Samuel Pennington; founded antiques digest

Samuel Pennington III founded Maine Antique Digest with his wife, Sally, after he retired from the Air Force. The two published the digest from their hometown of Waldoboro, Maine. (globe file/2001)

WALDOBORO, Maine - Samuel Pennington III, a retired Air Force major who launched Maine Antique Digest from his kitchen table and developed it into a definitive source of information for dealers across the country, has died at the age of 78.

In 1973 Mr. Pennington and his wife, Sally, wrote the 28-page first issue on a typewriter and distributed it to five people. It now averages more than 250 pages and is distributed nationally to about 20,000 subscribers.

Mr. Pennington, who died Feb. 2 at Miles Memorial Hospital in Damariscotta, was the driving force behind the magazine's success, his wife said.

"He talked and I typed," Sally Pennington said. "We knew nothing about making a newspaper, but we thought, 'Why not?' "

Mr. Pennington was born in Baltimore and joined the Air Force after graduating from Johns Hopkins University.

While stationed at Dow Air Force Base in Bangor in the 1960s, he and his wife ran an antiques shop on the side, but grew frustrated when they couldn't find reliable information about the early American furniture pieces they were buying and selling.

After he retired from the military, they published the Waldoboro Weekly for a short time before launching Maine Antique Digest.

For years, Mr. Pennington searched antique shops and attended auctions throughout New England, writing about items that were for sale and how much dealers paid for them.

"Some dealers didn't like that because they couldn't jack up their prices," his wife said. "But the readers liked it."

Mr. Pennington immediately set himself apart by writing tough stories about the underside of the business, including dealers who misrepresented reproductions as originals.

In the clubby world of antiques dealers, Mr. Pennington's insistence on naming names was revolutionary. "It set us apart, and earned us some pretty instant respect," Mr. Pennington told The Boston Globe in 2001. "After all, this was a business where even printing auction prices was controversial."

Competing against glossy antique quarterlies and bimonthlies, Mr. Pennington credited the black-and-white Digest's staying power to its approach to delivering facts. "What we provide is information, and we make it easy to find. For us, that's what sells," he said.

Mr. Pennington served on the local school board for many years, cohosted a weekly community television show, and was active in the Democratic Party.

He leaves his wife of 49 years and five children, two of whom work for Maine Antique Digest.

A memorial service will be held this spring.