Wichita store celebrates 60 years of surprise walk-ins. Stuffed squirrel, anyone?

Lots of people ask James Stewart if running his Money Town Pawn Shop is anything like what they’ve seen on “Pawn Stars.”

There’s one big similarity between his 60-year-old shop near Pawnee and Oliver and the popular TV show set in Las Vegas:

“You never know what is gonna come through that door,” as the show’s star, Rick Harrison, says in the opening credits.

“That is a true statement in this business,” Stewart said.

It could be a stuffed squirrel, a mink coat or someone who wants to take a loan out on a cemetery plot.

Once, it was $12,000 worth of dental equipment that was good for only one particular procedure, and Stewart said he couldn’t take it because he couldn’t imagine anyone ever buying it.

Whatever the items, he said, “It definitely makes this business interesting.”

Stewart, who has been at the store for 30 years, said he can be at a dinner party with a variety of people in all kinds of different professions, and “most of them, all they want to do is talk about the pawn business.”

He gets questions like, “What kinds of diamonds do you have?”

“Do you have a table saw?”

“How about guns?”

“In 30 years,” he said, “it’s been a lot.”

A Wichita businessman named Jimmie Ellis started Money Town at 31st and Oliver in 1966, and his son, Barry, eventually took it over. The elder Ellis went on to start Jewelry Savers, among other businesses he owned.

Stewart had been working his way up in management at Dillons when Kroger purchased the chain. He decided he didn’t want to work for a corporation.

Also, he said, he’s “not a sit-behind-a-desk” kind of guy.

“That would bore me to death.”

In 1996, on the recommendation of a friend, Stewart met Barry Ellis and talked with him for a couple of hours.

“He hired me on the spot.”

Stewart has been in the several-year process of buying the business and now co-owns it with Barry Ellis’ son, Spencer Ellis, who likely will take over the store when Stewart eventually retires.

“I’ll be turning 60 with Money Town,” he said.

Stewart has learned a lot about a lot of products and merchandise in that time.

“I can usually spot a fake Rolex 99.9% of the time.”

Sometimes, he said, he’ll call in a friend who is an expert in a certain field just as Harrison does on “Pawn Stars.”

However, he said, “That’s not very often that I have to do that.”

Money Town mostly deals in what Stewart called the main categories of jewelry, tools, instruments, firearms, electronics and sporting goods.

Keeping the store especially clean is a big deal for Stewart.

“I kind of call it the Von Maur of pawn shops,” he said. “We take pride in that.”

In times of economic hardship — especially when workers are laid off — people want to sell more items, Stewart said.

That’s not necessarily good for Money Town, though.

“You’ve got all this money going out with no money coming in.”

Unfortunately, he said, now is one of those times.

People are “just really hurting right now,” Stewart said. “We could be doing a lot better.”

In more prosperous times, he said, “That’s when we thrive as a pawn shop.”

In the difficult times, Stewart said he tries prayer.

“There’s been a lot of praying over 60 years, I’ll just say that.”

Repeat customers are “the backbone of the business,” Stewart said.

His oldest customer died earlier this month at age 83. Stewart said the man had done business with Money Town since the days Jimmie Ellis owned it.

There will be a 60th anniversary party at Money Town on June 13 with food trucks, a magician and an Elvis impersonator along with some giveaways.

Stewart was reminiscing with Jonna Ellis, widow of Barry Ellis, Sunday afternoon and said that when he first met her husband, he didn’t expect to necessarily stay at the store a year let alone 30 years.

“Looking back on it, I wouldn’t have changed a thing,” he said.

On an almost daily basis, he said he hears from people whose families have shopped at the store for decades.

It might be a man whose grandfather did business with Money Town when he was teaching him to hunt, or it might be someone whose mother and father bought tools there while remodeling their home while the child was growing up.

Stewart said he loves hearing all the stories.

“There’s not that many businesses that have had that kind of connection for that many years.”