Up for bid in Post Falls: 1,000 guns from private collection

If you like guns, welcome to the candy store.

A dizzying display of firepower from Winchester, Remington, Colt, Browning, Glock, Beretta, Ruger, Smith & Wesson and other manufacturers is ready to be auctioned this weekend in Post Falls.

The entire lot of 1,000 rifles, shotguns, pistols and revolvers belongs to one Inland Northwest collector who decided it’s time to thin his cache.

The job fell to Premier Auction Center, a family-owned business that mainly handles estate sales. For the past two weeks the crew there has been preparing for its highest-profile auction yet – a three-day firearms sale starting Friday night.

“I think the turnout is going to be insane,” said Kym Nagel, who runs Premier with her husband and parents on North Pleasant View Road.

Nagel said she knows of people planning to attend from throughout the Northwest and as far as Arizona. Their phone has been ringing constantly since last week with potential bidders wanting to know details, she added.

“The serious gun collector wants to know serial numbers and things like that,” Nagel said.

Inside the building, bolstered now with extra security, table after table is crowded with hunting rifles and handguns. Some are well worn and more than 100 years old. Others are new in the box.

A few of the standouts include Winchester pre-1964 Model 94 carbines, including some old ones sporting saddle rings; SKS Soviet semi-automatic carbines; and Romanian and Yugoslavian AK-47s. A few of the more uncommon handguns include a CAI Russian military pistol, a German-made Mauser C96 pistol known as the “Broomhandle,” and a Smith & Wesson 500, marketed as the world’s most powerful handgun.

“According to the number of dealers we’ve had come in here, he was a very good collector,” Nagel said. “Very good taste as to what he collected. It’s not junk guns.”

The owner wants to remain anonymous, and Nagel has revealed little information about how he amassed the collection and why he is selling it now.

“They needed to raise some funds,” she said, adding that the decision was “bittersweet, I’m sure.”

“Husband and wife both agreed, and here it is,” Nagel said.

Tracy Bennett, a St. John, Washington, resident who was picking up items from a prior auction Tuesday, got a peek inside the armory.

“I’ve been to gun auctions, but not like this,” Bennett said. “This is going to be amazing. This place should be packed.”

A hunter, she plans to be back in town to bid on some rifles that caught her eye.

“Everybody’s talking about it,” Bennett said.

Premier brought in the collection packed inside a 24-foot trailer and has been working long days to unpack, sort and identify each item, which is tagged with the make, model and caliber. Every gun has been entered into the auction house computer system and recorded under Premier’s federal firearms license.

Premier will allow the public to preview the collection at no charge Thursday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.

“I think just for the average person that wants to see this amount of guns in one place at one time, and just drool over them, that’s going to be our crazy day,” Nagel said.

The auction will start at 5 p.m. Friday and continue at 10 a.m. Saturday and 10 a.m. Sunday.

“We’re basically going to go as long as the crowd allows us,” Nagel said. “They’re going to be long days, but we’re going to flow right through it.”