I’m guessing that it was about 1997…I know it wasn’t too long after we started collecting Nevada casino goodies. Every weekend we were out scouring antique/collectible shows, antique stores, and when the weather was nice we’d be at flea markets and garage sales.

One Sunday we were headed west on I-94, probably heading for Chicago. Near Michigan City Indiana, we saw a sign advertising a flea market. We pulled off the highway and drove a mile or so down the road. We found a small flea market with tables set up in a grove of oak trees.

We wandered through the tables and picked up a couple of things…but I don’t remember what they were. I do remember that my hands were full when I approached a table that had a lot of paper goods on it. I saw the corner of a show program, from the Stardust! For some reason I didn’t want to set down whatever it was I was holding, so I called my husband over and pointed out the Stardust program. He pulled out the program and then he found a TON of old travel brochures, maps, hotel brochures, postcards and other paper goods from tourist and travel attractions from all over the country (especially the west)! My husband has always loved that type of paper goods…not just from Nevada.

There were a couple of young men working at the table and they told us that they’d helped their Grandma clean out her house. Grandma had traveled a lot, and collected paper from every trip. When she wasn’t traveling, she was writing to various Chambers of Commerce for brochures, so she could dream about her next trip! They were asking .25 each for most of the paper items, or 5/$1.00. They said the Stardust program was nicer than most of the other stuff, so that was $1.00. I think we walked away with about $25 worth of paper goods that week. They said they hadn’t brought everything, so we told them we’d be back the following week. I think our second visit yielded about $18 worth of papers. We went back a few more times after that, and got even more goodies from them. That was a real treasure trove!

I can’t swear that all of these brochures were from that treasure trove, but these items are very representative of what we found on that table…

(Sorry...I forgot to scan the Stardust program )