Ep. 637 - Live Auction: INTO THE VAULT 2024

ENTER THE VAULT! <- click there

Are you ready to uncover the next hidden gem in the DU Vault? Ducks Unlimited presents the largest auction of the year, Into The Vault, which is proudly presented by Dive Bomb Industries.

With over 600 items spanning more than 20 categories, you have an extraordinary chance to claim rare and exclusive treasures, from unique, one-of-a-kind firearms to remarkable prints and never-before-seen relics. Bidding opens November 25—mark your calendar now!

Don’t miss your chance to own a piece of history—your next great find is just a bid away!

Listen now: www.ducks.org/DUPodcast
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Creators & Guests

Host

Matt Harrison

DUPodcast Outdoor Host

What is Ducks Unlimited Podcast?

Ducks Unlimited Podcast is a constant discussion of all things waterfowl; from in-depth hunting tips and tactics, to waterfowl biology, research, science, and habitat updates. The DU Podcast is the go-to resource for waterfowl hunters and conservationists. Ducks Unlimited is the world's leader in wetlands conservation.

Matt Harrison: On today's episode of the Ducks Unlimited podcast, we have special guest David Schussler, Chief Event Fundraising Officer here at Ducks Unlimited. And David is over into the vault and he explains what Into the Vault is. He explains some of the items that they're going to be auctioning off, but he also goes into detail of some of the really cool items that he has seen over the years and also some of the strange items. Stick around to hear about some of the really cool things and some of the history behind Into the Vault.

Matt Harrison: Hey everyone, welcome back to the Ducks Unlimited podcast. I'm your host, Matt Harrison, and today we have with us Mr. David Schussler, Chief of Event Fundraising. And Mr. David is going to be giving us some really cool information here in just a little bit. But before we dive off into that, if you don't mind just giving us a little background of kind of how long you've been with DU and kind of all the many hats you wear, because you do a lot for us here at Ducks Unlimited. So give our listeners a little background of David Schussler. I've worn a lot of hats.

David Schuessler: I just celebrated my 25th anniversary as staff with Ducks Unlimited. Was a volunteer before that. Started as a regional director in North Carolina. I think I did that for about five years. I moved to Texas and was a director of fundraising out there, worked in the states of Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and New Mexico. Wow. Then I did a two-year marketing sabbatical here. I think it was about two years, a year and a half. Jumped back into events, was a director of fundraising in Ohio, Michigan. and Indiana, and then I was a Director of Fundraising from New Mexico to Alabama, North to Kansas, and then National Director of Event Fundraising, and now this. I've been around. I'm an old lion.

Matt Harrison: I think it'd be easier to name the states you haven't worked in than you have. Well, the whole topic of this podcast is going to be something that you had a big part in of starting here at Ducks Unlimited, and that is something called Into the Vault. And it is something that is newer around here. It hasn't been around just extremely, extremely long. But will you give our listeners a background of how Into the Vault got started, what all the logistics was behind the scenes of getting that up and going, and why we do that now at Ducks Unlimited?

David Schuessler: Yeah, so Into the Vault's five years old. It's our national online auction and truly was born out of the depths of COVID and almost by duress in the summer of 2020, right after everything had hit and we were all staying at home and you had to have a note from your doctor to leave your house. We had a lot of inventory up here because we weren't able to hold any events. And Adam Putnam, our CEO, and I snuck in to the office one day when nobody was supposed to be here. And we were walking through the warehouse just taking a look at everything that we needed to sell that we weren't able to sell because of our events not being able to happen. And we had started our online event business at that point. And we're really getting our legs up under us for that. But as we walked around, Adam was looking, and he was relatively new at the time, and was pointing and said, well, what's that? Well, that's our gun cage with 3,500 firearms that I need to be moving through events right now. What's that? Well, that's all of our decoys. And he pointed to some old dusty boxes way up high, and he said, what's that? And I said, that is all of the donated items that have come in from donors or estate gifts that have come in. And about every three or four years, we go through this stuff, and we try to figure out what we're going to do with it. Some of it goes into the museum. Some of it we'll try to send out to chapters. And he looked at me, and he said, sell it. Wow. And I said, okay. And so two more staff and myself started sneaking in the next day for the rest of the summer, working out in the warehouse six feet apart. We didn't want to catch COVID. And we went through all this stuff and realized that we really had just this treasure trove of not only vintage Ducks Unlimited, merchandise, but just waterfowl hunting and the waterfowl lifestyle type merchandise. And we came up with the end of the vault concept, decided to hold it around Thanksgiving that year, hoping that it might assist folks in purchasing Christmas presents for those hard to buy for family members and friends and loved ones. And it really hit. In fact, we broke a record the first year for the largest auction that we've ever held. The first year, it was the biggest auction we had ever held. And every year since, it's grown. So every year, we break a record with it. Now, our National Trip Auction, which was a spinoff of Into the Vault that was in its second or third year this year, fights for that title. In fact, I think the National Trip Auction that we held this past August might have beaten it. But we're gonna see what this one does. It's a great sale and it's just really a lot of fun because of all the vintage and antique items that we're able to kind of bring back in front of people to take a look at.

Matt Harrison: Be completely honest, whenever you and Adam were walking through the cages and y'all had this idea come about, did you see it taken off like it has? Because I mean now it is something, like you said, it fights hand-in-hand for the most money raised.

David Schuessler: We knew that first year it would be fun. We knew we could raise some money with it. We had no idea that there was such a segment of our supporters out there that still had an interest in some of this older merchandise, and especially our collectible firearms, which is a great story in itself. But this year, and I'll just go ahead and I'm going to bury the lead here. We've had 51 guns of the year. 46 of them will be sold in this year's End of the Vault. Are you serious? 46 of the 51? 46 of the 51 guns of the year. We almost have a full collection of guns. Now these are all individually that they'll be sold, but we almost have a full collection.

Matt Harrison: Now were a lot of those guns donated?

David Schuessler: Almost all of them came in either as donations from in-estate gifts or just supporters wanting to donate them back, or they were donated to local chapters and the chapters sent them in so we could sell it for them. This started as a This started as an opportunity for us to move merchandise that we were sitting on, for lack of a better word here, and it's really morphed into a very large consignment sale for our 2,400 chapters around the country. That's unbelievable. You know, you get a 1978 Shotgun of the Year donated to your local chapter, you can certainly sell it at your event in front of 200 people. or you can send it to End of the Vault and we'll sell it in front of 200,000 people and whatever it sells for, that chapter retains the credit for their awards and bragging rights with their neighbors and all of that.

Matt Harrison: Wow. And now this is open to the public, right? Open to the public. So anybody can go and bid on a… been on a firearm or items.

David Schuessler: All they have to do is register when they come to the site before they start placing bids.

Matt Harrison: Wow. And they have a chance this year at 46 of the 51 guns a year. Cause I know a lot of people that, man, you mentioned gun of the year and they're like, where can I buy it?

David Schuessler: You know what I mean? There's not many places. There's not. Yeah. There's not many. We don't, you know, that, that program started in 1973. We don't have a seven. I'm trying to think of all the ones we don't have in there. We don't have a 73 or a 74. Those are kind of the hardest because only 500 were made of each. Wow. We have the retail version that Remington put out those years in this sale, but we don't have a true gun of the year. Um, there's those, and I think one from the nineties, one from the eighties that are, that are missing, but it's close. If somebody wanted to have almost a full collection, theoretically, they could get on here and this is where, if you ever want to start your Ducks Unlimited Gun of the Year collection, this is the sale for you. Wow.

Matt Harrison: Now, would you say firearms are the number one seller for the Into the Vault? Would you say that's the main focus or would you say memorabilia or other things outside of firearms?

David Schuessler: I think just because of their cost, they probably, year to year, bring the most revenue through the sale, but If I had to guess, I think people come for the firearms, they come for the collectibles, but once they're in there, they might see a piece of original art, or an old federal stamp and print, or a first estate stamp and print, and there's just so much in there that it takes a while to peruse it all and take it all in, which is why we have continued to start this thing the Monday before Thanksgiving and then run it for about 12 days to give people that Thanksgiving break to be able to go and get in there and take a look at everything.

Matt Harrison: It's truly unbelievable at some of the items too. I think it was my first year at Ducks Unlimited. Y'all were moved, somebody was moving some of the items or something's outside the office and I was, somebody was with me and we were just looking through them and it was like Michael Jordan sign things you're talking about. I mean it was some of the coolest items. It's not just, you know, not just waterfowl related. Now there's a lot of DU things but there's also, I mean, all kinds of different items that are being auctioned off. It's unbelievable.

David Schuessler: There's jewelry and watches and We have a section for knives. Of course, the collectibles have a high, high interest from the folks that come in. And those are both Ducks Unlimited collectibles and just collectibles in general. From an artwork perspective, oftentimes we have enough artwork from a a particular artist that we can run a whole section just on that artist.

Matt Harrison: Oh wow.

David Schuessler: Like Terry Redlin this year we have over 30 Terry Redlin prints. Wow. In a section that's dedicated just to his work. So it's really neat. It's a lot of fun for me It's like Christmas day when this stuff comes in throughout the year. We have dedicated staff, two dedicated staff, Julie Sanderson and Jessica LaPearl, who literally take 12 months to put this sale together. And something will come in and they will know that it's of high interest and will come to my office and say, we've got something to look at. And then, you know, you'll go and you'll walk over and look at it. It's like Christmas day.

Matt Harrison: Wow. And now you've hit on it just a little bit, but if you can go into a little bit more detail on how Ducks Unlimited collects some of these items. You said, you know, some just donate, you say some it's estate, some people, you know, just straight up give it to their local chapter, whatever it is. Right. So, what would you say the majority of the way we receive these collectible items, how do we receive those?

David Schuessler: Today, it's coming in from the chapters. Really? Yeah, I bet 65 to 70 percent of the items in this year's sale came to us from a chapter.

Matt Harrison: And that's all donated, correct?

David Schuessler: And that would have been donated to them. Now, there might be some chapters that are sourcing some of the old hard-to-find guns of the year and investing in that and then, you know, recouping that investment through the sale, but the majority is just being donated to their chapters. Right now in our country, and some people might have heard this we have the biggest transfer of wealth that's ever going to happen in the history of our country with that boomer generation going on to other places whether that's great beyond, the great hunting blind beyond, or moving, downsizing into smaller homes or into assisted living facilities. And that generation collected big time. And so I can say that we see this not necessarily from a financial transfer of wealth, but just what they owned. And so many of So many of these boxes that are coming in from our chapters are old so-and-so sold their big house and they're moving into a townhouse and just decided that they didn't need this stuff and so they gave it to the local chapter. most of our chapters understand the opportunity, they just send it straight on to here. And some of this stuff is, it's shocking of what people don't want to take to a smaller home with them, or can't take to an assisted living facility, and maybe what their kids don't want, but as I start to actually experience these things myself with my father, I get it. You know, it's like, I don't need any more DU artwork at my house. What am I going to do with these 12 prints? A couple of years ago, I took all of my dad's as he transitioned into a smaller home. I gave them to End of the Vault because I wanted DU to raise money with. Yeah. I might have kept one.

Matt Harrison: Maybe one or two.

Matt Harrison: What would you say one of the most valuable items has ever been given to Ducks Unlimited? Ooh, for this sale? Let's go every year, that's since. You said it's been five years now?

David Schuessler: Yeah, I would say the most Ducks Unlimited as a whole was, well, I can tell you that just from a pure resale, because I was at it at the 75th Houston gala 75th du 75th anniversary houston gala in 2012 a weekend for five couples at pecan island was donated and sold for a hundred thousand dollars

Matt Harrison: Are you serious?

David Schuessler: And the donor was there and turned around and did a second one. So, that's the most expensive item ever sold at an auction was that. If you look at it from an appraised value, there was a Ward Brothers Canada Goose decoy that we sold for $65,000 the last time our national convention was in Baltimore. That would probably be that item. Yeah. As far as into the vault, we sold a David Moss original two years ago for $27,500. So that would, if I look at all five vaults, that David Moss original, which had two people that really wanted it, because I've sold probably six or seven Moss originals through the years. That one by far brought the most. And so that's what it's worth right now. It was one of a kind. It was an original. So that's probably, of all five of them, that would be the most expensive. This year is probably the 1928 Parker, which is a Packmeyer Invincible. Now let me explain this, because everybody needs to go and look at this firearm. So most people are familiar with Parker firearms, right? In the 80s, Frank Pachmeier, and most people are familiar with the name Pachmeier from Pachmeier grips and pads. Up until the time that Packmeyer kind of went into that, into the pads and grips part of the firearms, he had gun shops, basically, but they were shops that took existing firearms and upgraded them. Wow. And the big one was out in California, and Packmeyer took these Parkers. I don't know how, we can't figure out how many he did. But he took these Parkers and then he had his engravers just completely redo them. And he was trying to mimic the three original Invincibles that were done by Packmeyer. There were only three Packmeyer Invincibles that came out of their shop. Only three? Only three. They were the NRA at their museum. But Frank Packmeyer did the Packmeyer Invincible, and he would have these, just this amazing work done on it. And in the 1980s, he donated some to Ducks Unlimited for use inside of our event system. I don't know how many he donated. I cannot find it anywhere in our records, but you can find a little bit about it online. Well, We have one of them, and it was Christmas Day, like when they said, come see, they know, oh my gosh, it was Christmas Day. So I start looking at it, and I start researching it, and I go, I wonder if this is one of the ones that Angelo B., who was one of the best known engravers ever, came out of Italy, Frank Packmeyer sponsored him and brought him to the U.S. to come over here and start his own engraving business. And so I got on the phone with Angelo B's son, Send him the images. He showed him to Angelo. Angelo said, that is one of the guns that I did. So there's a letter of authenticity coming from Angelo to go with this firearm. But it is absolutely shocking what this thing looks like. So for this year, that's probably the highest valued item we have in there.

Matt Harrison: Do you have a number in your mind you think it'll go for? I do.

David Schuessler: I'm not going to share it. I don't want to share it, but I do have a number in my mind of where I think it'll land. Wow. I will share that the starting bid is $12,500. Actually, it might be higher than that. I think it might be 17 now that I think about it. And at that price, it's a deal. Absolutely. At 17, it's a deal.

Matt Harrison: And it's coming with authentication.

David Schuessler: That's right. I will tell you that nobody knew Angelo B. had engraved this firearm until I reached out to Angelo's son. So it brought additional value when we realized it was an Angelo B. engraved gun. Wow.

Matt Harrison: Got to be interesting to see. Now, Into the Vault is sponsored, correct?

David Schuessler: Yeah, Dive Bomb Industries wanted to get involved with us in a way that, of course, would help something that we're doing inside of the event system. And just in talking with them at our collegiate third term symposium this past summer, you know, they said, where could you need some help? And I told them, I need help shipping with Into the Vault because something about this sale that you don't see with eBay or when you go to some of the firearm sites or some of the decoy sites, we don't charge bidder premiums and we don't charge shipping. So whatever you pay is what you pay. We cover all of the shipping, and because we're running it ourselves, there is no third-party buyer's premium on it. And I said, you know, this thing continues to grow. We get more and more eyes on it. We sell more and more every year, but our shipping prices are going through the roof, just like they are with everybody. And I said, I really would love for y'all to sponsor this. So we can continue to offer no shipping to our buyers and they were all in. I mean it took them like three seconds to say yeah we're in. So they are the sponsor of this and everybody needs to thank Divebomb because there are no shipping And some of this stuff is very expensive to ship. We insure it. The firearms all go air. We don't send any firearms freight just because that's safer for the item. a great partnership in what they've done because it allows us to continue to keep our prices down and not have those add-ons that none of us like to get hit with after we're excited about buying something on auction.

Matt Harrison: All thanks to DiveBomb. All thanks to DiveBomb, yeah. That's huge, that's huge. And now, something's different this year than last year, right? Is there a difference in Into the Vault this year from last year?

David Schuessler: We have started a new program inside of it, which is a Buy It Now program. So, this is not for, obviously, one-of-a-kind items, because any buy-it-now item you have to have multiples of. But, it's the end of the calendar year, and while we do a very good job of managing that inventory that we sell in our events down to, dwindle it down to nothing at the end of the year, We do have about 15 to 20 items that we're going to have some leftover stock on. And they're very popular items. It's not that these were duds or anything. And we're going to offer a buy it now on these. So you're not bidding in an auction. If you go to the buy it now section, you can go and if you like that decoy, you can buy it. You can buy it and we'll ship it out the next day. And there's some really good Christmas shopping in there. Both kids stuff as well as some things some adults would enjoy, decoys, homeware. So that's new and we're hopeful that it's going to be a great addition for people that do want a Christmas shop and want to go ahead and get it over with the first time they go to the site.

Matt Harrison: Wow. And now, that'll be available at the same time all the bidding items will be available.

David Schuessler: That's exactly right. There's a drop-down. I mean, you can view them all, or there's drop-downs where you can go to the different sites, whether it be original artwork, firearms, decoys. One of them's called Buy It Now. And the price you see is the price when you hit the button, you're going to pay for it. We get a printout here in the warehouse, and we ship it that day. Wow.

Matt Harrison: Roughly, each year, how many items are shipped? And I know you said each year it's gone up, items sold.

David Schuessler: Somewhere between 500 and 600 items. Wow. And we ship them all inside of four days. Every item? Everything that we're selling is boxed up ready to be shipped right now. So they bring it in, they catalog it, inventory it, take a picture of it, clean it up if need be. Some of these old prints might be dusty. We go ahead and clean it. Take a picture of it, put it in, mark it, put it in a box and mark that box with our, you know, the number system that we use, and then we put it in the warehouse ready to go. And in four days it's shipped. And then the sale will end Saturday night, December the 7th, and then by the 12th everything will be out. Wow. We have about 20 to 30 people that work on shipping. We bring them in from all over the event division, and they're in the back matching up mailing labels with boxes because we know- That's a quick turnaround. It is, but we know that a lot of these, so much of what's sold on this sale is Christmas, and we want to go ahead and get those to people. Wow. And there is a way when you sign out to get FedEx notifications of when your stuff ships and where it is as well. Wow.

Matt Harrison: How cool is that? Very cool. Well, with all these items, you've seen some cool ones, you've seen some strange ones, you've seen a bunch. What would you say the coolest item is that you've ever came across in your five years of doing this?

David Schuessler: So, most people are familiar with the federal duck stamp that is called King Buck. It's the only one that's ever had a dog that has been the federal duck stamp. Mainer Greece did it I believe in 1969 was the year or 59. So a huge estate gift came in from Nebraska two or three years ago and the family The kids had gone through everything, and this is what was left. And so we're going through it. It took us about three days to go through everything. They brought it to Memphis. I remember it was hot. We were having to go out and unload these things off of box trucks. But we started going through it, and this family had been very, very close with Maynard Reese, the artist. So we had a lot of Maynard Reese artwork. that came in, and one of the things interesting about King Buck is the way the federal duck stamp used to work is the artist sold the prints, right? So the federal government sold the stamps, and you had to have one to hunt. But the artist would issue the prints, and they would do a first edition, and if that sold out, they would do a second edition, then a third edition. Well, King Buck was so popular that I think Reese did four editions, if I'm not mistaken, and then he did a colorized version. So he took His King Buck, and he sat down with pencils, and he colored 50 of them. Now, we had sold one of those the year before, okay? And that's a rarity. It was a one of 50. So we're going through this estate gift, and I pull out something that looks like King Buck, but it's a chocolate lab. It's not a black lab. And I'm looking and I'm going, this is interesting. And the family's attorney had come with the gift. None of the family was there. But our regional director, Steve Wilson in Nebraska, had been there when they boxed everything up. So I'm sitting here looking at it. I'm trying to figure out what's going on. Steve and the attorney walk over and they said, you know what that is. And I'm like, well, it's King Buck. It's a colorized version of King Buck, but he's brown. And they said Maynard did that for the family. They had a chocolate lab that had been the family pet and the hunting dog and Maynard later in life did a colorized version of King Buck as the Chocolate Lab. No way. And so I asked Steve Wilson, the regional director, I said, how did they not want this? And he said, well, the daughter procures artwork for the Smithsonian, right? So they've got a lot of nice artwork, right? And when Steve asked her about this, she said, oh, Maynard could never do dogeyes right. Are you serious? Now that's the story. That's the story I was told. Wow. But to me that's probably I mean, it's a one of one. No doubt. But just the provenance of how that got to us is really cool. The story behind it. Yeah, it's just really, really cool. And that was auctioned off?

Matt Harrison: I think two years ago we did that.

David Schuessler: Two years ago. Yeah. Now, we have some mysteries that show up from time to time, and they're DU mysteries, and we have one this year I cannot figure out. I call it the freak. It is the freak. So this year, we have a firearm. It's a Smith & Wesson 3000 shotgun. Have you ever heard of a Smith & Wesson?

Matt Harrison: A Smith & Wesson 3000?

David Schuessler: It's called a Smith & Wesson 3000. And this gun was donated through an estate gift. And when they opened it up, they called me back. They said, David, we've got something. We can't figure out what it is. And so I walk back there, and I'm looking at this firearm. And I said, well, it's the Coastal. Well, back in the 80s, 81, 82, 83, 84, we ran a series of four shotguns of the year And one was called the Coastal, one was called the Chesapeake, one was called the Plains, and one was called the River. And they were done to, I guess, pay homage to certain parts of the country where waterfowl hunting. Right. So, this gun looked just like the Coastal. It had the same medallion. It had the same look. It looked just like the Coastal from 1984, but the Coastal was a Browning BPS. So I'm looking at this gun, and I pick it up. I've never seen a Smith & Wesson 3000. Only one I've ever seen. And I notice that it has a deer… Its barrel is for slugs. It has a deer hunting barrel on it. And the serial number is D-U-X-X-X-X. It was a DU serial numbered gun. So it was a… So it was a DU serial numbered gun that mimicked the Coastal that had a deer hunting barrel on it, a slug barrel. So here's all I can figure. And I say this… I've written this in the description. All we can figure is, We put our shotguns of the year. kind of out to bid, right? And if somebody wants to send in something, now we do it at SHOT Show, but back then, if somebody wanted to send something in and said, this is what it would look like if we did it, all we can figure is Smith and Wesson entered that gun in the selection, they had to put a serial number on it, so they put the X's, and they probably pulled the base gun off of the line, and they were probably running deer guns that day. So they, again, this is what we figure. They pull it, they put the coastal and everything down to the specs that we wanted to see it look like. They send it in. We say, no, we're going to go with the BPS. We send it back to them and somehow it gets out into the general public.

Matt Harrison: No way. Will there be a way to ask Smith & Wesson, you think? We've tried.

David Schuessler: Nobody knows anything about it. Literally the mystery. It's a mystery, but I think that probably is what happened. Yeah. Because the fact that it has a DU serial number, they- And hex, hex, hex. It didn't have- Yeah, like, I think this was a- A run. Yeah, this was a prototype. But the prototype got back out into the general public and came in through an estate gift. And that one's available this year? Yeah, I call it the freak.

Matt Harrison: The DU freak. That is- Somebody's gonna have a really cool item.

David Schuessler: And then- This next one isn't a freak, but it's pretty cool. We have a new in the box, never taken out except to take a picture of it. Original Super Black Eagle, not an H&K. I will say it's not an H&K, but it was from 1998 and right when Benelli USA, when they went from H&K to, they set up Benelli USA, they had a program through our events, and I was an RD then, so I can tell you this story. I know this one's factual. When they started importing, for the first little bit, all the Super Black Eagle Ones for that year came through DU events. And it's Ducks Unlimited stamped. Are you serious? So, it's a DU Super Black Eagle I, new in the box. And for those who know what that means, there's something special about the original Super Black Eagle I. Wow.

Matt Harrison: And it's new in the box. I might have to go bid on that one. Wow. New in the box.

David Schuessler: Yeah, so that one's really neat. And, um, just came in.

Matt Harrison: And I wonder, I mean, we're just five years into this. I wonder, you know, another 10, 15 years what these items are gonna, that you're gonna see.

David Schuessler: I think it's gonna be more and more of this because you have that transfer of wealth and a lot of people want this stuff to find its way back to DU. And I don't know how many donors I've talked to that have said, I want to give it back because I want it to make money again. Right? Like DU was able to raise revenue off of me that went into your mission. I'm done with it. You know, I've looked at this art for 25 years. It's time for somebody else to go and hang it on their wall.

Matt Harrison: It'd be cool too to see in the long run if there's ever any items that you auction off that you'll get back. That would be deep. That'd be cool. That'd be neat. Yeah. Alright, so we've heard the coolest, and we did hear the freak, which is strange, but is there any other item that you would say was just extremely strange that you just- Yeah, a full collection of Star Wars figurines from the 70s.

David Schuessler: Really? I mean, in a lot of times when this- When these estate gifts come in, they'll just, they're gonna send it all. You know, I sold an autographed Don Knotts Barney Fife headshot. I think we ended up selling that for $175 last year. Wow. And we have stuff like that all the time. Yeah, all the time. A real interesting one, and you wouldn't know it unless you know anything about knives. There is a steak knife set and a carving set that goes with it by Randall Made Knives out of Florida, which is a pretty well-known knife maker. In fact, it's so well-known, if you go online to buy this set, it states, you will pay us and wait six years. Six years? Six years for us to build your set. That's how backed up they are at Randall. And so, it was an estate gift, and it came in with it. It's staghorns, and then, you know, Randall's high-quality metal, and it came in, and so we're selling it. And they take six years. If you were to order one off of their site, it takes six years to get it. That is unbelievable. So, it's, you know, things like that. And that's why we want people, we want to give people time to go and look, because it's just really cool stuff in there like that. And that's just, you know, that's just in the knife section.

Matt Harrison: If you could take one item home, what would it be? Would it be that Super Black Eagle I?

David Schuessler: I have one. I have an H&K Super Black Eagle I. Thanks to my father-in-law. Thank you, Matt Carson, wherever you are. I love the Parker. I'd never shoot it. It would sit in a safe and I'd never see it. The 3000. I… I think it would probably be one of the Jim Killen original pieces of art. You know, and Jim passed this past summer. He was such a wonderful donor to DU as well as to other groups and everything that he did sharing his… just sharing his passion and his talent. We have two Jim Killen originals. If I had, if I could just take one thing out of the sale, I'd take one of those originals and put it somewhere in my home where I could see it every day. Where I could wake up and drink coffee and see it every day. Yeah. Yeah. So, that's, that's, that's probably what I would choose. That's cool. This year.

Matt Harrison: That's awesome. Okay, well tell our listeners where they can go and find

David Schuessler: Okay, well, starting November 25th, Monday the 25th, which is right here, it goes live. But if you want a sneak peek, you can go and look at everything. You can't bid until it goes live on the 25th. You can go to intothevault.org and go take a sneak peek that'll stay open I think all the way up until the time that it goes live goes live on the 25th of November closes Saturday night December 7th and if you're going to be hunting that afternoon and on the road don't worry we have a proxy bid system inside of it so you can go and set whatever you want your maximum bid to be and it will only increase you if somebody outbids you and again guaranteed shipping by the end of the day on the 12th. You can't beat that.

Matt Harrison: Can't beat it. Can't beat it. Well, David, thank you so much for taking time to explain to our listeners what Into the Vault is and all the cool aspects of it. It's really cool just to hear. I mean, I didn't even know all that intel on it. So, I'm excited to see all these items auctioned off this year because I know there's going to be a lot of happy people out there getting some gifts around Christmas. Yep, I hope so. So, thank you so much again, David. We also want to thank our podcast producer, Mr. Chris Isaac, and we want to thank our Ducks Unlimited podcast listeners. Thank you all so much and God bless.