When Woolley was called off to film a segment, I wandered around the taping, eyes wide open and occasionally agog at some of the items people had brought in. I caught up with Steve and Marion, who had their hands full with an 8 foot tall telescope (in pieces). The antique stargazer, which Steve dated back to 1850, was purchased by the couple 50 years prior from a neighbor in Palm Desert who had taken it when the local school no longer had use for the archaic instrument.

"It still works," Steve said proudly. "All I had to do was clean the lens."

Next, I wandered from telescopes over to jewelry, where I met Maureen and her husband Larry from Berkeley. Maureen had been given a silver Chinoiserie bracelet from the "Court of the Seven Seas" at the 1939 Golden Gate Exposition by a patient when she was a dental hygienist in the 1970s.

"This very elegant lady patient of the doctor I worked for was always so immaculately dressed," Maureen said. "And when I admired her bracelets -- this was one of three in a set she was wearing -- she told me her husband had been the curator of Asian artifacts at the expo where it had come from. Then she told me she had no children to pass it on to, she unsnapped it from her wrist and passed it on to me." Maureen put the bracelet on, pointing out its pagoda scene and raised detailing.

"I wear it at least twice a week. Now, when someone compliments a scarf or a pair of earrings I'm wearing, I love to do what that lady did and hand it off to them." Maureen learned that her bracelet was worth about $200, but she had no intention of selling anyway.

"My daughter is getting this one day. I want her to have it to remember how important random acts of kindness are."

Next, I met Larry, who also had a piece appraised with better monetary results. His white 1968 Hot Wheels Camaro turned out to be one of the most rare toy cars from the period. He wouldn't say what the appraiser valued it, but said he was "very pleasantly surprised."

"I thought it might be worth more because it was still in the package but not by that much."

Among the most popular appraisal fields at any Antiques Roadshow taping is painting and prints. It's almost always the field with the most requests. My eye was immediately drawn to to a woman in line with a large, turn of the century poster from France.
"It's from between 1900 and 1906," Sandra said of her piece. "I collect these French posters, but this is one of the earliest ones I own. My other ones are all more Art Deco and this is very Belle Époque."

As I took in her poster, an advertisement for a major exposition/fair in Paris, a number of other people began to take notice of it. Sandra said the item would definitely be staying in her home, regardless of the value ("it looks perfect on the wall I had to sacrifice so it could hang alone"), but when word reached us later that Sandra and her poster had been chosen to be taped for the show, we wondered if she might hear that her poster was worth a price that might make her want to reconsider selling.

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Behind the Scenes at Antiques Roadshow: The Characters, the Stories and the Treasures