Man’s Garage Sale Junk Is His Wife’s Treasure

As garage sales go, it was wildly successful. Hundreds of bargain hunters showed up over two consecutive Saturdays at the upscale Tulsa home. Steve Connor happily cleaned out his garage. And he made an impressive $1,000.

So why is Susan Connor so distraught?

“When I walked into the garage and realized what was gone, I started moaning and screaming,” Susan Connor said. “I was devastated.”

Susan Connor’s horror story--which has been very big news in Tulsa--began in June, when she took her two young children to visit family in Richmond, Va.

Steve decided to hold what he promoted as an “Unauthorized Garage Sale” and a “Covert Operation.”

Unbeknown to him, the garage contained boxes of household items that his wife just hadn’t unpacked, and countless sentimental possessions--infant clothes (including first shoes), Madame Alexander dolls and a framed map of the United States, a memento from her late grandfather. Sold--all of it.

When she returned this month, Susan embarked on a marketing campaign. Local television carried stories of her woes, the Tulsa World published a feature, and she went on the radio. The Connors ran a $175 newspaper ad two weeks ago--trumpeting “Husband in the Doghouse”--imploring people to return the items. They offered to pay $3 for every $1 spent.

Susan did get back the framed map, a chair and the dolls, but no baby clothes. “I know people think I’m overreacting,” she said. As for Steve, he declined to comment. “He just wants the whole thing to go away,” his wife said.