In the midst of the COVID insanity this summer, I was playing on eBay one evening, not really looking for anything but just seeing what came up on my searches. It was mindless post-modern shopping at its best. I typed in Harrisburg under ART and got a ton of hits. Most were cheap prints, images cut from books or works by weekend painters, nothing that did much for me. As I scrolled down the page, I really had little hope of finding anything. I had picked Harrisburg as my target since I was born in the city and spent much of my life there. Unlike many who deny their roots in the capital city of Pennsylvania, I am a proud Harrisburger with many fond memories of living there as a boy and then adult. So, as I look at the listings, my eye was caught by a painting titled A Sunday Afternoon in Harrisburg, dated 1951. The painting was by Ira Deen, a noted local Harrisburg artist who passed in the 1950s. His works are often rather formulaic, and I recall interviewing a contemporary who commented that Deen would paint the same scene over and over to undercut his competitors. This painting was totally atypical of his work. It depicted a Victorian house along a tree-lined street. What caught my eye were the two figures in the foreground. One was an older woman in hat and gloves walking along the sidewalk, and the second was a younger person riding a bicycle. Deen showed them moving in opposite directions. The painting resonated with me because while I am not old enough to remember Harrisburg in 1951, this scene was one right out of 1961 or 1971 or even 1981. A lady out visiting on Sunday afternoon in hat and gloves being passed by someone in more casual attire out for a bike ride. I had seen that scene a million times. The formal and the informal passing each other by in front of a big old Victorian house. It was the Harrisburg of my youth. I think I took a nanosecond to hit the buy it now option, and the work now hangs on the wall in my home in Wyoming. A couple of weeks after this nostalgic trip, I was back online and was clicking on Harrisburg antiques. For years I have been collecting coin silver from Harrisburg. Again, not because it is particularly rare or collected but because it is part of my youth. My first job as a museum director was at the John Harris Mansion, and they had in their collections several pieces of silver made by (and a portrait of) George Beatty of Harrisburg. When I conducted tours of old Harrisburg Cemetery, I would stop to talk about Beatty and his family. You can imagine how shocked and pleased I was to see several spoons by Beatty for sale online. Now I know those spoons were not made in Harrisburg. Silver collector guru John McGrew told me that most, if not all, of the coin silver spoons from inland Pennsylvania were probably made in Philadelphia in large shops and then counterstamped with a local silversmith mark and shipped out. Still, they were from my hometown, and they had the unique distinction of connecting me to a story from my first days in the museum world. They too were ordered and came home to Wyoming. I write about all of this because I think collecting your hometown remains something important no matter where you live. It can connect you to the places of your life. It can add richness to your collecting. I know for one that when I use those spoons at Thanksgiving while looking at the Ira Deen painting of a Sunday in Harrisburg, I will find myself back home. Peter Seibert, a native Pennsylvanian, grew up in the antiques business and remains closely tied to auction houses, collectors, and dealers. Professionally, he has served as a museum director and public historian in Pennsylvania, New Mexico, Virginia, and Wyoming. He holds a Master of Arts in American Studies from Penn State and has authored two books and numerous articles on decorative arts, interior design, and history.