Their Life Is a Treasure Hunt : Serious collectors passionately pursue objects that seem like mere oddities to most people.

At 39, Danny Biederman is still in love with his childhood idols--James Bond, Maxwell Smart and Illya Kuryakin.

Over the last 30 years, he has collected hundreds of toy gadgets, original posters and cardboard cutouts related to the popular television and movie spy shows of the 1960s.

His oldest daughter is named Illya after Kuryakin from “Man From U.N.C.L.E.” Middle daughter Moriah Flint’s name honors the lead character in the James Coburn spy picture, “Our Man Flint.” And then there’s Bond, baby Bond, his year-old son christened for Agent 007.

Mark Rigney, 26, hasn’t dumped his first love, either, although he does like to go “dumping.” That’s what he calls his frequent searches through garbage dumps and abandoned outhouses in former campgrounds to locate old beer cans. Rigney started collecting cans in fourth grade, and it still occupies much of his spare time.

“It’s crazy,” Rigney said. “I admit it.”

Biederman and Rigney belong to that not-so-rare breed of San Fernando Valley collectors who will do almost anything to increase their supply.

Pick any object, and somebody in the Valley is sure to collect it, including such oddities as citrus juice reamers, toothbrush holders or gambling chips.

“There have to be at least 25,000 collectors in the Valley,” said Mark Bondeson, who runs an antique and collectible show the fourth Sunday of every month at the Los Angeles Equestrian Center in Burbank.

Scott Borowsky, president of Souvenir & Novelty Magazine, a Pennsylvania-based trade publication for souvenir shops, said the collecting business has “just exploded in the last five years. That’s because so much more is available these days, and the awareness of what’s out there is also greater. I don’t see it slowing down.”

Gene and Arlene Grossblatt of Northridge don’t plan to stop any time soon. About a decade ago, they began picking up new gambling chips on their trips to Las Vegas. Suddenly, they had a few dozen--and a new obsession. They looked for new chips and old chips. Vegas became a giant antique shop in the middle of the desert.

“Now, rather than just gamble, we collect chips,” Arlene said.

Rigney was also hooked before he understood what was happening. As a fourth-grader in Columbus, Ohio, he wanted to keep up with the other boys who were collecting cigarette packs or beer cans. His parents were against the cigarette packs because they were afraid that they would lead to smoking. They worried less about beer.

“No one in the family smoked,” Rigney said, “but everyone was willing to have a beer or a glass of wine, and so it was socially more acceptable.”

Even today, Rigney is no guzzler. Once he makes an important discovery, he often pours out the beer. “I find it to be pretty fattening,” he said. “Most American beer tastes like garbage.”

Rigney is searching for a metal detector to help sift through garbage. “I love to find cans there, and I’ve never been able to explain why,” he said.

Once, Rigney, who uses maps to find old campgrounds, feared that he and a friend had gone too far when they searched for cans at a backwoods Ohio cabin. “We thought it was deserted, but then this guy and his son show up. The son takes a machete to a tree and tells us to get off his property. We’ve been a lot more careful since then,” he said.

Several years ago, on a trip to Puerto Rico, the Grossblatts ignored casino signs that warned that it was illegal to take chips off the premises. Feigning a stomachache, Gene went to the bathroom and stashed the chips in his pocket. “We felt like we were robbing banks,” said co-conspirator Arlene.

For many collectors, the excitement of the hunt is even more fascinating than the actual discovery.

“I can’t sleep the night before we go to an antique show,” said Mary Walker, who, along with her husband, Ed, has been collecting citrus juice reamers since 1975, when a friend showed them one.

“Most of the time, life is pretty mundane. As adults, very seldom do we get a chance to get excited. Collecting gives you that adventure. It gives you back a part of your youth,” Mary Walker said.

Collectors say it also chips away at your sanity. For more than a decade, the Walkers, of Sherman Oaks, gradually amassed a supply of 2,100 reamers, from Chinese porcelain to American glass to Japanese figurine.

Ed Walker owns two Valley music stores, and Mary operates a business management firm in Beverly Hills. But they still found time to write two books: “Reamers--200 Years” and “More Reamers.” A third book--”Reamers, The Definitive Book”--is scheduled to be published by Muski Publishers in Sherman Oaks next year.

Several years ago, however, the Walkers realized that something strange was happening; the reamers had begun to own them. “Only the bedroom and the two bathrooms,” Ed Walker said, “were not filled with reamers. We had no room for anything else.”

It was time to downsize. Over six months, the Walkers sold 1,800 reamers, pocketing about $50,000, which they promptly used as a down payment for a condominium in Hawaii. (The couple estimate that $30,000 was spent to purchase the reamers.)

“You spend the first half of your life collecting things and the second half trying to get rid of them,” Ed Walker said. “We’ve learned how to control our space.”

Yet, the Walkers don’t stick to their prime obsession. They also collect toy cap guns and salt and pepper shakers.

“I love the guns because they are so illogical,” said Mary Walker, who owns about 150 of them. “Why would anyone make a cap gun like that? But they actually work.”

Some collectors, however, reserve their passion for a single pursuit and wouldn’t dream of selling.

“I’ve thought about selling my collection because I have been broke,” Rigney said. “But I know where I got each can, and how much I went through to get it. It’s a diary, a photographic guide of my life over the last 15 years.”

He proudly points out the McLab’s Premium Eastern, which he pulled out of a dump in a Texas ghost town, the Becker’s Best he found trying to catch a snake in Oak Creek Canyon, Ariz., and the Craig’s Hunt Club, a Canadian brand he discovered when canoeing with his mother. His oldest can is GB Age Dated Beer, made in 1937 by the Grace Bros. brewing company in Santa Rosa.

Each year, Rigney, an assistant manager of a Studio City bookstore, spends about $1,000 on the hobby. He often relies on the generosity of friends to help him empty a six-pack of new cans on the market.

Rose Morgan, a collector of toothbrush holders, also doesn’t hesitate to spend money on her habit. She parted with $350 for one holder, a figure of Popeye with a pipe. “I just had to have it,” said Morgan, of Van Nuys.

It has taken her five years to amass more than 200 holders. A weekend without a visit to an antiques store is rare for the retired elementary schoolteacher.

Like many collectors, Morgan encounters the ridicule of friends or family members who can’t comprehend her fascination. So she has turned elsewhere for support.

“In my will, I’m leaving the toothbrush holders to a good friend in Maryland,” Morgan said. So far, her family hasn’t complained.

The Walkers, however, believe that many people are “closet collectors” who won’t reveal their specific love until they are certain that they won’t be abused. A collector, they say, is anyone who compiles more than three of an item.

“We’ll say something about the reamers and, then, they’ll go on and on about their collection,” Ed Walker said. “Before, they might have been worried about boring you.”

Their hobbies also have a way of bringing husband and wife closer together.

“I thought he was nuts at first,” said Arlene Grossblatt, “but it’s contagious, and I got into it as much as he did. Now it gives me something to do when he gambles, and it gives us something to talk about all the time.”

All together, the Grossblatts have collected more than 10,000 gambling chips, dating back to ivory chips used on the riverboats in the South of the 1850s. They also have samples from the opening night in 1946 of Bugsy Siegel’s Flamingo Hotel in Las Vegas. They trade often with other collectors who belong to the Casino Chip & Gaming Token Collectors Club in Brick, N. J.

Because many casinos have gone out of business, most of the chips they’ve pocketed couldn’t be exchanged for cash. Still, according to books about chips, the Grossblatts estimate that their collection is worth thousands of dollars. They aren’t insured, but they’re not concerned about it because word about what was stolen would spread quickly, preventing anyone from selling the collection.

The Grossblatts, however, worry about the future.

“We don’t know what we’re going to do with our collection,” Arlene Grossblatt said. “Our kids think we’re crazy and have joked about having a junk sale.”

In the meantime, like most collectors, they are more preoccupied with finding the next elusive piece.

For Danny Biederman, that means tracking down the original props used in some of his favorite television spy shows and movies. He would give anything to locate the shoe phone Agent 86 used on “Get Smart.” He has talked to the show’s producers and special effects people, but so far, he’s had no luck.

Biederman became hooked for life when in 1964, at 10, he watched his first episode of NBC-TV’s “Man From U.N.C.L.E.,” which aired from 1964 to 1968. Almost immediately, he graduated to James Bond.

“There were all these beautiful women,” recalled Biederman, who has written magazine stories about the old spy shows, “and I was a little boy who liked to look at girls.”

Over the years, he has gathered hundreds of magazines, original television scripts and enough merchandise to fill a toy store, including a “Wild Wild West” (on CBS-TV from 1965 to 1970) lunch box and a James Bond harpoon gun from 1965’s “Thunderball.” He occasionally hosts film festivals for his friends, showing black-and-white episodes of the shows on his 16-millimeter projector.

He, too, has spent countless thousands on his hobby, which doesn’t always thrill his wife.

“She doesn’t like to own anything,” Biederman said, “and has asked me before if I could move my ‘junk.’ I try not to be defensive.”

Biederman also brags that one of his daughters, at 2, was humming the theme song from “Mission Impossible,” which aired on CBS from 1966 to 1970.

So far, however, she hasn’t asked for a shoe phone.

WHERE AND WHEN

What: Antique Collectible Flea Market.

Location: Los Angeles Equestrian Center, 480 Riverside Drive, Burbank.

Hours: 7 a.m to 3 p.m. the fourth Sunday of the month.

Price: $3 general, free children under 12.

Call: (818) 843-3706.

Free Advice Words to collect by from five local collectors:

Mark Rigney, beer cans: “Hit the local stores and see what they’ve got. Learn who the local collectors are, and don’t get too hung up on money. Collect them for the fun of it.”

Danny Biederman, memorabilia from old television and movie spy heroes: “Start watching all the old spy shows and go from there. Go to swap meets, toy shops, science-fiction conventions and start meeting people.”

Mary Walker, citrus juice reamers: “Do not buy damaged or cracked goods. Don’t buy things that are shipped because if you want to sell it later on, it will be harder. The most important thing is to always buy some things in good condition.”

Arlene Grossblatt, gambling chips: “Start off specializing in a particular area and then extend outward. Focus on Nevada. Join the club to trade with other collectors.”

Rose Morgan, toothbrush holders: “Find other people who enjoy collecting the same thing. That makes it more fun.”

Guidance for Assessing Value

Suddenly, after months of searching every antique store, you spot that perfect something to enhance your collection. But how do you know if it’s the real thing? How can you assess its value or know if you can do better somewhere else?

For each object, there are different rules and sources that can steer you in the right direction. For general information, consult price guides that are available at antique stores and souvenir shops. Many items have specific manuals and guides to help the collector. There are also thousands of clubs for collectors across the country.

For information on the collectibles mentioned in the main story, contact:

* The Beer Can Collectors of America, 747 Merus Court, Fenton, MO 63026, or call (314) 343-6486. They will send information on joining the club.

* Casino Chip & Gaming Token Collectors Club, P.O. Box 63, Brick, N.J. 08723. They will send an application to join the club.

* For citrus juice reamers, write Muski Publishers, 14534 Ventura Blvd., Sherman Oaks 91423. They publish books about reamers.

* For television and movie spy memorabilia, write Toy Scouts--Catalogue of Baby Boom Collectibles, 137 Castertown Ave., Akron, Ohio 44303. They will send their catalogue.