Jim Durst spies the curious look on his mark's face and quickly works his magic.
He scores a piece of glass with a tool that looks like a can opener. Then he grabs the pane on the cut with the tool's pincer, squeezes gently, and, plink, it comes apart clean.
"That's neat," Donna Roetzer says.
Durst sets the hook.
"Come over here and try it," he says. "You are over 18, aren't you?"
The Spring Hill woman smiles, takes the tool and makes her own score. Plink, and suddenly, like so many before her, she has to have the Amazing Tile and Glass Cutter. $12 later, she does.
"You know what? I have grandchildren who play outside," she says. "Now, if they break a window, I don't have to have someone in and pay them $50."
Similar transactions play out countless times every Monday in a remote stretch of pasture a little more than an hour north of Tampa in rural Sumter County.
That's when a speck of a town called Webster, population 805, swells to 30,000 or more.
The people are here to visit the Sumter County Farmers' Market, better known to outsiders as the Webster Flea Market, and the companion Webster Westside Flea Market next door.
They are here to hunt, hustle and haggle for bargains and oddities in a place that holds plenty of both as part of a tradition dating back nearly seven decades.
Each week, as many as 2,000 dealers make camp here, their wares laid out over 70 acres that unfold like manifest destiny.
December and the weeks before Christmas mark the start of the Webster high season, with stocking-stuffer peddlers and crafts artist adding their loot to the lot.
"Anything you want, you can find it here," said Martha Jackson, of Ocala, who had family visiting from Arkansas, which of course meant a visit to Webster. "Sometimes you find a surprise."
The stroller she pushed down a rutted dirt concourse was overflowing with socks, ornaments and tape.
The surprise: a 10-pound block of cheese her husband, Terry, picked out.
The market's volume is staggering, making it one of the largest such collections in Florida.
Connoisseurs will recognize much of the booty, particularly in the Webster Flea Market on the farmer's market grounds. There's the usual flea market assortment of socks, colognes, perfumes, dishes, videotapes, baseball cards, coins, T-shirts, birds, hunting knives, skillets and sunglasses. But the offerings hardly stop there.
It boasts a cornucopia of fresh produce, much of it grown in Sumter and surrounding counties, in a nod to the market's roots.
And there's also plenty of just plain junk, as even a slick brochure for the market describes it.
There are old traffic signals, gumball machines and wagon wheels.
There's magnetic jewelry, hand-carved wooden fishing lures and postcards from yesteryear Florida.
One stall has birdhouses crafted from twigs and tin containers; another offers little pig planters carved from tree stumps. Every half-baked action figure that never quite took off at the Toys "R' Us can be found at one booth.
And, if you like, you can buy wooden display boxes with glass tops made and sold by Don and Linda Benton, of Tampa, to showcase the junk you've bought.
"It's a variety of everything," said Harrell Gant, manager of the Webster Flea Market. "I don't think there's anything in this market we don't have."
The market was founded in 1937 as a place for local farmers to sell their livestock on Fridays.
Cattle sales continue there today through the nonprofit farmers' cooperative that runs it. About 49,000 head were sold last year, Gant said.
The flea market began as a natural outgrowth of the cattle operation. It was more of a chance for farmers to sell and trade unneeded barnyard equipment, known as the miscellaneous auction.
In the early 1950s, Harry "Wimpy" Simonecht and a few other men began auctioning furniture along with produce during sales that had moved to Tuesdays. Simonecht added to the excitement by offering airplane rides, according to a history of the farmer's market, Born of Necessity by William Carlisle.
By the 1970s, people began referring to the farmer's market as a flea market. It had moved to Mondays and diversified its offerings.
Other flea markets would follow to capitalize on the traffic, most notably Westside, which many visitors don't realize is a separate, privately owned market. Only the narrow NW Third Street separates them.
Westside takes junk to the next level.
In fact, you might think of the companion market as the Wild West. There's no telling what you'll find in it.
Trailers haul in metal works, antique furniture, dolls, glassware and deer heads.
For $295, there's a wrought-iron bear trap that weighs about as much as a bear. Unlike the main market, guns are sold, as well.
James Cooper and his wife, Jane, of Bushnell, offer an array of antique farm equipment, including a rope maker and a tobacco shredder, the latter patented in 1868.
"If it catches the eye, they buy it," James Cooper said.
William Kane, of Bushnell, visits regularly. He's looking mainly for the doors of old post-office boxes. He found three on a recent Monday, though only one in good enough condition for his purposes. Kane attaches them to distinct wooden boxes he makes and gives them to his grandchildren as banks.
"It's something different," he said.
Calls of "I'll give that to you for $10" and the corresponding "Will you take $8 for it?" are heard over and again, though the amounts differ. The regular sellers offer long-honed sales pitches.
John Warnken, all 260 pounds of him, stands atop a bench made from Cypress Twigs hauled in from the St. Johns River basin, extolling the virtues of the Florida-grown wood. It looks brittle, but nary a creak can be heard as he bounces on top of it.
"This stuff is as sturdy as it comes," he said. "It's hard to hurt it."
Warnken said he likes the Webster market because people come with money and a willingness to part with it. His business partner, Jenny Ivie, said it's not a bad place to spend a sunny day, either.
Clearly, many Webster patrons aren't shopping as much as they are browsing. They're just looking at the stuff arrayed about them - and the people, too.
"I've told him that going to Webster is like going to the circus," Ivie said. "You just don't have the clowns and the trapeze artists."
Many of the visitors are retirees who drive in for the sale day, from as far away as North Carolina.
They're looking for memories as well as bargains.
People come in tank tops or flannel shirts, boots or pumps. They have faded tattoos or faded dye-jobs. Their variety is as rich as the merchandise around them.
"A lot of people come here without a dime in their pocket, believe me," said Bob Nicholson, of New Port Richey, who with his wife, Debra, sells glassware finds from yard and estate sales. "But they're friendly and nice, so I guess that's all right."
Some come for the tales, some of them undoubtedly tall, that get spun around the bargaining table.
Gene Dwyer, of New Port Richey, holds court in the open field at Westside, where he sells jewelry. Big men with big hands always are stopping by his table, betting him his ring sizer can't accommodate their stubby fingers.
They're always wrong, except this one time. A stocky guy - had to weigh 350 pounds, but wasn't fat - walked up and pulled a ring from his finger that might better be described as a bracelet. Dwyer put it on the ring sizing stick. It fell the length of it, over the handle and onto the table.
"His hands were like meat hooks," Dwyer said. "His fingers were so large he couldn't close his hands."
He could only guess the ring size: 22.
For all this, the admission is free. There is parking on the grounds for free, as well, though it usually fills up. Nearby parking typically runs $2.
Bargain hunters start showing up as early as 6 a.m. for the finds, so it's best to get there not too long after daybreak. Many of the vendors start packing up not long after noon.
Truth is, shoppers need to arrive early if they hope to come close to seeing everything. Even then, they'll probably miss something.
"You'll see people who come two, three weeks in a row because they can't see it all," said Dottie Rousch, manager of the Webster Westside Flea Market.
- Times researcher John Martin contributed to this report.
If you go
The Webster Flea Market opens at 6:30 a.m. Webster Westside Flea Market opens at 6 a.m. From Tampa, drive north on Interstate 275, then Interstate 75. Exit at State Road 50 and go right (east) to State Road 471. Turn left (north) on SR 471. The flea market entrance will be on the left.
