Any reasonably good hardware store is worth a pause, a quick browse. There are coconut mats, garden and kitchen stuff, and of course rows and rows of little screws and nuts and fasteners and bolts. But if you find yourself in Steves Hardware on St. Helena’s Main Street, prepare yourself for something different. The store has been in business in the same town since 1878 with only one change of ownership. You will find memorabilia all over the walls and bits of Northern California sitting right on the shelves.

The current owners, Gary and Ron Mehegon, took over from their father Verino, who bought the store in 1955 from Warren Steves. Long before that, however, Verino’s parents came to America as immigrants from Italy, going first to Washington State, where Verino was born. Their next move was to Petaluma in Sonoma County where they tried their hand at chicken farming. This failed when all 15,000 chickens died from disease a few years later.

Finally the Mehegon family moved to the Napa Valley, to Rutherford, when Verino was twelve. He worked alongside his father in the thriving walnut and prune industry until the age of 15, when he began his career in the hardware business, working at Alney’s Hardware Store. At 21 he shipped out to Korea with the armed forces, only to return to the Valley, marry and buy Steves Hardware. Along the way he had a son, Gary, in 1955, and the store prospered. So much so that it only made sense for Gary and his younger brother, Ron to buy out their father in the early 1980s and take over the business.

Today almost every square inch of wall space is crammed with bits of Steves remarkable history – dated ads and placards, a set of old Stimson scales, boxes of ammunition – images of a different world where hunting and fishing were a part of every day life in the Valley. An ancient clock graces the wall in the back of the store and a huge, beautiful hand-painted safe – a museum piece almost – is there, ordered by Mr. Steves in 1914.

The store’s staff is also a pretty remarkable group in their own right; folks in blue shirts all running about directing customers to hoses, gopher traps (and dynamite) and everything else. Yet the atmosphere is relaxed and relatively free of tourist trappings. Bright kitchen and household items are up front (by the sale rack, which should not be missed), next to the gun department and even more historic memorabilia. Serious hardware is in the back of the store, which is also where you’ll find locals putting the staff through their paces. Intriguing things hang from the lofty ceiling, rows are stacked high and neatly with ropes, twine, chain, vinyl tubing, bits of plumbing necessities … an endless supply of hardware. There is even a kind of tree made up of enormous containers of nails, bolts, screws and staples. It’s not far from the coyote urine, $14.99 for an eight ounce supply.

Steves is a small town store with a remarkable history and a fascinating present. Unlike the coyote product it’s not something you can bottle, only experience. Can you visit the Napa Valley without walking through Steves? Of course you can. Would you be missing something if you did? You can bet on it.

Kate F. Love is a banker, choreographer and a graduate of the Law School at the University of Warwick, England.