Avery Trufelman

And to hear about how this happened, I talked to a woman named Patricia Ziegler.

Initially, Patricia wasn't a fan of military surplus herself.

In the 1970s, Patricia was an artist.

She was working in-house as an illustrator at the San Francisco Chronicle.

And that's where she started dating a reporter named Mel.

I met Mel, and he would buy things at surplus stores.

Mel and Patricia fell in love, and together they quit their 9-to-5 jobs.

They just wanted to make enough money to paint and write and travel.

Mel had gotten it at a surplus shop down there.

And to Patricia, this jacket had a really different vibe.

Mel looked really dashing and swashbuckling in this jacket.

Patricia changed the buttons and added suede patches.

Okay, they couldn't find those exact jackets that Mel found in Australia, but they did the best they could in California.

They found a local dealer who was offloading 500 Spanish military paratrooper shirts.

Which makes sense when you think about it.

Franco had just died in 1975.

Spain was getting rid of surplus from the last regime.

Mel and Patricia bought all 500 shirts.

And they sold these shirts at the Sausalito flea market.

It was just little touches of style.