and then you know, of course my son and
stuff like that. He was fantastic and my had you know,

(20:25):
got an married, had a kid, and it was like
fantastic and everything was working out really really well, and
just rolling with the punches. Yeah, because you know, furniture
market kind of died, switching gears into doing rarely furniture,
restoring your memories and doing all that stuff. And you
know I was doing that until you know, a couple
of years ago, right six seven years. I remember coming

(20:46):
in there and seeing you working on that, you know,
inlays and stuff like that, and your work in late
bool where h water diamaries to it and they got
like a beautiful cabinet. When Sandy hit here. I mean
I was doing tons of work, you know for Hurricane
Sandy came through, and you know, it's just like it
was overwhelming, overwhelming. I just didn't have any chanft to it,
you know. And then back in the day when I

(21:08):
was making a lot of money, I was starting to
buy antique motorcycle parts and pieces. Okay, so that's all
that transition, and that's a whole So at the same time,
you were starting to get this bug for early motorcycles. Yeah,
because I was looking at you. My I was so
passionate when the antique shop. But I love setting up
my antique shop. I was going out to like different
like Brimfield and all and all different shows in Atlanta

(21:30):
and going out west to any antique shows and setting
up and selling there. And now was that? Was that?
Also reading books on motorcycles like the wood or that
was a little bit more hands on. I joined the
are any antique motorcycle called of America. I had some
great friends and some good mentors. Dick Nwkirk was one
of my good buddies. I met him at one of
the shows and he's he's just going to turn ninety

(21:52):
next month. And this guy was like he kind of
showed me the ropes. You know, there's other people too,
and then there's other people too. And I was starting small.
I was just getting into it. So I was buying
hardly forty five stuff back in the in the eighties
when it was you know, like nothing next to nothing.
It was just cool to have an antique bikes and
stuff like pieces and parts around And I was, you know, uh,

(22:12):
I built a hot rod. Uh you know, thanks to you.
You inspired me to build a hot ride. Oh I
did absolutely. I didn't know that. Oh absolutely, Yeah. I
built a hot rod strike. It was this crazy as
motor and it custom frame that's a fun end. Yeah,
it was nuts. And it was like the first three
wheeler with a soft tail frame in America. Oh yeah,
though you were early on that it was the first one.

(22:33):
It was that company from Canada that made the frame
for me. Actually it was Well and Thunder No, no, no,
I forget what. It's a long time but they made
they made a soft tail adapter to take a service
car rear end. Okay, and that was the first heart one.
But I was from watching your show, dude, really yeah
that that inspired you absolutely must watch your show and

(22:53):
like this is so cool what you were doing, you know.
So it was nuts. It was like we would work
in the shop with them at our dinner break and
we'd go stairs and we throw you on TV and
Jesse James and Heavy the topper build off stuff. Yeah yeah,
all inspirational. Yeah. I think it was a good era

(23:13):
in time for television, you know, where where people would
started building things again and that was inspiring the people
that's hands on. Yeah, yeah, I mean when I saw
what was going on with with you guys, and you
guys were like making frames and doing custom work and
custom paint job. The design element of it, oh freaky.
It was so out of this world and it was
like wow, yeah, and that was right. It was man. Yeah. Yeah.

(23:35):
You know it's funny too because, uh, you know when
you talk about kind of being self taught, I in
the same way had people in my life that even
coming up through the steel business. Uh you know, just
where they taught me how to weld and grime and
read a tape measure. You grew in my business. I
grew up in that business. Yeah, and it really sharpened, uh,

(23:56):
my my craftsmanship, my my ability to work with my
hands and things might have just been a railing or
stairs or you know, but I was making things and
I loved it. It's scratched an itch for me. But
it wasn't until I was in like my mid twenties
and my father afforded me the opportunity to build motorcycles
that I realized I had creative ability. I used and

(24:18):
it wasn't but it wasn't taught. I didn't I wasn't
good in art. I couldn't draw, I never did anything
I never read an article on it. I just had
an inclination creatively, my mind started to kick in, and
you know, here's a product of everything now but you know,
now that's twenty five years ago that started, you know,
and so so time flies. But it's funny because I

(24:39):
think some people have a natural inclination towards something like
you with woodwork kind of opened the door for what
was next. It was you had an appetite for it.
And it's nice to scratch that itch. You know. You
want to dig further into or into our the things
that really flip our switches, the things that inspire us, right,
so we want to like dig deeper. What is the inspiration?

(25:00):
Where's it coming from? What I mean, how we're looking
through sometimes through nature, sometimes we're doing through architecture, something
something new, you know, ancient art. It's funny too, you say,
because you read the books that kind of got you going, right,
those were your big inspiration. Yeah, you go, I was
soon We would go to the mall as kids would
go to Oceananty mall, you know, all all the whole family,
and then I would just go to the bookstore and

(25:21):
everybody else would go shopping mall. Rat in it, and
I would be like all I was in Wolden books,
you have your face buried in face already and to
do it yourself. Section like what was what was going on?
I was looking for the new things that were and
Eric Sloan, you know, he was a writer on early
American tools and how America was built. And I bought
all his books, Repers for Wood, Age of Barnes, a

(25:42):
Vanishing Landscape, all his books or other inspirations. So it's
all these different things. I subscribed to Mother Earth News magazine,
so it's really crazy as a magazine, but for self sufficiency.
And it was like just because because they had articles
in there about you know, solar power. It has articles
in there, be litting off the grid, and that appealed
to me as well, be self sufficied, right right, not reliant,

(26:04):
not reliant on not now inside sources so much. It
was just something being different than everybody else. You know.
It was just like I wasn't it wasn't interested in
mainstream society at all. Right, I could give a shit, really,
you know, I didn't care. It's so funny too, because
at that age I ran from books. I couldn't stand read.
I want to read. No, I hadn't read in school.

(26:25):
I was suffering. I was crying every No, dude, don't
get me wrong. I sucked it as a student as well.
I mean I was not a great student. Math was like,
oh my god, I'm why, I'm nothing to do with it?
You know, algebra? No, I will not to do it.
I was a history yes I was. It was interested.
And of course I took architectural drawing and mechanical drawing
for four years. That was a huge So that must

(26:46):
have been a big one for Yea to layout, visualization,
plan in advance, come up with drawings and ideas. Not
just that, but when I got into the antique restoration
of motorcycles and you have to reproduce a part, and
I do. I make carburetors, I make frames and fixtures,
all different kinds of things, any little part. I'd go
find an original part from a collector and get it.

(27:08):
I would, and I would. I would reverse engineer it
and make aanical drawing with paper on a drafting table
and actually draft everything. I have reams of drawings and
way back of Indian carburetors and racing carburetors and heads
and valve assemblies and anything that you needed to restore
these bikes. I was missing, you know, I was networking.

(27:31):
I was restoring bikes for people because I wanted to
get into their collection so I could bar the damn
carburetors and you get it your I would never you
can't reproduce anything accurately unless you have it in your hand,
So I would measure it down to the last thousands
of micrometers, make a beautiful mechanical drawing, and ask where
all that skill set from high school kicked in. Yeah. Man,
I'm like, I'm really glad I did this right. And

(27:52):
so my drawings look back on them and it's like, man,
it's it's like it's such a cool reference and now
it's like they're always there. Yeah, and just for you know,
nobody does that. Nobody does that type of work at all.
It's cast day, so it's all cad. Nobody does that
by hand. Nobody does the cast hand. And the attention

(28:13):
to detail is what you're into. I love that because
like I'm a purist when it comes to like collectibles
and doing things like that right. So I love originality.
And so if you can't have the part and you're
able to make it the way it was. That's like
the best you can get it as opposed to having
what doesn't exist almost anymore. You're recreating something all together.

(28:36):
To me, that's like, that's one of the things about
what you do that I've always been impressed by. And
I'm not generally impressed by a whole lot, but I
see your skill set, man, and I'm like, this guy's
like a mad science issue over here. I appreciate you.
You're getting the vibe them putting out there, you know.
So then motorcycles come into play, and in what that

(28:57):
became a hobby for you for yourself, like a personal thing. Yeah,
Me and my son were like, you know, making whatever
parts or pieces like that. It was a hobby. Yes,
at first, I was like I was because I was
being in an antique shop and always getting the most
money for the earliest piece of furniture. Like if you

(29:19):
had like a you know, a Victorian air address from
eighteen nineties, okay, you could sell effort you know, fifteen
twenty five hundred bucks. But if you had like a
seventeen nineties Chippendale right like one hundred years earlier, you
were getting six or seven thousand bucks or something like
that where it was real deal, right. So that's how
I was like, Okay, so let me put that same
idea and the same thing into the antique motorcycle thing.

(29:42):
I'm gonna stop buying these Harley forty five and Harley right,
the more common stuff, more common stuff, and I really
want to start searching for the early and rare stuff,
the rare stuff. And it's just like clicked right there.
And then I just sold a lot of that stuff
off and used those funds to buy a frame. Will
you find? First off, is be going to like we
go to Oli, or we go to Wasseion or Davenport,

(30:05):
and you look around, you would find a motor, right,
you would find an old Indian motor from nineteen seven
or nineteen I remember, I remember in nineteen I bought
a nineteen seven Indian motor from the Antique Motorcycle Club
magazine from some guy in Washington from earl Echele. He
was a racer. He raced in Salsburg. His grandpop did
you know, and he has his nineteen seven original paint

(30:26):
Indian motor, like and it was like twenty five hundred bucks.
I'm like, I'll be right, there, dude, I couldn't get
there fast enough. Yeah, And I made the deal with
I met this guy who's he bought a lot of
other stuff from him forty years. And you find a motor,
and then you'll find a part here in a gas tank,
another part, But you never set of wheels. You never
Sometimes you'll find their hubs, but you never find the frames. No,

(30:47):
they're hard, yeah, because they're in the ground somewhere. Yes,
they were scrapped. Yeah, I mean, from what I understand,
the boy Scouts had scrap drives, Victory scrap drives in
World War One and cleared out all the basements of
all the frames. You've all this stuff, all the front
health the war foot ways. Right, they helped the war,
but they would never get rid of the motors because
the motors could do work right right, right, you put

(31:08):
a CD right, that single cylinder Indian seven motor could
run a front five mile right, Yes, exactly, they could
run a sauce. So it was vera scenario because it
was the value. So when the farmer or when the
guy bought a motorcycle in nineteen seven, well by nineteen twelve,
you know, we're nineteen fourteen, that motor was more cycles outdated.
It couldn't climb the hills like a two speed, you know,

(31:28):
like an Excelsior could or Harley. And then when the
transmitions came out, nobody wanted the early stuff. They threw
all thetly the bar. It was absolutely right, it was obsolete.
So but what they would do was they was like, oh,
they don't. They would take the motors out of them
and they would throw the frames in the back of
a scrap pile. Boy scouts would come around. You got
up to the filet up in the back. Theres a
bunch of frames in the back. You can take them, so,

(31:50):
you know, damn boy scouts man. So let's talk about
the types of bikes you ended up getting into. My
focus was on early American motorcycles, and that was that's
I wasn't involved with getting involved with British motorcycles or
anthing like that, or European bikes because I saw the values.
I saw what these bikes are selling for. That I
mean that truly was a driving factor with a driving
factor of me buying all these I'll spend a lot

(32:11):
of money. I'm motors and parts and pieces, hubs, this
stuff is expensive, but I was justifying it, like, hey,
I just saw like a nineteen seven Indians sell for
one hundred and and you know you were like halfway
there on for half the money. So I'm like, kid myself,
I'm gonna find a frame and buying all these pieces.
And sometimes that happened. Sometimes it's like fifteen years for
that to happen. But you know, then you'll fight a

(32:33):
chassis for a Seer's and you have the motor and
you put all these pieces together and you got a bike,
and then it's like it so is that when you
started casting the different parts. Yeah, frankly, well that was
kind of like we were doing. There was a big
thing with overhead valve racing Indians. It's a taller frame, right. Yeah.
The board track racing, Stephen Wright came out with some

(32:55):
great books The American Racer that inspired everybody to get
into board track racing. He was telling the story of
the American board track racing scene, the Indian racers, the Harley's,
the Celsiors, these cyclones, all these sexy bikes. Yeah, friends
with a cool paint. Oh my, that left the cool paint.
But the history, I mean, there was an accident in Welsburg,

(33:15):
New Jersey, where twelve people died on the track, on
this board track, and they opened the track up in July.
They closed it September, you know, And it's like that
was it was called. They would call him murder Dromes
their motor drome. They called him murder Drume. Guys were
dying and this was a huge sport. The attendance for
those motor drome races back in nineteen you know, you know,

(33:35):
twelve and thirteen was as much as as a football
game is now. Yeah, people, I'll tell you I got
I got a trophy over there in my cabinet that
was won by H. Perry Harry E. Mack. Yeah, he
worked for Harley, he did. I have a trophy that
he won. He got his name on it over there,
nineteen oh five, Garfield Park. Really yeah, it's fantastic trophy, right,

(33:57):
I got it from the grandson. Where's the bike? I
don't know where the bike is. There's a picture of
the bike somewhere, but O five's early early well, yeh
super Harley suppose live No, that's what they s This
is the stories. I got a bunch of articles with it.
This is the idea that he was one of their
early guys and he was an engineer. He wasn't a racer,

(34:19):
but he raced and he won this ten mile race
nineteen oh five Garfield Park. And at the end there
was like a fifteen mile race where they all raced
it out and it was on a concrete track and
a Fox terrier ran out in front of him and
he hit it and he cracked his head open for
the last It was the last time he ever raced.
It's all in the history books because then later he

(34:39):
worked years later, he worked for Briggs and Stratton as
their main engineer. Hit it as their lead engineer. I
did years later. But he came up with the PM bike,
the Macki motor, that overhead valve motor, the Jefferson and
he would invented all different parts, all different front ends.
You know, he was a real he was a real
engineering mind. Do some brilliant engineers back then. I mean

(35:01):
they're all trying to make, you know, a faster bike,
a more efficient bike, so the climb hills go faster.
And it was really but it was always on the
race track. First they would race on Sunday, that's right,
and sell on money. That's all right. If they had
a nice bike, was running good, and if it was
you know, Excelsia or Indian, they went to the Indian dealers,
guys in the stands and they went and went b
Damn motorcycles just won the race. I know. And I

(35:24):
also think when you look back sometimes the timelines don't
really add up for these guys. And I think they're
saying they were around longer than they were because it
was better for business. Doesn't that make any sense? So
they say, oh, we we been around since oh two.
I meanwhile, you can't find barely in O five. I mean,
Harley says they've been around since nineteen oh three. I've
never seen no. I think it's one in the museum

(35:44):
that in Milwaukee. I saw that. Yeah, But I mean
I think they really started production No. Five. Yeah, and
even Indian they started No. Nine, but they only had bicycles.
No No, they saw oh sorry, oh one, sorry one, yeah,
oh one, O two. I have the catalog for O
two and I have an original paint oh for my
shop right now, a totally original bike. Wow. But the

(36:04):
production was low, I mean, but then they were the
one Indian really was leading the pack. They had the
most production. I think by nineteen like eight, they had
like I don't know, twenty five hundred bikes or maybe
even more than that for that year. And they Bike
Harley at that time in nineteen seven only made like
one hundred and fifty. So it was way ahead of there,

(36:28):
way way ahead, way way ahead. But they had They
also were building bicycles for a lot of years, but
they were at they over, but they hired what was
the company? Yeah, they hired a Royal manufacturing company to
make all the parts for them until they got a
big enough we're company together where they could make everything
in house. So they had from nineteen o two to
nineteen nineteen seven Aurora Manufacturing Company was making all their stuff.

(36:49):
And then nineteen eight Indias like, okay, contract over and
we're going to start making our own stuff. And then
then they started and they were killing. But nineteen thirteen
I think they made you know, like thirty five thousand motorcycles. Know,
it was crazy, real they were. Indian was definitely on
top of their game. They were the most advanced motorcycle
in that time period. Yeah, and I love them. I'm
actually working on you know, from nineteen to They're my

(37:12):
favorite motorcycle for Nikes. I'm doing all the diamond frames
I got, like, I'm doing ten bikes. Oh, those are fantastic,
I know, and they're the biking the frames because I'm
wanted to damn frames. Yeah, so we're actually making all
the casting. My sons helped me out. We're doing all those. Yeah,
those diamond bikes are got they got the look. They're beautiful. Yeah,
they're like very art forward, they yes, and you know,
it's kind of like they're they're they're the bikes that

(37:33):
inspired everybody else to yeah, to make it go right,
you know. They're the one thing else the motorcycles, deside
the early motorcycle business going on there so sweet. Anyway,
that was what the motorcycle stuff kind of was inspired by.
The money was being made. There was a guy out
in California who was reproducing the top ends for the

(37:56):
overhead valve racing in the factory racer, but no nobody
was making the damn carburetor. Nobody had a carburetor for
these things. And that's the hardest thing. That's the hardest
thing to find. Ye and I had just bought a
nineteen eleven Indian and the guy had a carburetor, a
racing carburetor that he said, would you like to buy this?
It was like thirty five hundred bucks. There's a lot
of money bang in And I'm like, all right, I

(38:18):
know what this is. I'm going to buy it. I
saw it in piece even Write's book. So I went
to work to reproduce that carburetor, and I did twenty
two of this car me and my son casting cast things.
First off, I hired a pattern making company to make
the first couple of patterns, and then I'm like, I
don't want to pay that bill anymore. That was like
six gram right, hang, I learn that, dude, it's going
on a woodworker. How hard could we make a pattern?

(38:38):
You get to buy the shrink rules. And then so
I took the carburetor and took my mechanical drawing skills,
reverse engineered it, made the patterns up and started making
them and did twenty two of them. Carbetters, there's twenty two.
My Carbritter's sitting out there. Me and my son. We
had a little machine shop at the back that's a
lot day antique shop open. We had a little shed
I built and we and we worked on a machine
and needles and all the parts for the carburetor in

(38:59):
this little shed. And and just like I was the
only guy in the world still am who makes those carvers,
And I'd make him anymore. That whole ship is sailed, right,
everybody mar everybody who was who wanted a board track
racer got it. Yeah, you know, so once in a
while I get a call for a guy wants a carbriger.
But you know, well it's so interesting. I'm glad we
got this background because I think a lot of people

(39:19):
don't know this about maybe year past from watching American Pickers.
Which leads me into the next thing. When did you
meet Mike? Well, when was the first time you went
at Mike had my antique shop. I mean he was
he was my picker basically, I mean he was. I
met him at at Oie And here's so he was
to pick for you and then come sell it to
you and then sell it. Yeah, yeah, he was. He

(39:40):
was a picker. He was the guy who he filled
his truck up with. He would go and just he
had a great eye, I mean, amazing guy. And I
met him and he had this it was it was
a red van he says no, but he was a
red van at Oie and it was pactful cool stuff.
He had like you know, weather veans and like lightning
rods and like old crocks, and it was they take
motorcycle to me. I'm like, dude, what are you doing here?

(40:02):
You know? And he was like he and I bought
some great stuff and brought it back to my shop
and sold it. So and the week became fast friends.
I mean, he was like, what year was that? Oh god,
it was thirty ish thirty yearly years ago. All right,
so you guys been hurt Friday for thirty plus years ago.
So it's been a while. Oh I didn't want to
think about it, you know, I know. But anyway, so
we became fast friends, I mean, and so we started

(40:24):
picking together. Here he's from Iowa and he he would
come out to my place and we would pick the Northeast.
I'm like, we'd get in the van and the Northeast
is the best pick. Oh my god, it's like that's
where all the good stuff, where everything is everything. So
he and he was smart what he was doing. He'd
come to my place. He says, I got a bunch
of leads. I said, where you get these leads from? Dude.

(40:46):
So he was getting from the old antique motorcycle magazines
from the sixties and seventies and he's calling them up.
He's calling the people up in there, Hey, do you
still have that bike? What happened to that thing? What
happened to that motor And he was developing lead through
the old antique motorcycle magazines and that was that's really smart.
That was for this this guy, because that was still

(41:06):
sitting there in the basement. One of the you know,
the things that suck up would be most about Mike Wolfe,
the guy brilliant. Yeah, he's a super smart guy. Yeah
you know, yeah, maybe not book smart, yeah, but he's street.
He's he knows the business and he knows how to hustle.
I mean, the guy he's got he was he was
an inspiration to me. I'm like, who is this guy?
You know? And so we became fast friends and he's

(41:28):
you know, sleeping my couch. Yeah, he'd be upstairs like
like I you know, he's stayed there for like a
week or two. I'm like, dude, hoole man, I was
sick of seeing you already. But we'd have a lot
of fun. We we you know, picked the wherever he
had leads. I had some leads. He had way more
leads to me for antique motorcycles. He was really into it.
He was really cultivating good leads and he was bringing

(41:50):
me along and then I would bring him along some
of my stuff that I had too, and some of it,
you know, intertwined too. We would noticeing people, you know,
especially in Pennsylvania and stuff like that in New York.
So we would and we go We did Hershey together,
we did antique shows together, and you know, and we
were We're feeding off each other's energy. He liked my
shop and then I would go to Iowa and he

(42:11):
had a shop out there too. It was a small shop,
and like we had the Davenport motorcycle right down the
street from him, and stay stay at his house. So
we was back and forth. It was it was like
we we got along great, you know. So and that's
how I met Mike Wolfe. And this is before the show, yeah,
way before the show, way before the show. Yeah. And
I know I've spoken to Mike about this, and I

(42:32):
know he had to really beat down a lot of
doors before he got his show. Oh, my god, this
didn't come to him. I know. It was years of
really trying to sell the concept before it got picked up.
Here's what happened, dude. I would I would like, but
we'd go to our pick and he'd be like he'd
be filming or you'd have a you know, a camera.
I don't know what the little camera was back then,
but like whatever it was, and he would be filming

(42:56):
things like Jersey. Look what I just filmed. And he
called me Jersey. He's the only guy whoever never met
you called me. He calls from New Jersey and he's
from Iowa, so he's like Jersey. So that's how I
got the nickname Jersey. Oh really, he gave you that.
He gave me that name. No, we're pretty good. Oh
he's the one. So Robbie, you call me Jersey. Everybody
in his family called me Jersey, and I hated it. Yeah,
so now it's kind of grown on. Yeah, you just

(43:18):
resigned town like, Okay, I'm Jersey. Yeah yeah, but no John,
you know. Yeah. But anyway, so we we had a
great time, you know, going on his leaves, picking things
up and making a living. I mean we're both like, dude,
I mean trying to make a living, right, and it's
just it's hard, you know. I mean I had the
furniture restoration business and whatnot, but also an antique shop.

(43:38):
I had to you know, get stuff sale for sale, right.
You had to have inventory, right, you had to have inventory.
And then I also noticed that my furniture wasn't selling anymore, right,
that was fading. Yeah, and I'm like, okay, now what
do I do? You know, you know, I got I
gotta support myself. I got a family support. I got
figured this out. And that's when antique motorcycles start. That

(43:59):
starts like versifying. I taught myself glassware. I taught myself pottery.
I taught myself early paintings, how to repair pottery and porcelains.
I was diversified. I changed everything I was doing. I was.
I was getting in the more into fine antiques, going
to the show up in brandy Wine and looking at
really good furniture, watching Antiques Roadshow, and and the Keno

(44:20):
brothers taught them and nerd it out on these early
American furniture. I love that stuff. I gotta tell you, man,
that was my favorite show. Yeah, anti Olo's show is
like my favorite I could just I could watch it
around like yeah, like if that's the only thing that
was ever on, it was never bothers. It's an educational show.
It's value based and you get it and you really
can learn a lot from these people who are explaining

(44:42):
what these things are and also exciting like how these
people have these things right right? The story the story.
But yeah, the story is always great, that's what's cool.
Like when I started working with the show and Mike,
what you know, there was those issues. Frank was really
ill and he you know, he couldn't work on the

(45:02):
show anymore. And Robbie got on the show. Then he needed,
you know, somebody else on the show. Then they wanted
me to go on the show. I'm like, well, do
I really want to be on the show. Yeah, I
remember talking to you about I was freaking out, Yeah exactly,
I did we did? You called me and said, hey,
what's this television? What television? Giggles? Did I do it? Yes?
And yes, do it? And he inspired me. I'm like,

(45:24):
you know, and I was like I was kind of
freaking out. Yeah, Well you were used to well, you know,
having a job and working and that you well, now
they were going to take my time. They were going
to take you know, yes, every month I had to
go and do this show. And at first I was
when when Mike started the show. First off, let's get back,
let's back up a little bit. Nobody gave him this ship. No,

(45:47):
I mean I watched him take all these films that
he was making of different picks, and he had to
get a teaser reel and he hired like I think
it was crazy Eyes, the productions out in Iowa, and
this young guy put the beautiful teaser reel together and
it showed him and Frank picking. It was great, man,
I loved it. I mean, this is so cool, it's exciting,
and like Mike, this is great, keep it up, keep
it up, keep going, and I'm inspiring him. And I

(46:08):
watched him it was like and then he would like
try and market it to people. And it's really hard
to break into that that business, very very hard, very
very hard, because all these execs think they know what
the best television is. What they're only thinking about what exists,
so that they want they want to sure bet of
course they want to show everybody does. And I think,
you know, I'm talking out of my turn. Really I
really don't know the business. But what I saw from Mike,

(46:31):
I watch saw him suffer. I'm like, and he would
call me up. He's like, you know, dude, I don't
know what I'm doing here. He's you know, he's trying
to put two pennies together, you know, to you know,
figure out how he's going to live, you know, and
they've got he's trying to make this show work. It
was his dream, big sacrifice, big sacrifices he's making. And
not only that, but it's just like he never lost
faith in himself, and I'm like, and and also I

(46:52):
never lost faith to him either. I'm like, dude, you're
gonna do this. It's gonna be great. And it was
like focus on the story, focus on the story, focus
on the story. And I think that helped a lot.
And he did, and that show is really story based.
And you know, even for me, like these are, I'm
like addicted to collecting. I mean, I love it. It's
a sickness more than anything. I think. The thing I
love about it other than the visual and early advertising

(47:15):
and that is the story and the history. I am
a sorry I will pay more for history. I love.
I am That's the thing I love to do. I've
researched for days and not even bought the thing I researched.
But I got an education. And then again, like you
said earlier, you have the right people in your life.

(47:36):
You make the phone call, heywing, your toy guy, you
motorcycle guy. You know, Mike's got someone everywhere, right, well,
all of you on the motor early. Yeah, I was
helping out with early motorcycles with him, and you know,
and also just you know generalistics. We just we were
just like antique dealers and we sharing information and we
trusted each other. And so yes, you do network. It's

(47:57):
a lot of networking. The networking is big. And that
brought me up into a better understanding. And you can't
really get an education until you make the risk. You
buy it. You make some mistake, thing wrong things. Hopefully
you do good. Yeah, you get rid of some of
the stuff that you didn't do so good on and
over time, if you have a good eye, yeah, and
you have some education and you do some investigating, you

(48:18):
could do pretty good. Because some of this stuff I've
gotten at a real reasonable price. And that's part of
what I like about collecting. I don't just go and
throw money at stuff. If I can't sneak up on
it a little bit, you want to probably not buy it.
Find it like stock market. I like that. Gotta buy
lots because there's room in it and it's better than
money in the bank. You know. That's what I love.
That's that's what I'm passionate about. You see all this stuff,

(48:39):
I mean, even this block right here, you know, came
out of a Studebaker building. You know, it's crazy beautiful.
And I've always miirred the stuff that you've had, and
I respect you for the history that you like save,
but also the research that you do to find out
what each piece have you like, I've learned things from
you by even those boats I bought from this, I
called over the Stevenson's Institute, got the professor on the phone.

(49:02):
He got the back to me with all the serial
numbers and told me exactly what I had the testing
boats for that from an America's cup. That's right. I know,
there was so cool that first off. We both like
dig that kind of stuff, so we've always gotten along
that way. Yeah, it's not just a flashy snow, it's technical.
The piece of how it plays it it's part and
hidden history, correct, you know, like you had that big

(49:24):
zeppelin Ye crazy, Yeah, I mean that's amazing. It's it's
actually an engineering model. And to me it's like a
piece of oh, like real Americana. Like think about it.
It's a piece of history, you know, it's not it didn't.
It was a piece of history. It had a function.
It helped create Zeppelins. And the quality. You can see

(49:44):
the quality. I know you're a quality guy. You love
to see quality. You've you've recognized it, and that's the
hard thing to see. It is an eye for your quality. Bill,
this is what made you your reputation together. It's a
quality of the design and also the machining and the
and and the fabrication. I mean it's like nothing else
set out there right now. It's unique. It's very unique. Yeah,
and I liked and that's why I got like a

(50:05):
lot of one off signs. I like to collect one
office if I can. You know, of course that's as
much value. We all want the one. I want the
one off motorcycle and yeah I want the first R
Times Yeah, yeah, yeah, one, Yeah, I want the first
Indian that's you know there, what's that Traube. What's that
troub trout that net walk starts place. Yeah, that's a
great point. Oh my god. I mean the whole museum
is amazing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean the whole world

(50:26):
is really cool with the whole antique motorcycle stuff. And
that's where Mike and I really grew strong together, really strong. Yeah,
like we were. We were spending some serious money on
stuff and like and you have to have that that
courage tould do it. I mean we're talking about, you know,
spending fifty thousand dollars on a piece of junk bike
that looks like crappy, right and looks I don't Douber

(50:48):
would walk right over walk past it, and I mean
you have to see it. You got to understand history.
You got to know what the value is going to
be and kind of like beat you know, two steps
ahead of where the value is going, you know. And
so we had that, we had that bond, and then
he's doing this show and I'm like paying attention to
what he's doing. I'm not trying to get in his
business with no at all. I'm like, that's cool, dude,

(51:09):
you do that, you know, Yeah, And he did it,
and that was, and then like five years nobody wanted
it and he suffered and he's like, dude, nobody wants
to show get man, don't worry about it. You're going
to get it. You're go get it. And then he
got into some I guess through History channel. He got
in the back door through a friend of his, and
he got an interview there and they bought he says,
Jersey Day's bought six episodes. That's all it took. I'm dude,

(51:33):
so proudy. That was so cool. I was really so
proud of what he had accomplished there. Yeah, because and
he tells me the story, He's like, I didn't know
what he was going to do. He was like he
wasn't sure where to even go. He didn't have anything
lined up. He wasn't expecting this, and he was like
from the seat of his pants. He had a film
crew there and directors and you know, all these guys.

(51:53):
They's like all right, I'm like, no way, okay, let's
do this. And he's like knocking on some guy's door, Hey,
can we film in here? It was that raws and
that's what made it great too. That's still what makes
it great. It is it is. And you know, I
got to tell you for the years that I spoke
with him once we got to know each I didn't
know him back then, but later we got to know
each other, and uh, he said, man, your your guys
show kept me going, Yeah, I saw what you guys

(52:14):
were doing, just regular guys making television. And he's like, man,
it just kept making me push, make me push, because
he said, I knew I had something special. Yeah, you
got to get other people to see it. Do was
nothing like it on the market, nothing, and there still isn't. Yeah, well,
I mean Paunt Stars was kind of like started to dish.
I'm fish. It's it's not the same show, but it's
not as it's not as personality driven as far as

(52:36):
like different characters where you go visit Middle Earth. You know,
it's just random guy. I love you know, doing the show.
I've grown to really really enjoy it to being with
people and finding out like where did you get all
this stuff from? And why is it here? Is that
your favorite part about being absolutely just the people. It's
the people. Yeah, I love that interviewing the people. It's

(52:56):
the engine this show. And you know, here's another really
important part of it. For me and it gives me
bootmall goosebumps. E've been thinking about it is that we're
going to a house and I've never miss these people before.
I have a little idea who they are, but I
mean it's totally organic. We're going in there and the
father's gone, who have collected with this stuff? The mother's
gone to collected all this stuff. This is this is

(53:17):
this is a family member, and they're explaining to me, like,
this is my dad and this is his stuff that
we have and we have to we don't we don't
know what to do with it, right, And you got
to kind of go in there and some of his
collections are amazing collections, and you got to tell the
story of the father or the mother who's gone through
their collection. Oh, I understand why he bought this. Now

(53:39):
I see where this is going because I'm coming from
the same background. I understand what this collection is about.
But you can see, like his the evolution of his collections.
Sometimes this was his early stuf and then before he
passed the best he bought the he's playing. He's really
stepped up and bought the best, you know, right piece
of art that he afford and so now it's not

(54:01):
just we're picking people. It's almost we're doing a eulogy, right,
you know what I'm saying. Yeah, and that is oh
my god, it's such a responsibility. Yeah. And you could
see the respect for the families oh after the show,
and you know, I'm sure there's a lot of behind
the scenes everything, because it takes a lot to make
a television show, but to come in and respect what

(54:22):
it is that you're looking at and honor the memory
of people because it's usually their kids are grandkids, are
moving things along. It's like you said, they don't have
a passion for it, they don't know what to do
with it, and they want to see it in a
good home. Yeah. And Mike is so good at that,
and I know he is. He gets everyone real comfortable.
Oh absolutely, And I've kind of learned that from him too,
because I was really super nervous starting to show. I'm like,

(54:44):
I don't know if I'm gonna be good at this
or I just don't know what to do. But it
just worked. He said, dude, you're killing it. I'm like
I am like, well, we're just being you. I'm just
just like we're talking here. I remember having the conversation. Yeah,
he said, hey, Mike, you know, because I know you,
they would call you on the phone get their opinion.
But you say, hey, Mike wants me to come on
the road and be a part of the show. And yeah,

(55:06):
I said, dude, you should do it. And I know
you were concerned about it because you didn't really care
about being famous. No, you didn't care about his notoriety.
You you cared more about am I gonna like this
is this like the next chapter and how is this
going to affect my job, my David, my bills? Right,
because and that's where you were at. And I'm sure
you know that works out over time. Yeah, apparently you

(55:26):
guys work through that a little bit. Yeah it's okay,
I mean yeah, I mean, who whatever, No one's getting
to do what you're doing. Right. It's such a great
life experience, you know, it's it's just so cool. I mean,
they treat me really great. On the show. We travel
all over the country. We meet these great people, we
see these great collections, make these connections with people, I
make friends with these with with people, and there were

(55:49):
part of their life now And you don't realize how
important that really is. Like these are people, you know,
we're coming into the collection and their dad's gone or
mom's gone, and now we're celebrating them and putting and
documenting the family's history on this pop culture media. Yeah,
and it's there forever. I mean we're still watching. I
love Lucy reruns. This show is going to be gone forever.

(56:10):
I mean, he's it's been on since two thousand and nine,
I think was the first show and here we are
still going strong fifteen years later. Yes, I mean the
show is doing good. Our ratings are way up. Yeah,
I mean we're doing really good. Timeless that's why, I guess,
I don't know, I think so. And it's story driven,
so we have the same experience. We just happened to
create a genre. Yeah, you were out there. We loved

(56:31):
the whole the dynamic, the chemistry you guys had in
our show. I mean that's what That's what kept me
tuning in on every all right Wednesday. Nor the personalities.
We were very real and raw. There's no rehearsal, we
weren't taking acting lessons. We were the same people on
camera as we were off camera, and we just hit
at a time where there was a real appetite for it,

(56:53):
and it was new. It was new to television. There
was no reality shows like ours before the wa It
was family driven family. You had your whole family there,
your dad, your brother, you and you guys were all
like it was. We were a little nuts absolutely as
doing I'm like, did you just back into your dad's truck? Right? Like?
You just do? Yeah? How many doors can you know? Yes?

(57:15):
And you guys were just it was so brilliant watching
that and seeing that and it definitely inspired me. Yeah,
legacy shows, Uh, Pickers is one. You know, there's shows
that were on when we started. So we started in
two thousand and two, right, and there were other shows
that were popular at the time, not necessarily reality just shows,
but nobody remembers them, nobody. They were just there for

(57:36):
a blip. Yeah. What we did was we came up
with a whole generation. We brought a whole generation to
people up with us. And you know, like you said,
it's the characters that is the staying power. And even
now today up the appreciation there's like nostalgia for our
show now and the appreciation. I'm fifty now, so everybody
who started watching the show was half their age that

(57:59):
they are now, but now they have kids, some in college,
you know, so it's a it's a pretty interesting dynamic.
But I see it in Mike's show. It's a legacy show.
We have a lot of fun doing it. I mean,
I think it was kind of we had a shaky
period in there when Frank got really sick and they
couldn't do a show anymore and all that was going down,
you know, that was it was all hard. Did they

(58:21):
bring you in because Frank was sick or you want
to I mean, I suppose so yeah, I mean I
don't really know, but yeah, I get. I mean, I
guess they wanted a little bit more diversification, not just
buying oil and gas stuff, and I had a more
background in general antiques, furniture, tools, you know, machine work,
you know, art whatever. I mean, Well, it's the evolution

(58:42):
of the show too, because it was just the two
of them the first few seasons and then they started
bleeding in Rob Robbie the girl would go out. You know,
they mixed it because the more picks you got, the
more episodes you have, and he doesn't have to be
at every single pick, you know. The mechanics of the
show had to change. Yeah, but that was a stretched out,

(59:02):
really thin and I mean I can't believe that he's
still doing it. Pull and not just that they pulled
this off. Yeah, I mean, this is a super strong show.
It's amazing. And then we got like we have a
huge crew. It's like, you know, yeah, thirteen guys on
the road, you know, pulling us across the country and
doing all this stuff. I mean they're all relying on it. Yeah.
You know, if I don't show up for work, it

(59:23):
ain't working that that's right. You you mess everybody up. Yeah,
and that is the way. That's the way our show
always was too. I will say, man, I'm jealous of
these shows like like Pickers, And I'll tell you why
our show was such a process show. It was like
six weeks an episode. How you know you guys could
do like twenty episodes in six weeks. Maybe not, you
know you? And I heard it's three hundred hours per

(59:44):
episode with the edding and everything. So it's it's it's
kind of like, yeah, right, there's still that's but it's
not quite You can get more done in a shorter
period of time. And I think they're half hours, right,
are they half I know they're an hour lung show.
Are they hour long show? They're alon show? But in
any event, you know, our show was so labor intensive.
It just was. It's I can't even bathom how that was.
Even this is all new to me, the production of it.

(01:00:06):
These guys blow me away. It's all in the edit.
These editors who made our shows put it together. They're brilliant, yea.
And they got a formula that is trying creating something
and taking all the little slurs out of my speech.
I watched one of the editors and they're like, have
these three screens and I'm on there and they're taking
you never said this so good, and I sounded so
good in my life. These guys are making me sound.
We could probably do that. We could do that for him, right,

(01:00:29):
So Ronnie through the machine. Yeah, so I said, could
you please put the Brad Pitt filter on once in
a while? So yeah, yeah, I want so. Anyway, It's
just funny. It's my life is just like a different
It's I'm still I still work in my shop, i
still hold these things I'm doing. I'm working on the
marshmatch right now. I was painting yesterday. You know, I'm doing.
I don't do furniture. You're squeezing in projects? Absolutely? I

(01:00:51):
still yeah, I'm still I'm still right about Are we
gonna ask you how they didn't being done? Well? It's hard, yeah,
because I mean you're on the road, you know, ten days,
you know, two weeks sometimes and then you got to
travel out. You're packing your basket, your stuff ready, and
then you're getting back and you unpack and get your
stuff ready. So how much time out of ten days
of two weeks? It's almost just harder time to start

(01:01:13):
even to start up a project. But I'm making it work.
You know, It's like it's life. Is it enriching your life?
Are you? Are you happier for it? Absolutely? Yeah, Well
that's I mean you're enjoying it. Yes, It's a different
dynamic to my life, and I'm really I feel I

(01:01:36):
pressed off. I felt like God gave me something in
my hands, in my brain a long time ago when
I was born to be able to work, would and
do all these things, and I was always been very
grateful for those gifts. This is just one more gift. Yeah, well,
one more thing I've been Well, He's given you a
platform to showcase it. Yes, yes, And I've had that
my well, most of my adult life. So I can

(01:01:56):
appreciate that because it affords you the opportunity to keep
doing that thing that you love. If I can inspire
someone else like I, like, you know, inspire somebody to
the young guys to do what I'm doing, because the
craft is getting lost. All these old guys who are
you know, welding and gone there and they're going there now,
C and C. And you know AI is going to

(01:02:17):
take over. There's not going to be craftsmanship with these
hands and his mind anymore. You know, it's gonna take
it's gonna it's gonna be We're closing that generation of
craftsmen unfortunately. Absolutely so. I mean I want to inspire
young people to get involved with stuff, or old people
or whoever change the change their direction in life a

(01:02:38):
little bit, inspire them maybe, and that could really happen
at any time. Yeah, there's no real there's no there's
not an expiration day on that. Now can get inspired
at eighty years old. This just one little thing, what
one little piece of information, one little piece of the
passage in a book that I read when I was
twelve got me to this point where I'm at now

(01:02:59):
inspireired me back then to keep this, to keep my
energy up, to keep it going, to keep the enthusiasm going.
And I'm hoping that our show and then you know,
they're showing more of me on the show. Now. I've
been pretty steady on it for like four years is
twenty twenty. I've been pretty much on everything going going.
And that was a wild time because everyone else was
going wild. Yeah, everybody, no one was filming. And twenty

(01:03:20):
twenty in the middle of COVID and we're filming and
we had to get tested three times a day. We
were massed everywhere, and then we're making this TV show
and we're the only ones out there doing it. It
was like we were in some kind of like strange
like you know, apocalyptic drama. And I'm telling you, the
world shut down. In every type of filming and even
type of television show, they all went, they all stopped.

(01:03:41):
We didn't do it. We did. It's amazing. We kept going.
It was crazy, it was nuts, but I'll never forget it.
So yes, to answer your question, I do like doing it.
I'm being I guess talked about more on the show.
We talk about what I'm doing about the processes and
the stuff that Mike doesn't really talk about too much

(01:04:02):
because he doesn't know. But I want to bring out
like how to cast something, how to machine something on
a lathe Are they doing any of that with you
over there? We've been in your shop, film my shop
all the time. Yeah. Yeah, so more and more that's
gonna be. It's getting show on the show, and I'm
proud to be part of that part of that. And
not only that, but you know, I got my son,
I have two grandsons. This is all this is my story. Yeah, yeah,

(01:04:25):
I'm and that's a big deal. Yeah, absolutely, So this
is my book that's getting written right and it's it's
so I want to I want to show people what
I've done and what I'm doing and keep motivating other
people to do something. Perhaps you know, one little, one
little thing that inspires some guy and I see it
all the time. Now it's working, you know, I'm you

(01:04:46):
can hear what people are saying. Absolutely. Manas guy sat
at home depot yesterday, I'm picking up some some wood
and he's stopping in the parking lot. He says, dude,
I love what you're doing. And it's not even with
the show. We're talking about the cannonball stuff like he's
because he've been following me for a long time, and
the stuff that I've been with antique motorcycles. And I said,
do you watch the show? He says, no, I don't.

(01:05:06):
I don't watch the show. But I'm talking about me personally,
And that felt good because I'm not The show is
not my life. My life is what the show was
just part of your life. It's part of my life.
That's so, and I'm glad that beyond it. It's amazing
because it gives me that that platform. Then he said,
to showcase the things. Yeah, I mean in some capacity, right, Yeah,

(01:05:27):
it's cool to do it. It's time consuming. Yeah, it
takes off a lot of my energy, but my energy's
still there. I'm still very damn while you can, right, Yeah,
So I'm going to continue doing it as long and
still have me. They have said, they've said the black
car for me yet to get out of here Jersey,
you know. So, I mean, that's pretty good. That's good.
But but it's it's Mike and Robbie, and you know,
we have a lot of fun and Mike has done

(01:05:48):
this amazing thing with this show. I am so damn
proud of this guy and amazed at him. His energy
is up and his creativity the way he and it's
it's ongoing. I mean, he always getting new ideas and
he's like when he's on when he when he's on
pick together, he's directing us too, right, and he helps
me a lot, Like if I'm getting stuck with something,
I have to explain something we just saw a big
tool pick and right, He'll be like, say it this way,

(01:06:11):
or he'll be like, this is how you Well, he
just gets me idea to put it in my own words, right,
but he's like, why don't you hit it from this aspect?
And it's so funny too because as much as I
built motorcycles for all those years and we had all
this family dynamic, the one thing that you get really
good at is making television because you understand the ins
and outs of it. An American Chopper. Although there was

(01:06:32):
a production company there, we made American chop Sure. We
all the creative was us. Every thing we did we
did pretty naturally and it was made great content and
we were the ones driving the ship the whole time.
All that for the whole duration of that. They came,
they found us, they put us on television, but they
didn't make us. You had to beat You're the guys,

(01:06:52):
you're the talent. You're the guys who inspired everybody else
to do what they're doing, and they're there to document that.
That's what I feel about our show. That's right, that's
the best show you can have right there. Yeah, I'm
just learning not to put my back to the camera.
You know, open to the camera. The camera. We set
this up last night. I know where my camera is.
I'm going to respect it. And it's like, and it's

(01:07:13):
four years later, you had to tell you, hey, joh
oh my god, I got I've got to open up
the camera. Say that again. Open up the camera. That's
all right, don't stand in front of the object you're buying. Well,
talk about it, and you know, then it was like
the show is like we'll go on a pick and
we're that's the the contributor, the people who were picking,

(01:07:33):
and then there's a whole other part of the show
is that's the interview. So we have to do the interview.
We talk about that that that that day that we're there,
and sometimes that could happen two weeks later. Oh, yeah,
I believe me. I did those they're called pickups. You
didn't like, Yes, I would do. We would do three
or four episodes. I would do pickups for a day,
all days. But it's good because in the beginning they

(01:07:57):
had Mike Road doing it, like in the first few episodes,
Miro that, And then they started using up Micro. Yeah,
Micro is a great guy. Uh. Then they started using
us and it made the show more personal because then
we were telling the story in first person, in our voice. Yes,
and that really helped the show. I think that helped
people with us in the show, and it got our
fan base really invest But now I know how hard

(01:08:20):
those pickups are. They can that's the hardest thing I do,
because you have to sound like you and still say
what they're looking for. I got to explain why do
I buy this stuff? What my boat explained? Do the eulogy, Yeah, right,
that's RRD and but that's part of the storytelling. Yes,
and so it's a it's really important to the content
of the show. It's amazing how it works. I never

(01:08:40):
had I had no idea how these shows, how your
show would get and now I've got that, you know,
I got the backstage pass and how I'll just create
insight and it is so much or it's a lot
of work. It's a big team. It's a big team.
But also it takes like at the end of a
pickup day. I am it's the worst. It's you rather
have to physical activity. Is nothing compared to doing that

(01:09:04):
because my brain is melted. I am just totally. I'm
as spent. I just gave everything. I just gave everything
that I had and I don't believe me. I was
there for too many years. Yeah, you know exactly what
I'm talking about. It's just like and it's so it's
such an emotional you know, regurgitation of the day. It is.
And then you got a recall because if it was

(01:09:25):
not recent, you have to remember the scene and they
try and get you to yeah, well they bring up
you know, they'll bring up some footage or all right,
Herschel My director is amazing, you know, one of our directors,
Tyler's another one. And these guys they get my recall
going and then all of a sudden it just comes back.
And then then you're like, oh, yeah, I just remember
what I want to say. Yeah, because I do think

(01:09:46):
I'll say up at night sometimes thinking about like, wow,
I should say this about this thing or this people. Right,
and I'll get my phone to make a little note
and I'll and I'll start writing a chapter that I
want and then I'll then i'll that'll bring that into
my into my pickup. Yeah, and really it starts to
come together. Yeah, it seems to be working. Yeah, it's me.
It's a good tool for me. It's good. Yeah. We
did pickups like once a week for a decade. And uh,

(01:10:08):
we would also need outfit changes. So yeah, we would
get these like folders of red hat, black shirt, work shirt,
blue shoes, you gotta and we I'd have a pack
stack of clothes here and I put the red shirt
and hat. Do my pickups change my alth. I do
that all day, you know, because it has to fit
in the scene or else it doesn't. It's not continuity.

(01:10:30):
But they have their own formula for us. You know,
it's amazing what to do. When I watched the show,
I'm flabbergasted and how well they make me look on
the show. It's like I can't believe that this is me.
And also that when I'm doing voiceovers on stuff, I'm
like that's me talking. I mean it might. He's great.
I mean, he's he's got a great voice, he's a

(01:10:53):
great emotional intellect. Yeah, and he connects with everything and
show in the way he disgrees. His adjective are really fantastic. Yeah.
I've learned a lot from him doing about But also
I'm a reader too, and I have that capacity as
well articulate and also but getting the getting the emotion
into words like finding out it's the very emotional show.
It's a descriptive thing. Yeah, it's right and finding the

(01:11:15):
right the right the right descriptive words and getting and
building that, building that emotion up so the viewer can
experience and you know, and I think we're doing that,
you know, I mean it's it's we get a lot
of positive feedback from on the from me on the show.
You know, of course, there's it's it's hard to to
you know, navigate it, especially when we lost Frank. We

(01:11:37):
got beat up a lot. Yeah, and it was it
was really sad what people were saying. It was we
were to their own conclusions obviously. I mean, well now
now they're figuring out what was going on, and you know,
Mike was really heartbroken about it, and I was supporting him, like, dude,
we got this, you know, and now he's like he's good. Yeah,
I know that was hard for him. It was so hard.
I mean it broke everybody's heart. It was so but

(01:11:59):
here we are, you know, we're back, we're doing it
and we're moving on and you know we have we
have the wisdom of Frank's presence in the show too.
You know, it's all there. I mean, he got us
to where we're at. Yeah, he was one of the
early Endgeld. He's a great friend. He was a good guy.
You know, we had we had a great you know.
He every time he come to my house, he buy
me something, he brings something. He picked me. Here, Jersey,

(01:12:20):
take this something. I have a I have I have
a York news team that put the newspapers in it.
It was like, oh and boss, and it's got all
yellow paint on it. He gave it to me one
time and it's it's the top my stove. Yeah, in
the back above the stove. I love it whenever I
see it. Yeah. He was a great guy, you know. Yeah, so,
but that was but that's part of the deal. It
was hard. The show has got it's up and downs

(01:12:40):
and its own emotional content as well. And now that
I'm and more and more involved in it, you know,
I love doing it. I'm just really really into the
whole creation of it and glad to be part of it.
You know, I'm grateful. Yeah, I defin a lot of
gratitude for you know, American Pickers, and you know the
production company Cineflix, Mike Wolfe, you know, Robbie Danielle, all

(01:13:03):
these guys who put the whole show together. The crew,
it's amazing guys. Yeah, I mean I'm part of that
family now. You know, you're lucky to have a good
group like that. Yeah. And we're still going, man, I
mean it's going good. We just we just got done
filming in Phoenix and then we're heading down. I'm heading
to the Mekam Auction in Las Vegas. And then right
after that I got to scoop back here and heading
right out again and we shoot down south. It's winter time,

(01:13:26):
so we're going where it's warm. You know, Florida. I
don't know, Florida is pretty cold right now. Right now,
Georgia is like four inches of snow. Yeah, but you
know what back of last long. It's better than here.
It's so cold. Yeah, it's old. I mean it's like zero. Yeah,
so it's in ueras of here. So but we can't
film these things when it's cold out we're outside a lot. Yeah,
so we got to go where where it's warm and

(01:13:47):
then the spring combering and going hopefully back in the northeast.
This is great, man, This conversation has been great. I
mean I knew some of this stuff, but not all
of it. Very enlightening. And I feel like the fact
that you you've never done a podcast before. Now, no,
I'm not really involved with podcasting at all. I mean
it's a lot of time. Yeah, you know, it's like
my time is like really valuab, I'm gonna work on
stuff at all. Unfortunately for me, you're right down the street. Yes,

(01:14:08):
well it makes a kid the neighbors. You don't got
to get on a plane or and I don't see
you often enough. No, that's true. It's it's because I'm
on the road a lot. You're busy as all get
out in your life and doing this, and you did
an amazing job here watching your lisp face and it's
it's what it's amazing what you're showcasing here, you know,
the Legacy show. Your Legacy show is here now. So
it's cool. And I'm glad that you invite me in
the podcast. And I'm glad your son came. I know

(01:14:30):
my son is here. It's great. You know, it's fantastic
family affair. He's been part of it too, Yeah, you know,
watching me do my thing, and you know, he helps
me a lot. He's the guy if I have a
CSC problem or something like that, because I don't see
his computer in the American Control machines at my shop
or CAD. He's my guy. Yeah, if I got to
get something done, you know. And we do a lot

(01:14:50):
of molds for the for the steel molds for the
for the motorcycle frames. Right, you know, he helps me
out and other engineers as well. Yeah, right, back back
and a couple of the guy takes a village cool man. Well, hey, man,
I appreciate you coming out. Hey, I'll have you back
out at some point in time if you're if you're
down with that, absolutely, man, I mean you mad. You
know what I'd like to do. I'd like to maybe
come over to you. That'd be great. Yeah, that'd be yeah,

(01:15:12):
it'd be fun that places. Maybe do something in your
space talk and we'll just talk about some different things. Absolutely,
and you could show us around, Yeah I could. We
could look at a nickel tour. We can cast the car,
Breder do it, or we can do it some nickel plates.
People would love that, Yeah, they I would love that. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
We do it all the time, you know, always. That's
it's like we're always getting stuff going. Yeah, so all right,