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CNN Saturday Morning News
Interview With Scott Sandman
Aired August 17, 2002 - 09:19 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: You know, we have this discussion in our family. It's patina.
CATHERINE CALLAWAY, CNN ANCHOR: All right.
O'BRIEN: Patina is spin for something that looks like crap, basically, you know, in that sense.
CALLAWAY: Can we say that? (UNINTELLIGIBLE)...
O'BRIEN: Well, I don't know, it's cable, I guess we can. So anyway, I've got some patina here. Look at this. This is a book on the Lindberghs. But you know what I found most interesting? Look at the author. Can you get in there on that, Robert, get a closeup of that?
CALLAWAY: (UNINTELLIGIBLE). O'Brien, I love it!
O'BRIEN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) that, right? Right?
CALLAWAY: Was that a relative?
O'BRIEN: No. Well, you -- I don't know. Long-lost? Check out this little game for $5, Lotto.
CALLAWAY: This is something your wife bought at the garage...
O'BRIEN: Lotto.
CALLAWAY: I'm sorry, I keep saying garage sale.
O'BRIEN: Well, I went up too...
CALLAWAY: It's a yard sale.
O'BRIEN: ... it's the world's longest yard sale. Then we got Sandy...
CALLAWAY: (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
O'BRIEN: ... and Connery (ph) decide to get a bunch of buttons and a little dolly.
CALLAWAY: And I like these little shiny buttons.
O'BRIEN: And these are some of the countless items that you will get if you head on up to the far eastern corner of Tennessee and northeastern corner of Alabama...
CALLAWAY: Look at that!
O'BRIEN: ... and on into Kentucky for the world's longest, largest, most stupendous yard sale.
And here to talk a little bit about it with us is Scott Sandman, he is the director of the Fentress County Chamber of Commerce. He's in Knoxville.
Scott, good to have you with us.
SCOTT SANDMAN, DIRECTOR, FENTRESS COUNTY, TENNESSEE, CHAMBER OF COMMERCE: Good morning, Miles.
O'BRIEN: All right. How did this all get started?
SANDMAN: About 16 years ago, our county executive came up with the idea to bring tourists off the interstate back on to the rural U.S. highways and let them see something a little bit different, and it's grown from there.
O'BRIEN: I should say so. Give us the size of the scale of all of this. Have you ever tried to count up the number of vendors, anything like that?
SANDMAN: Oh, it's impossible to tell how many people participate. But it's about 450 miles from Gadsen, Alabama, to Covington, Kentucky, so...
O'BRIEN: Well, give us a sense of, you know, as you go along there, what I noticed is a lot of places will kind of open up their yards and you go and there are 75, maybe 100 vendors in one place. It's not like just individual yard sales.
It's become -- it's somewhat organized in a disorganized way, right?
SANDMAN: Yes. Yes, it is. It's -- there is no standard way of doing it. Every community that is involved does it a little different. People set up all across their yards. There is people utilizing public parks and like you said, big groups of vendors are There.
O'BRIEN: Have you ever tried to count the traffic, the number of people that come through?
SANDMAN: No, we haven't. It's hard to tell exactly how many people come to the sale, but they do come from all over the United States.
O'BRIEN: Do you do any shopping while this is underway, Scott?
SANDMAN: A little bit. I go out and look around. There is a lot of interesting things out there to be found. I've seen cars to buggies to antiques. Everything is out there on the sale. O'BRIEN: What is the best bargain you got ever?
SANDMAN: I found a very old Batman comic book.
O'BRIEN: Oh, awesome.
You know, I was looking for lunch boxes. I remember I had a great Batman lunch box, and it's hard to find them. You know, those lunch boxes actually go for quite a pricey deal there.
This is, obviously, good for folks who have been sort of, well, they call it progress when they build those interstates, but it's not always progress, is it?
SANDMAN: No, it's not. I think sometimes by traveling the interstates we miss a lot of what makes this country great and it's the people out there across the country.
O'BRIEN: Well, and this is case in point of it, and we invite you, if you're anywhere near this place, check it out. We checked it out twice this week. Sandy, you know, she had this table she saw, she didn't get it, kept her up at night, she went back and got it.
CALLAWAY: Did she really?
O'BRIEN: Among other things. So she did a total of eight hours with the kids in the car over two days.
CALLAWAY: Well, which part did you go to? Did you go to Chattanooga?
O'BRIEN: Yes, we went to Chattanooga, just north of Chattanooga there. It was great, Scott. We had a great time. Keep up the good work up there. We enjoy it.
SANDMAN: Thanks, Miles.
O'BRIEN: All right, good to see you. Good luck with this year's world's longest yard sale.
O'BRIEN: I got to give a shot out to Gadsen, Alabama. I worked at a radio station there many moons ago. Just a little town.
O'BRIEN: We won't say how many moons ago, yes.
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