LI antiques dealer Val Jacobsen dies at 81

As a Cold Spring Harbor antiques dealer, Val Jacobsen sold a Queen Anne candle stand to the White House, as well as 18th-century andirons signed by their creators.

But the transactions that family members remember most vividly are the sales of items from Jacobsen's own 247-year-old house in Lloyd Harbor. Early in his career, for example, he sold the family's antique bed -- only a few days before his wife returned from a hospital with the couple's newly born first child.

Jacobsen's explanation: He'd gotten an offer he just couldn't refuse.

"Every day was a treasure hunt," said Ginna Jacobsen, his wife and business partner of 55 years. "He loved what he did till the day he retired."

A Saturday memorial service is scheduled for Jacobsen, who died July 13 from brain cancer. He was 81.

Jacobsen was born April 18, 1930, and grew up in West Nyack, N.Y. His family collected antiques there, and as a high school student, he learned the business working part-time in an auction house. He later studied business administration at St. Lawrence University, where he also met his future wife and set up his first shop in the basement of his fraternity house.

The family business, Valdemar F. Jacobsen Antiques, opened in the early 1950s -- first in Huntington, then in Cold Spring Harbor. Jacobsen expanded his antiques store with a Georgian-style brick building on the west end of the Cold Spring Harbor shopping village, where he worked as a dealer and appraiser until retiring in 2001.

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Business wasn't confined to selling 18th- and 19th-century American furniture and accessories -- including the sales to the White House during the Carter and Reagan administrations. Jacobsen also created pieces of his own. Shortly after marrying, he bought some old blacksmith bellows, converting them into 11 coffee tables that sold for $110 apiece at a New York City antique show. The proceeds paid for a honeymoon to Bermuda.

Jacobsen was president of the Cold Spring Harbor Improvement Society, president of the Lloyd Neck Bath Club and a board member of the Huntington Historical Society. In 2009, he was honored by the society at a "Wine Under the Stars" fundraising event for his contributions to the community and the antiques world.

"Val was a tremendously hard worker," said Dean Failey, a former senior vice president at Christie's, the international auction house. He recalled antique shows that Jacobsen helped organize in Houston, Minneapolis and other cities across the country.

Besides his wife, the former Virginia Potter, Jacobsen is survived by three daughters, Nancy Patterson of Cold Spring Harbor, Susan Kean of Lloyd Harbor and Cindy Leaman of Greenwich, Conn., along with eight grandchildren.

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The Saturday memorial is scheduled for 11 a.m. at St. John's Episcopal Church, Cold Spring Harbor. In lieu of flowers, contributions may be made to the Society of St. Johnland, 395 Sunken Meadow Rd., Kings Park, NY 11754, or to St. John's Church, Cold Spring Harbor, NY 11724.