Follow the sign and you may find 'Timmy' from Lassie or The Beav's big brother in addition to antiques.

By Susan McDonald

Pop into an antique emporium in Cambria or Cayucos and you may find more than you bargained for. Chances are you just might bump into someone famous.

"Jonathan Winters comes in all the time," said Sue Patchen, owner of Antiques on Main, an 8,000-square-foot antique mall in Cambria's East Village. "He collects toys. He always buys something."

Recently, the zany comedian bought a toy monkey called "Busy Mike," described by the shop's major dealer Vicki Burton as an antique Japanese-made tin action toy.

"We have lots of return customers," Burton said. "They always say, 'See you next time!' That's really fun."

Other recent celebrity sightings include actress Meg Ryan and a female soap opera star that no one could seem to remember by name.

Rayda Bankhead, a dealer at the large Rich Man, Poor Man antique mall in Cayucos, is related by marriage to Tallulah Bankhead. "My father-in-law was her cousin," the shopkeeper said. But that's not her big celebrity story.

Rich Man, Poor Man is known for a large collection of old kiddie lunchboxes displayed on the second floor. One day while Bankhead was working at the front cashier counter, a man came to her with a Lassie lunchbox he wanted to buy.

"I gave him my Lassie story," she said. " I told him my parents took me out of the movie theater during 'Lassie Come Home,' because I got so hysterical about the bad things happening to Lassie."

Then she said she asked her customer if he had a Lassie story.

"I'm Timmy," he told her, holding up the lunchbox displaying his likeness from about 50 years ago. "I never got a chance to have one of these."

"Now that was something," Bankhead said. "It was really him."

Up the street at the Remember When? antique mall, owner Francine Esposito said actor Pat Morita from Karate Kid fame has been a repeat customer.

And at Ellie's Dream, a small shop in Cambria, actor Tony Dow (the Beaver's older brother Wally) is a frequent shopper. "He comes in often with his wife," said shopkeeper Marcia Smith.

The most exciting celebrity sighting at that shop was a Barbara Streisand drive-by, Smith said. "The store was closed, but the owner saw this big Land Rover pull up, and Barbara Streisand rolled down the window."

The mega-star looked over the shop, but drove off before the owner could open up and invite her in, Smith said. "That was disappointing."

But the biggest and most influential celebrity, all the shopkeepers agreed, is one who has never been near their stores. That would be Martha Stewart.

"A couple of weeks ago, everyone who came in wanted milk glass," said Velda Moore of Rich Man, Poor Man. "I said, 'Oh, Martha must have had this in her magazine.' "

Sue Patchen agreed. "Whatever Martha has in her book or on TV is what everyone wants."

Marcia Smith even tried to lure Martha to Cambria to see the huge assortment of wedding cake toppers at Ellie's Dream. For a quarter-century, the store's owner Judith Larmore has been collecting the bride-and-groom decorations that go on top of wedding cakes. She has more than 400 on display at her tiny shop, with some dating back to the mid-1800s. There are also some rarities from the 1940s with grooms dressed in military uniforms.

"I wrote a letter once to Martha Stewart about this store," Smith said. "I thought she'd love all these cake toppers. She never answered me back."

Maybe next year.

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Susan McDonald is an award-winning journalist who lives in Cambria and likes antiquing.