Meet Petaluma Military Antiques and Museum’s new owners

Two new owners, both Sonoma State University students, have stepped up to operate what they believe to be the country’s largest military museum and antique store.

They’re intent on bringing new energy to Petaluma’s Military Antiques and Museum, a venture started 17 years ago by history buff Wally Peterson.

“What we want to do with these items, every chance we get, is to preserve their history,” said Kevin Braafladt, 32, is an Army Reserve Officer and masters degree candidate in history.

His business partner Jason Yarnall, 38, is pursuing a degree in pure mathematics.

Both have worked at the store, Braafladt since it moved to 300 North Petaluma Blvd. 12 years ago. It’s located in the basement of the Petaluma Collective antique store, with 4,000 square feet of retail space and a 2,000-square-foot museum dedicated to Richard A. Penry, Petaluma’s only recipient of the Congessional Medal of Honor.

“Wally wanted to retire,” Braafladt said. “We told him, ‘When you’re done, we want to step up.’ ”

In January, the pair took possession of the inventory - well over 10,000 items, most of which span the time period between the Civil War and World War II.

“Nationwide, there are about a dozen similar to our size,” Yarnall said.

“Typically they’re small, less than 1,000 square feet,” Braafladt added.

“There are bigger ones,” Yarnall said, “but they have a lot of reproductions. We stick with all original pieces.”

Their oldest item is a Model No. 1795 US musket dating to 1826, the first flintlock musket the government produced after the Revolutionary War. It’s priced at $2,500.

Probably the most popular items are U.S. field gear from World War II. Helmets, for example, run between $150 and $200, Braafladt said.

A rarity, Braafladt said, is a World War I Finnish uniform, priced at $3,000, “the first we’ve had.” It’s rare, he explained, because uniforms were considered clothing, especially during the Depression. Further, American troops weren’t stationed in Finland.

The store has many German objects, he said, because GIs brought them home as war souvenirs. Currently they’re researching a box of German medals to weed out any that are fake.

“We don’t want to sell something that’s not original,” Yarnall said.

“But we’re not perfect,” Braafladt added. “If we miss something and someone else finds it’s a repro, we’ll buy it back, no questions asked.”

The new owners estimate that 75 percent of their sales are online, which may be why Petersen and his original partner, the late Charlie Numark, did little advertising.

Braafladt and Yarnell want to maintain a bricks-and-mortar presence and higher local profile. To that end, they are offering school tours and making frequent changes to the museum displays.

“When people come in, they never know what they’re going to see,” Braafladt said. “It’s not stale, it’s a living museum.”

They also contribute items to the Petaluma Museum Association displays and are interested in working with other Sonoma County museums.

They also donate money and Jeep each year for Petaluma’s Veterans Day Parade. “When it comes to Vets Day parades,” they agreed, “Petaluma’s is the best.”

But the most enjoyable part is talking with the interesting people who come in - whether to buy, to sell or merely browse and chat.

Clients are primarily history enthusiasts. The pair also has dealt with the History Channel and a number of movie companies. Actor Will Smith wears World War I aviator goggles from the store in “Men in Black 3,” and producers of the 2012 movie “Red Tails,” about the Tuskegee Airmen, paid them several hundred dollars to rent items from the store.

“They were filming over in the Napa Valley,” Braafladt said. “The main scene was at a camp, soldiers talking about life, and almost all the stuff on the camp table, canteens, cups, cigarette packs, was our stuff or things they reproduced from our originals.”

Of the items they purchase, people bring in about 60 percent, Braafladt said. The rest come from collectors or estates. Many of the items they buy are resold, usually to collectors.

“Our hope is that it won’t end up in a drawer, or the trash.”

When they buy items, he said, “We want the background.” They don’t want the history of the owner to vanish, leaving only a uniform, weapon or medals.

Often the original owner has died.

Pointing to a recently purchased crisp gray American Red Cross uniform, Braafladt said it was brought in by the daughter of the woman who wore it. She told the partners no one in the family was interested in keeping it, adding, “I wanted it to go where it was appreciated.”

It’s likely to become part of a planned display of women in the military, joining a newly purchased Women’s Air Corps uniform and a female Marine Corps.

One seller, the nephew of the items’ owner, wrote up a long biography, Braafladt said. “It makes such a difference. You put a uniform in a museum and people say, ‘Oh, that’s neat.’ But you put in the life history and it makes it far more interesting.

“In our hands, hopefully the story is carried on. We want people to know we’re here to preserve the memories of those who came before us.”

A woman came in some years ago with her great-grandfather’s trench mirror, “a polished piece of metal a soldier shaved with,” Braafladt said. “It had a bullet hole in it. She told us he had been Petaluma’s first World War I casualty.

“I implored her, said it was something the family should keep, but she told me, ‘I sell it here, or it goes in the dumpster.’”

Looking at the items makes people think about the individuals who took part in the events, Yarnell said.

“When we get a box of stuff in, we try to think about what brought this group of things together. Was the owner in the military and slowly collected the items before the family gave away or sold them?

“Was it a collector who scoured the earth for their own reason? Or was it just in the bottom of a box, incongruent with everything else?

“We like to discuss things and try to understand. It’s like sitting in the middle of a dozen mystery stories. None of us were there. We only have our own ideas.”

To learn more, like Military Antiques & Museum on Facebook, call 763-2220, or visit militaryantiquesmuseum.com. Hours are 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Thursday through Sunday, or by appointment.