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00:10I'm Mike Wolf and I've spent my life traveling the world chasing forgotten objects and the
00:16histories behind them. People everywhere are turning up artifacts every day often by chance
00:24and if you're lucky some of these finds can be worth serious money.
00:32Tonight on history's greatest picks. There are people out there who turn a good profit
00:40from bad money. We're talking artifacts connected to mobsters. Lansky's family argued he was actually
00:48given this medal in a secret ceremony at the White House. Outlaws. This car would be worth a bundle
00:55if you could actually find them. And even murderers. The signature is none other than Jack the Ripper.
01:03They say crime doesn't pay but these guys they know different.
01:11So sit back and let me tell you the stories behind some of history's greatest picks.
01:28Outlaws have always captured the public's imagination. And let's be honest, notoriety sells.
01:35Take the Colt revolver Pat Garrett used to shoot Billy the Kid. In 2021, it went for more than
01:41six million dollars at auction, making it the highest price paid ever for a gun. But a decade
01:48earlier, another guy stumbles across his own piece of outlaw history and thought it just might make
01:53him a killin' two.
02:02The main character of this story is a man named Frank Abrams. He is something of an amateur photographer
02:10who also has an interest in antique photographs. Frank is poking around an old flea market and he sees this
02:18great old photograph with five old cowboys on it.
02:23The photo is a tin type, which is an early type of photograph that could be printed relatively quickly
02:29onto metal. It's kind of the 1880s equivalent of a Polaroid. It's cheap, would cost about 25 cents.
02:36So he buys that with a couple other photos for about $10 and he takes it and hangs it on
02:44the wall
02:44in his Airbnb. It's some old west whimsy.
02:49Then one day in 2011, he sees a story about a photo of Billy the Kid selling for $2.3
02:56million.
02:57And that's when he takes a closer look at his own tin type.
03:03One of the figures looks familiar.
03:07There's a guy in the front row in the far right and it looks like he's blinked because it's a
03:11six
03:12second exposure. He's a little gaunt. He's got an impressive mustache.
03:15As he zooms in on the photo, he's looking around and he notices something.
03:20Written on the collar, really tiny, Pat Garrett.
03:26This is Pat Garrett.
03:31Pat Garrett was a lawman, was involved famously in the Lincoln County War.
03:37Garrett is famous for his own exploits, but you do not say the name Pat Garrett without saying
03:43another name. Billy the Kid, who Garrett killed in the line of duty.
03:49The more Frank looks at that young guy in the back left of that photo, he starts comparing that kid
03:55to the kid in the photos. And he's thinking, wait a second, they sort of wear the same cardigan.
04:01And when you look at them, they also have the same sort of asymmetrical face.
04:07The really key is Billy's wearing this little pinky ring. And in his photo, that kid in the back left
04:13is also wearing a pinky ring.
04:15This could be Billy the Kid.
04:19Suddenly, this photo's getting a lot more interesting.
04:24That's when Abrams starts asking himself, if a photo of Billy the Kid alone is worth $2.3 million,
04:31how much could one be worth that shows both Billy the Kid and Pat Garrett?
04:37But why would the most famous lawman in the Old West, Pat Garrett, be posing in the same photo with
04:45Billy the Kid?
04:47Then, as he zooms into the upper left of the photo, he notices something else. A series of numbers. It's
04:538-02-80. It's August 2nd, 1880.
04:58And that date is actually really significant, because at that point in time, Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, they're
05:03not enemies, they're friends.
05:07In the Old West, the border between lawman and outlaw was a porous one. Many men went from one side
05:18to the other and sometimes back again. Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid rank together, they gambled together,
05:25they even went out in target practice together. But the relationship sours when Garrett becomes a lawman.
05:35And suddenly, Billy, his friend, the outlaw, can no longer be his friend. He has to bring him to justice.
05:44Garrett and associates come upon Billy, staying at the house of a friend. Billy hears a noise,
05:51famously asks, Kianess, who is he? The answer comes in the form of gunfire.
05:58And the short life of one of the American West's great outlaws comes to an end.
06:09Pat Garrett pockets 500 bucks for ending his old buddy's reign of terror,
06:15and even gets himself a shiny gold sheriff's badge out of the deal.
06:19As for Frank Abrams, that little flea market fine that he snagged for $10, the one showing both the
06:26killer and the killed, is now valued at more than five million bucks.
06:32And while Frank plans to hold on to it for now, he has finally taken it down from the wall
06:37of his Airbnb.
06:45Pat Garrett's gold sheriff's badge isn t the only piece of hardware pinned to a man
06:50with a murky past. There's another metal, one so controversial, it stayed secret for 75 years.
07:02It's 1997. Cynthia Duncan is going through items and heirlooms that belong to her grandparents.
07:11And among some of these items is a collection of bow ties from her grandfather.
07:16And a real surprise. Buried among the bow ties, she finds a medal.
07:23U.S. Medal of Freedom is an award created by Harry Truman in 1945 to serve as a way to
07:36recognize citizens who had gone above and beyond during the Second World War.
07:40Cynthia's family has never talked about her grandfather receiving a Medal of Freedom.
07:47And apparently there's a good reason for that. Cynthia Duncan's grandfather is none other
07:52than the notorious gangster, Meyer Lansky. Not a guy that's known for his exceptional national service.
08:01He is one of the founders of a group called Murder Inc., Murder Incorporated,
08:06which is said to be responsible for over a thousand contract killings. If you needed somebody
08:13murdered or tortured or persuaded in some other fashion, Lansky had a hand in it.
08:18He's also a part of what was known as the National Crime Syndicate, which was this group of Jewish and
08:24Italian gangsters. He was a senior leader of the American mafia dating from the 30s all the way into
08:29the 70s. Why would someone of his background be awarded the Medal of Freedom?
08:38To answer that, the Lansky family looks back to December 7th, 1941, the day Pearl Harbor was
08:45attacked and America was pulled into World War II.
08:49After the war is joined, the United States initiates Operation Underworld, whereby we work with the
08:55mafia because we want to prevent them from working with enemy agents and saboteurs, and we need to keep
09:00the ports operating. And who controls the commercial seaports in the United States? Well, the president
09:05wouldn't like to admit it, but it's the mob. Now, at the time, the main man, the head of the
09:12five
09:12families in New York City of the mafia is none other than Lucky Luciano. Luciano's in prison. Second in
09:19command is Meyer Lansky. The Office of Naval Intelligence goes to Lansky and they tell him,
09:25we need help in overseeing the American ports. The government has to suspend trying to shut down
09:32the mob and instead actively working with the mob to keep the ports operating. And during their time
09:40on these ports, nothing happens. No arson, no sabotage, no attacks as smooth as clockwork. It's incredible.
09:50A year later, the feds ask another favor from Luciano and Lansky.
09:56In July 1943, the United States, along with the United Kingdom, launched Operation Husky,
10:02the Allied invasion of Sicily. And who do we have to cooperate with? Once again, the mafia.
10:08So who better to assist the allies with establishing a connection with the Sicilian mafia than
10:14mobsters back home in the United States? Guys like Luciano. And he gives them basically a road
10:19map of you talk to this family about this, you talk to this family about that. But they're also
10:23talking to his man on the outside. It's Meyer Lansky. And so because of the efforts of Luciano
10:30and of Lansky, when the war is over, Luciano is allowed to leave prison, but he's deported to Italy.
10:37As for Lansky's efforts, it's said that he ends up going to the White House and receives a Medal of
10:45Freedom from Harry S. Truman. Now, in the National Archives, there is a list of every recipient of
10:53the Medal of Freedom. Lansky's name, though, never appears on that list.
10:58The family story is that there was a secret ceremony during which Meyer Lansky was presented the medal.
11:03So we can't talk to Harry Truman. We can't talk to Meyer Lansky. We can't talk to the people who
11:08could tell us exactly what happened. And what we're left with is a box full of bow ties and an
11:13example
11:14of the U.S. Medal of Freedom. But it's also one hell of a story.
11:21Nearly 60 years later, Lansky's long lost Medal of Freedom surfaces in a box of bow ties. When it hits
11:28the auction block in 2022, bidding starts at just $250. And it climbs to $44,000 in less than three
11:36minutes. But his bow tie collection, they didn't make quite the same impact, selling for just $6,000.
11:51If fame sells, so does infamy. And some collectors will pay just about anything to own a piece of an
11:59outlaw's past. One guy paid over $112,000 for Clive Barrow's watch. And another was ready to drop 62
12:08grand on a letter that was written by Al Capone from Alcatraz. But there's one collector by the name
12:14of Mark Love who's after something bigger.
12:21Every collector finds their way to collecting in a different way. Mark Love was born into it.
12:29His father is a Dillinger collector. He became a Dillinger collector. They were both obsessed
12:35with this folk crime figure that was John Dillinger.
12:42Love and his father collect a wide range of artifacts that are directly tied to Dillinger. His pistols or
12:50handcuffs from times he spent in jail right up to the very end of his life. They have his death
12:56mask.
12:58But there is one object that Mark and his dad were never able to find.
13:04A 1933 Ford V8 that Dillinger used in his breakout from prison.
13:12It had to be somewhere. They just had not found it yet.
13:17The story of the car that becomes Mark's obsession begins in 1934.
13:31It happened during one of his many bank robberies. Dillinger was an infamous bank robber. And over
13:39time, he also became something of a folk hero. Because when he robbed a bank, he would not just take
13:44the money, but destroy the mortgage records so that the bank couldn't foreclose on your house.
13:50He's also got the charm and the good looks of a Hollywood movie star, Humphrey Bogart.
13:57It's said that when his image appears in newsreels, cinema audiences actually stand up and applaud wildly.
14:05This desperate public enemy now rises to fame as an underworld hero.
14:09People called him the Robin Hood of the Great Depression.
14:14The truth, of course, is a lot less glamorous. This was essentially a psychopath who robbed from
14:22everybody for nobody but himself and killed many of the people who got in his way.
14:28He's broken out of prison multiple times and that is about to happen again. Probably his most
14:33famous jailbreak is his escape from Lake County. And so, using a gun that he carved out of wood,
14:41but apparently was realistic enough to convince the guards, Dillinger bluffs his way out of prison
14:47and into a getaway vehicle. Dillinger speeds off.
14:55But here's the thing. Of all the cars they could have stolen, this one happened to belong to Lillian
15:01Holly, the first female sheriff of Lake County, Indiana.
15:07But the car that allows Dillinger to escape prison also leads to his ultimate downfall.
15:14In escaping from Lake County, he does what? Crosses state lines.
15:21Which means that this is a federal matter that gives J. Edgar Hoover and his Bureau of Investigation
15:27the authority to go after him, making him public enemy number one.
15:34They start picking off Dillinger's accomplices one by one.
15:40Dillinger comes to an end, perhaps fittingly, outside of a movie theater.
15:47Dillinger emerges, only to be confronted and shot dead by government agents.
15:56As for the getaway car, in the 1940s, it sold off during a police auction and literally
16:02disappears from the face of the earth. There are even rumors that it's been scrapped.
16:08Meanwhile, anything associated with John Dillinger starts to take on enormous value.
16:14Even the blood-stained money from some of his robberies becomes very valuable.
16:20Theoretically, this car would be worth a bundle if you could actually find it.
16:26Mark Love spends a decade and thousands of dollars trying to track down the missing car.
16:32A major breakthrough comes when Mark hires a private detective who finds the car's VIN number
16:38in Maine's Department of Motor Vehicles. This is the lead he's been waiting for.
16:45Love heads to Maine. He finds the owner. The owner's father had actually bought the car
16:50at the auction in 1940. And it had been sitting in the garage all of this time. There had been
16:56some
16:57intention to restore it. Never quite get around it. And years go by.
17:03The car gets passed down from father to son and eventually the son decides to plate it.
17:07And that's how the VIN number gets registered in Maine's database.
17:11After all these years, Love finally finds the car and then pours thousands into it,
17:17bringing that old V8 back to life.
17:25In 2021, he unveils the car in a parade that ends at the Lake County Jailhouse,
17:31where Dillinger once escaped.
17:36The original price tag, $605. And then in 2023, it sells for nearly 150 grand.
17:51Dillinger's car stayed hidden for over 50 years. But the owner of the next item liked to bring it out
17:57at dinner parties to show his guests how a notorious Nazi general died.
18:09The location is the Nuremberg Trials.
18:16A guard makes a grisly discovery. A medic is called to the scene and sees a dead prisoner.
18:24On his lips are small particles of broken glass. A faint smell of almonds hangs in the air.
18:34And in the prisoner's cold, dead hand is a small brass canister.
18:42It is a German military issue item the Waffen-SS contracted for the creation of this item.
18:49These little brass canisters are about two inches in height.
18:52They unscrew at the top and they're just big enough to hold capsules of potassium cyanide.
18:59And these were issued to all SS officers as well as the Nazi leadership.
19:04The Nazi leadership has a lot to be scared of.
19:09If it looks like they're about to capture you, you better by God take that potassium cyanide.
19:13It can end a human life in a matter of minutes.
19:18And that dead man laying in the cell that smells like almonds is none other than Hermann Goering.
19:26Hitler's second command, the founder of the Gestapo, one of the most evil men in history.
19:35He's a convicted war criminal.
19:38Concentration camps was one of the things you found immediately necessary upon coming to power, is it not?
19:44Goering has been sentenced to death. He's set to be killed the next day.
19:49But he has decided to take matters into his own hands, beat the hangman, and take the coward's way out.
19:56Suicide.
19:58The real mystery is how did Goering, one of the most closely guarded prisoners on the planet at the time,
20:05get his hands on cyanide?
20:07There are a couple of theories about how this happened, and all of them involve the guards to some extent
20:12allowing it to happen.
20:13The most likely explanation is that he somehow smuggled it in, probably in a container of either hair cream or
20:22skin cream.
20:24The medic who examines Hermann Goering's body is a physician named Dr. John Latimer, who ends up being a collector
20:32of the macabre.
20:33So we don't know exactly how he got a hold of this canister, whether he grabbed it then and there
20:38or got it later.
20:40But in later years, he would show this and pull it out at dinner parties.
20:50In 2016, the brass canister goes up for auction in Munich.
20:55It sells to a South American collector of Nazi memorabilia for 26,000 euros, almost $30,000.
21:09Back in the day, step one for catching a bad guy was to issue a wanted poster.
21:13And over time, those same posters can become incredibly valuable.
21:18John Dillinger's sold at auction for more than $3,000.
21:22Jesse James, $57,000.
21:25But that is nothing compared to the most famous wanted poster ever issued in U.S. history.
21:38It's been six days.
21:40News from Washington, D.C. is spreading fast.
21:44John Wilkes Booth has just assassinated President Abraham Lincoln by shooting him in the back of the head at Ford's
21:53Theater in front of a packed audience.
21:57The war department is in a frenzy trying to track down this killer.
22:05So what they do is they issue what is called a broadside, which is basically a wanted poster.
22:13One of the main ways that the government got the word out.
22:18These broadsides were posted on the sides of trees, on buildings, in the middle of town squares.
22:25Because they are rushing to get these out, they're made a little bit sloppily.
22:29There are no photographs.
22:31Instead, they're just these very vague descriptions.
22:33For example, John Wilkes Booth is described as having a heavy black mustache.
22:37And his accomplices.
22:38John Surratt, who is said to have protruding ears.
22:41David Harreld, who is described simply as chunky.
22:44And there's misspellings.
22:46Surratt is spelled with one T, not two.
22:49Harreld is actually spelled Harold.
22:51What's also interesting about this wanted poster is that it offers a reward.
22:59For the arrest of John Wilkes Booth, information that leads us to John Wilkes Booth,
23:04you will get paid $50,000 and $25,000 for each of his accomplices.
23:09It is worth millions in today's money.
23:12And it is very motivating for the public.
23:18It is easily one of the most iconic wanted posters in U.S. history.
23:23But the irony is, it had nothing to do with actually catching the man on it.
23:29John Wilkes Booth and David Harreld are hiding.
23:33And they're trying to make it for Confederate territory in Maryland and Virginia.
23:38Eventually, they head for a farm, the Garrett Farm.
23:42This seems like it might be a good place to hole up for a while.
23:46Garrett's, they've never seen the wanted posters.
23:50They haven't even heard that the president has been assassinated.
23:53And they have no idea that their farm is about to be the center of the biggest U.S. manhunt
23:59in history.
24:02But as it turns out, the posters were not particularly necessary.
24:05Because what actually happens is that a former Confederate soldier gives Booth up to the Union.
24:14John Wilkes Booth refuses to surrender, refuses to leave the barn.
24:18They set the barn on fire.
24:19And when he steps out, he is shot.
24:25As soon as Booth has been killed, the wanted posters are no longer relevant.
24:32But there is one poster that's nailed to a tree in Philadelphia that's taken down by a local.
24:38And this is a poster that will stay in that person's family and be passed down from generation to generation
24:46for the next 150 years.
24:53In 2023, the poster goes up for auction and the reserve is set at 100 grand, but it doesn't stay
25:00there long.
25:01And when the hammer drops, it sells for an incredible $166,375.
25:10It's not surprising, considering fewer than 20 copies are known to exist.
25:15And almost none of those are in this kind of condition.
25:27Collectors are always on the lookout for a pick with major value.
25:31But what if the find is stolen cash?
25:34That's what eight-year-old Brian Ingram discovers when a handful of old $20 bills turn out to be linked
25:40to one of America's greatest mysteries,
25:42the D.B. Cooper skyjacking.
25:51Eight-year-old Brian Ingram is with his family along the coast of the Columbia River, which is in Washington
25:58State.
26:00He starts digging like any eight-year-old kid would do, and he realizes something's buried here.
26:08He digs down and he discovers cash hidden under the wet soil.
26:15And they are heavily degraded. They have been outside for seemingly a long time.
26:20There's no indication as to how they got there, where they're from.
26:24You can't even tell what denomination they are at first.
26:26But Jackson's face is still there, so they figure out that these are 20s that he has unearthed from the
26:32ground.
26:34Parents pretty quickly realize this is odd.
26:37And so they call the FBI.
26:42In total, there are about 290 bills.
26:45But because they're so water damaged at this point that there are only 30 that are still intact.
26:51One critical clue to the mystery.
26:54The serial numbers on the bills are still intact.
26:58The serial numbers on a bill tells you where it was printed, when it was printed.
27:03You know, it gives you a ton of information.
27:06That discovery gives the FBI something they haven't had in almost 10 years.
27:12An actual lead in the D.B. Cooper mystery.
27:19Nine years earlier, a man buys an airplane ticket in cash.
27:25Registers it under the name of Dan Cooper.
27:30When he boards the plane, he sits in the rear of the cabin, drinking a bourbon.
27:34Very nonchalant.
27:36Normal business traveler.
27:38Except that at some point on the flight, he calls the stewardess over.
27:44And he hands her a note.
27:46The note only has four words on it.
27:49I have a bomb.
27:55And he shows her a briefcase with wires and these red sticks, maybe TNT, maybe.
28:03It's not clear, but when someone says they have a bomb on a plane, you take them pretty seriously.
28:09Cooper then demands $200,000 in cash as well as parachutes when the plane lands in Seattle.
28:18They do just that.
28:19Although they do purposely give the money in 20s so that it is these large, unwieldy cases of money.
28:27Cooper instructs the plane to take off once again, and the plane starts heading in a southwest direction.
28:33With the plane over southern Washington, he opens the rear door, launches himself into the darkness, and is never seen
28:45again.
28:46He disappears.
28:48The money disappears.
28:49No one is sure what happened.
28:52It basically becomes a total cold case.
28:58After the hijacking, there's obviously a press conference.
29:01Authorities come forward and identify the man as Dan Cooper.
29:05But a reporter misheard the name Dan Cooper and identifies him as D.B. Cooper.
29:13And that's the name that is stuck in the annals of history.
29:17The only bills ever recovered from the D.B. Cooper hijacking are the ones found by 8-year-old Brian
29:23Ingram.
29:25It immediately kicks off this long-lasting legal fight.
29:31The family of Brian Ingram is saying, we found the cash, so it belongs to us.
29:37But the Ingram family isn't the only one that is laying a claim to the cash.
29:41There's the airline.
29:42They say it's actually their property.
29:44There is the FBI, who says this is evidence and we need it.
29:47There is the insurance company, which had to do this major payout and said, we want to get paid back.
29:52Finally, a judge in a U.S. district court renders a verdict.
29:56FBI, you get $280.
29:58And the rest of the money is then split between the family and the insurance company.
30:03This leaves Brian's share as 138 tattered $20 bills worth exactly $2,760 in face value.
30:19Fast forward to 2006, Brian decides to put 15 of these bills up for auction.
30:25The only unsolved aviation air piracy case in U.S. history.
30:3275 has been with Heritage Live now say 8.
30:34There's 8 now, go 85.
30:36They end up selling for $37,000, which is considerably more than their face value of just $300.
30:51Some family heirlooms tell their history, like the fragments of George Washington's coffin that sold for $12,000,
30:58while others have sentimental value, like a grandfather's baseball card collection that sold for more than half a million dollars.
31:07But one family's cardboard box carried clues to one of the most famous unsolved murder cases in history.
31:18A lot of families have these kinds of strange collections of heirlooms.
31:22Sometimes there's interesting stuff in there.
31:24Sometimes they're just junk.
31:27There's a guy, he's an English guy, and he has a box like this, filled with family heirlooms.
31:33The family takes it to the local auctioneers for appraisal.
31:36At first, this just looks like a random jumble of papers and odds and ends,
31:40but when they start to look through the box, they find photographs.
31:44And one of those photographs looks like a dead body in a mortuary.
31:50And there's a pair of handcuffs.
31:52And then as you get deeper into this box, you come across facsimiles of a postcard and a letter.
32:02The original owner of this stuff was Henry Helsin,
32:05a police inspector with the J Division of the London Metropolitan Police.
32:10Over the years, Helsin keeps mementos from his work,
32:13including evidence from a case that began one morning in 1888,
32:18a case that would haunt investigators for generations.
32:31He's called to a murder scene, and it's extremely gruesome.
32:3747-year-old Mary Ann Nichols has been killed,
32:40her throat has been slashed, and she has been brutally mutilated.
32:45This is not the typical kind of murder scene.
32:50The murder takes place in Whitechapel, which is in the east end of London,
32:54which is a part of J Division's jurisdiction,
32:56which is why Henry Helsin is lead inspector on the case.
33:00Three days later, another body shows up.
33:0347-year-old Annie Chapman.
33:05It's a horrendous scene.
33:08So, we have two bodies.
33:10We have the makings of a serial killer.
33:12Three weeks after these two murders,
33:14the Central News Agency receives a letter.
33:17The letter is addressed,
33:19Dear Boss.
33:21It's written in red ink,
33:23and it brags about a recent murder in the east end of London.
33:28The writer claims that he wanted to write the letter in blood,
33:31but the problem was it goes thick like glue.
33:36He threatens to clip off his next victim's ears.
33:41So, the news agency, they tell the police,
33:44and they dismiss this as phony.
33:47Anyone can send a letter like this.
33:50A few days later, however, two more murders take place.
33:54Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes,
33:57and part of Catherine's ears have been sliced off.
34:02And the very next day,
34:04after these two additional murders,
34:07a postcard is sent to the Central News Agency.
34:10And this one is just as weird
34:13and horrible as the letter that came before.
34:17And this time, the writer in question refers to themselves as Saucy Jack.
34:23And like the letter, it brags and it gloats about the murder,
34:28and it also, you know, cheekily apologizes about,
34:30sorry, I didn't have time to slice off the whole ear.
34:33I could only do half of it.
34:35I kind of ran out of time.
34:36And then the writer signs off Jack the Ripper.
34:43At this point, Scotland Yard takes over
34:46what's now being called the Whitechapel murders.
34:49And as the bodies continue to pile up,
34:52investigators release copies of both the letter and the postcard,
34:57hoping someone in the public might recognize the handwriting
35:00or even be able to identify Jack the Ripper.
35:05It does not work.
35:07It's still an open question about whether this letter,
35:10this postcard actually came from Jack the Ripper.
35:12A lot of people thought those letters were hoaxes,
35:14maybe concocted by some editor who wanted to sell more newspapers.
35:19Over time, though, the case goes unsolved,
35:22and these items that were in the police files mysteriously go missing.
35:29And it is suggested that some people who work the case
35:31end up taking these files as souvenirs for themselves.
35:35Now, the original Dear Boss letter was returned to Scotland Yard
35:39anonymously almost 100 years later.
35:41But the only surviving copies of the Saucy Jack postcard
35:46are copies, they're facsimiles.
35:53And that is what Henry Helson has in his collection.
35:58Which means that when Detective Inspector Helson's great-grandson
36:02puts these items up for auction,
36:05this garners a lot of interest.
36:09In 1888, it cost just one penny
36:12to mail the original letter and postcard.
36:15135 years later, the copies sell for over 15,000 pounds,
36:20which works out to be around 21 grand.
36:31No 20th century president captured the public's imagination
36:35quite like JFK.
36:37And ever since his death, collectors have searched out
36:40anything connected to his assassination,
36:42from a section of the picket fence on the grassy knoll
36:45to a window from the Texas Book Depository.
36:48But no collectible is as haunting or as revealing
36:52as an uncashed paycheck.
37:02A check comes through the mail.
37:07It's for $43.37, issued by the Texas Book Depository.
37:15Signed by the secretary and the treasurer.
37:18And annotated in the bottom left-hand corner is a note
37:22saying that this is a check for four and one-half days of work.
37:27The check's date?
37:30December 3rd, which just happens to be 11 days
37:33after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
37:38And the check is payable to one Mrs. Lee Harvey Oswald.
37:49Eleven days earlier, Lee Harvey Oswald is at his job
37:52at the Texas Book Depository,
37:54where he is paid $1.25 an hour to fulfill orders.
37:59His job is to take invoices,
38:02go up to the 5th, 6th, 7th floor,
38:04grab books to be shipped to schools
38:06or wherever they're going.
38:07He fills a box, the books, the invoice,
38:11takes them back down.
38:13That's his job.
38:14As we all know,
38:15the Texas Book Depository overlooks Dealey Plaza.
38:19Around noon, a police officer
38:21and the building superintendent
38:23rush into the Book Depository
38:26and pass Oswald,
38:28who is standing very calmly.
38:30A little bit later,
38:32one of Oswald's co-workers says to him
38:35that President John F. Kennedy has been shot.
38:41Very calmly, Oswald leaves work for the day,
38:44half a day early.
38:47Why?
38:48Because he had just shot and killed
38:51the president of the United States.
38:5648 hours and 7 minutes after the president steps,
38:59his accused Slayer is dead.
39:03Oswald has been shot dead.
39:06The check arrives in the mail,
39:08addressed to his widow Marina,
39:10and it is for four and one half days.
39:12The assassination happens on a Friday,
39:14so he had worked Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday,
39:17gets to work on Friday,
39:18and then shoots the president,
39:20leaves the building.
39:21So some bean counter
39:22at the Texas Book School Depository building
39:24makes it out for $43 and something.
39:27They still paid Lee Harvey Oswald,
39:28but they, you know,
39:29they clocked him out.
39:31So by the time Marina Oswald receives this check,
39:34she's now a recent widow,
39:36she's got a toddler,
39:37she's got another baby on the way,
39:39she needs the money,
39:40but she's being hounded by the press.
39:43Several magazines wanted her exclusive story,
39:46so Life magazine got the exclusive story of Marina,
39:49and they put her in a hotel
39:50to keep her away from the rest of the press.
39:53She doesn't want to go to the bank to cash a check,
39:55and she asked her attorney at the time,
39:57John Thorne,
39:58to cash it for her.
39:59But he doesn't.
40:01He gives her the cash,
40:03$43.37,
40:05and hangs onto the check for himself.
40:08It tells a story of what happened
40:11on that tragic day.
40:13It's an artifact
40:14that gives us direct insight
40:16into the moment in time
40:18that something tragic,
40:20but historically significant happened.
40:22Puts it into a file,
40:24it's never cashed
40:25because the lawyer isn't Mrs. Marina Oswald,
40:28can't go into a bank and cash it.
40:29So the check remains in Thorne's files.
40:32He eventually passes away in 1981,
40:35and it's his widow, Lois,
40:38who now is left
40:39to decide what to do with the check.
40:42This is 1963,
40:44Lee Harvey Oswald's last paycheck.
40:46In 2020,
40:48Lois decides to find out
40:49just how much she can cash in this check for.
40:52A huge moment in American history.
40:55Turns out,
40:56the infamous $43.37 paycheck
40:59sells for $69,000.
41:10It just goes to show
41:12whether it's a pile of soggy $20 bills,
41:14a $10 photograph,
41:16or an autographed postcard.
41:19While crime doesn't pay,
41:21an artifact with a story sure does.
41:24And when it comes to collecting,
41:26there's no such thing as bad money.
41:28any kind of moneypara have to get
41:28and who doesn't pay for it.
41:29There's no such thing Frywee on Patreon.
41:29it's a huge thing,
41:30and you can't just find out
41:30It could be in an introred,
41:30when the book replacement des bans,
41:30or the разработ я,
41:30for a long time unfix a little角 haver.
41:30And when it comes toAI,
41:32I don't think it's not up to what it is,
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