Garden City Clutter Inspiration for New Game Show

A new NBC game show planned for this summer has its roots in the castoff items and discarded clutter of Garden City.

The game show, "It's Worth What?" is the creation of Garden City native Lara Spencer, lifestyle anchor of ABC's "Good Morning America." Spencer, also known as the former host of PBS' "Antiques Roadshow," was born in Garden City and is a 1987 graduate of Garden City Senior High School.

Spencer has turned a passion for antiques into a thriving career on TV. Her book, I Brake for Yard Sales, is scheduled to be published next April. And it's all thanks to the stuff no one wanted in Garden City.

Growing up, she and her mother loved checking out yard sales together every weekend. "There were some great treasures to be had in the beautiful old houses of Garden City and the surrounding towns," Spencer recalled.

"It was always a ton of fun and I realized you truly could find amazing treasures in unlikely places. It was just part of my life. It's what led me to 'Antiques Roadshow' and that's what led me to starting an antiques business and, ultimately, the idea for 'It's Worth What?' Mom would always say, 'Who wants to go saling?' and laugh because this 'saling' had nothing to do with water."

Spencer's mother lured her to yard sales with the promise that she could buy any one thing she liked. "I was a major collector of anything Snoopy-related from the time I was four until maybe eight years old. So every Saturday morning I was always game to go out because I knew I could possibly score another Snoopy treasure."

Yard sales were just the beginning for mother and daughter. "We would do yard sales, garage sales and estate sales. We went to flea markets. She taught me about auctions. She had a real passion for the hunt and for interior design. We didn't have a giant budget so it was a great way to get one-of-a-kind pieces that didn't cost a fortune," Spencer explained. "She taught me how to rehab them, to repaint or to refinish or to recover. Even today, I'd much rather find something and recycle it than pick it out at the store."

Her new game show won't just be about antiques, she said. The host, Cedric the Entertainer, will ask a team of two contestants the value of all kinds of things, including clothes, travel, collectibles, real estate and merchandise previously owned by celebrities. Those who answer correctly move on to the next level, which is more difficult. At the end of the sixth level is a potential prize of $1million.

Growing up in Garden City, Spencer's friends knew she yearned for a career in TV broadcasting but even they might be surprised by her success. Her Garden City yearbook says she was the funniest and had the worst case of "senioritis." "What that means, I'm sure you can figure out. I don't know how I'd define it," she said.

A star athlete (she went to Penn State on a scholarship for springboard diving), Spencer also credits her high school coaches for teaching her perseverance.

"I was pretty focused from a young age but even I couldn't have predicted this, so I don't know how anybody else could," she said.