A Pre-loved Treasure House

Stand in the forecourt of the More4Less emporium of secondhand goods in downtown Cradock, edit out all the signage, add in a row of gleaming-new black Model Ts, maybe some classic petrol bowsers, and suddenly you’re back in the bygones when this massive building housed a Ford dealership and a filling station.

Linger outside for a minute and listen to the happy shrieks of the tots coming from the Krabbel en Klouter crèche just below the Moederkerk hall. See the ox wagon on the pavement, gently rotting into time and space. Now stroll into the shop, with your ‘picker goggles’ firmly in place.

Here’s Mario Lanza on the gramophone, just dying to sing When You’re in Love. And a Spode bust of the cigar-chomping Winston Churchill complete with bulldog face, a ship’s barometer marked Capetown Castle, an Ellam’s self-feeding rotary duplicator, some Codd-neck bottles, an Emidicta Dictation Machine, shiny platteland-town spoons (remember them?), a boxful of tot glasses that can double up as egg cups, a Queen Anne stove and an ancient Aga donkey boiler in perfect nick. And so much, much more. Who knew?

Hollywood gossip columnist Hedda Hopper once said of Mario Lanza, ‘His smile, as big as his voice, was matched with the habits of a tiger cub, impossible to housebreak’. In other words, that Mario was a bit of a party animal. The gramophone that promises to deliver the tenor’s dynamic tones bears the His Master’s