Globe Miami Times November 2021 Issue

Page 19

NOVEMBER 2021

19

PHOTO BY LCGROSS

Kate and Phil Stewart at their shop in Miami.

PHOTO BY PATTI DALEY

STEWART’S ANTIQUE NOOK, Continued from page 1 Over time the Stewart’s collected a “war chest” of old radios and furniture, mostly from Arizona estate sales. Antique items overflowed their home and into Phil’s workspace. They toyed with the idea of opening a store or putting up a booth in an antique mall, and why they decided on Miami is very simple, according to Phil. “We’re drawn to the people,” he says. “We feel accepted. The friendships are near and dear to us.”

Setting Up Shop in Miami, AZ The Stewarts inked their deal for the storefront on Sullivan Street in June, 2021. Then came the fires and they were asked to stay away until the danger subsided. They had but a few shelves up and a few things in when the waters came rushing in at the end of July. The flash floods that ravaged downtown Miami brought the Stewarts even closer to their new community. Mayor Sammy Gonzales made a big impression on Phil and he asked the mayor to cut the ribbon when they opened their new business the 2nd Saturday in August. “We’re off to a very nice start,” says Phil. “It has exceeded our expectations.” Phil and Kate are not ready to retire from their “real jobs” just yet. Phil’s been in the plastics business for nearly 40 years; he coowns PCM, a small manufacturing company in Mesa. Kate has been a first grade teacher for 20 years and works with the Mesa Unified School district. Kate is also a mosaic artist, a craft she restarted shortly before the onset of Covid-19. Some of her pieces are for sale near the front of the store. Some days she works on her projects there. “It is actually pretty relaxing up here,” Kate laughs, “and there are so many people to talk to; we just chat all weekend.”

Although one of the newest businesses on Sullivan Street, the Stewarts have already created a following, bringing new business to downtown Miami, and working with the other merchants to launch Second Saturday and promote the local business community.

It’s getting harder for the Stewarts to head back to Mesa at the end of each weekend. “It’s hard for us to quantify, but for Kate and I, when we’re in our store in Miami, it feels right,” Phil says. “There is something in the air.”

Pairing Old and New Technologies Experimenting with his mentor, Phil learned that some of the old radios lend themselves to being blue-toothed. “There is a jack in the back of the set where you can connect your bluetooth receiver and stream music and control it through your phone,” he explains, “though not all of them.” Lee Kinnard, owner of Dominion Firearms in Miami, has a 1946 RCA table radio that he recalls listening to as a kid. It belonged to his grandfather. It quit playing along the way, but Lee held onto it. Recently Phil cleaned it up and got it working again and was able to blue-tooth it. Now the radio plays all day at the shop, -- some radio programming, but mostly the content Lee streams. “It’s great,” says Lee. “The speaker on that old radio from 1946 is better than the soundbar or the TV.” This morning’s customer doesn’t give a “flying flip” about the blue-tooth pairing. He is fascinated with short-wave radios though and says they’re hard to find. Until now. He peruses the wall of short-wave radios. Phil points out a Zenith 5-band shortwave built in 1955. “These are phenomenal,” Phil describes, “you put these up in your backyard and you’re all over the planet.” From their store on Sullivan Street, the Stewarts can pick up AM stations from Sacramento and Montana and to Texas and Missouri. The short wave radios go all over the world, Phil says, in so many languages, some unidentified. “At night, when the ionosphere lifts, it allows a radio to reach out,” Phil says. “You never know what you’re going to get.” The man from Show Low got a 1946 Firestone. Another happy customer.

This 1946 Firestone radio was recently sold to a gentleman from Show Low.

The Golden Age of Radio

The first commercial radio broadcast in the United States occurred 101 years ago. It was election day, November 2, 1920, and station KDKA in Pittsburgh, PA demonstrated the power of radio as people heard the results of the Harding-Cox presidential race before they read about it in the newspaper. By the early 1930s, a majority of Americans had a radio receiver in their home and according to a 1947 survey, 82% of Americans were radio listeners. Radio was the first electronic mass media technology, surpassed by television in the 1950s.

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