When members of Damariscotta’s Miles Memorial Hospital League open the doors on their annual rummage sale this month, the veterans among them know enough to stand back. Last year eager bargain hunters started arriving at dawn for the annual used-goods bonanza at the local YMCA. By the 9 a.m. opening, the line was three people wide and half a mile long — in a driving rain under threat of a hurricane.

The reason for such eagerness is what may well be the largest rummage sale in the state of Maine. League members and volunteers — some six hundred in all — spend all year collecting and storing donations in two barns, then devote most of the week before the sale to sorting, pricing, cleaning, and admiring the hundreds of thousands of items. By the end of the three-day sale, they will have collected more than fifty thousand dollars to benefit the local hospital.

Besides the usual yard-sale offerings of outgrown clothes, old lamps, and romance novels, the Damariscotta sale offers everything from dentures to mink coats to bass boats.

The antiques section alone is split between “collectibles” and “treasures,” while an entire tent is set aside for appliances. This year, for example, the “boutique” department includes six thousand dollards worth of new alpaca sweaters from a now-closed downtown shop.

“We have experts who volunteer their time to judge the value of items,” says Connie Bright, who helps coordinate the event for Miles Memorial Hospital. “Plus we have some knowledgeable fellows who repair appliances and lawn equipment for us.”

The sale began in 1963 when a yard sale in a church vestry brought in five hundred dollars. Nowadays the event lasts three days. The last day, Saturday, runs from 9 a.m. to noon and features the famous two dollar bag sale. Anything that will fit into a paper bag goes for two bucks. “One year I couldn’t fit a refrigerator into the bag, so I put the bag in the refrigerator,” Bright says. Sounds like a great way to bag a bargain.

(Published September 2000)