Nostalgia is the motivation behind some collections. Others hinge on rarity or variety or local connections. Jim Frank’s collection has just one goal: Preservation of family legacy.
Antique tools, an old buggy, tractors once owned by family members – even a fireplace mantle crafted from a hand-hewn walnut beam from an ancestor’s barn – are among the relics Jim has lovingly gathered and preserved at his home near Springfield, Illinois, sometimes without intending to.
Decades ago, when Jim’s mother saw her father (then in his 80s) working near a shed on a hot day, she dispatched young Jim to go help. The shed had partially collapsed during a storm, and the elderly man was trying to retrieve a buggy and his farm tools. Jim lent a hand, but progress was slow.
Frustrated, his grandfather said he thought he’d just light a match to the shed and its contents. Jim can’t explain it today (“I don’t know who was speaking,” he says. “I never wanted that stuff before that minute”) but he staked his claim when he said, “No! I want it!”
