No regrets about parting with doll collection
By Mark Squibb | August 6, 2020
After a lifetime of collecting, Madonna Porter of Conception Bay South has donated her extensive collection of dolls, tea pots, china cups, trinkets, cameras, figurines, and vases.
Porter has given the collection over to the Royal Canadian Legion.
Members of the Legion were on hand at Porter’s Seal Cove home on Saturday, July 11, to pack up the collection and show their appreciation to Porter. The Legion will be auctioning off the collection, which Porter said she has had appraised at about $250,000.
Going on a month later, Porter said she has no regrets.
“I’m happy to have done it and help someone else out,” she said.
Porter has never been one to keep her collection to herself.
In 2009, she approached the town council about getting a permit to open up her collection to the viewing public as a sort of museum or exhibition, but the idea was denied due to safety concerns and liabilities should something go amiss, she said.
Porter has sold pieces over the years to help raise funds for others and has often said she would like to donate the whole collection one day.
She said she’s glad to have the collection put to good use, and was overwhelmed with the media attention the donation received, as reporter after reporter from various St. John’s media outlets descended on her Seal Cove home.
“It was just like a party,” said Porter.