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Antiques Roadshow - Season 30 (US) - Episode 04: Georgia State Railroad Museum, Hour 1
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00:09¡Gracias!
00:35¡Gracias!
01:00COSTAL HERITAGE SOCIETY SINCE 1990.
01:03CHECK OUT THE TREASURES THAT MADE OUR EXPERTS STOP IN THEIR TRACKS.
01:15MY MOTHER BOUGHT IT FOR ME WHEN I WAS A CHILD IN 1951 OR 52.
01:46No, no, no, no, no, no.
01:51We've got Margaret Mitchell inscribing to your grandma.
01:55Yes.
01:56After about six months, she was so swamped, she refused to sign anymore,
02:00which is good for us on the collecting side of things.
02:04And then over here, we have some Hollywood greats.
02:08We have the movie stars' names, the ones who were living who went to the centennial premiere,
02:12which was in 1961.
02:14So we have the autographs of Olivia de Havilland and Vivian Lee, who won the Academy Award.
02:21And David Selznick, who also won the Academy Award as producer of the movie.
02:25They played the movie for the centennial of the beginning of the Civil War, so 1961.
02:30There are some very interesting points about this book.
02:34Points are ways that we determine the edition of a book.
02:37And For Gone with the Wind is very popular, went into second edition almost immediately.
02:43And the way we can tell is this copyright date.
02:46This one says May 1936.
02:49And that means, for sure, 100% first edition.
02:53So that's important for value.
02:55There are more signatures.
02:57Yes.
02:57So on that page, it looks like my grandparents went out to a Confederate veteran's home
03:03and met with some very old Confederate veterans who signed the book
03:08as kind of a representation of what the book was about.
03:11I think they thought it was important to document these people.
03:15And then here, there are signatures of people that were formerly enslaved that were still living.
03:20I think my grandfather dated both of those two pages, like 1939, 1940.
03:26So just a couple years after the book and a year after the movie.
03:30The signatures in the back really speak to the epic nature of the story itself
03:36and, of course, the time period that it's trying to cover.
03:39The fact that there are people that fought in the Civil War on the Confederate side
03:43and people that were formerly enslaved.
03:46Writing their names in here, it's just sort of a testament
03:48to what an important work this was.
03:52It was a big story for the city of Atlanta.
03:54The other thing is this photo, which is fabulous
03:58because it's got Margaret Mitchell.
04:01Which one is she in that photo?
04:03Yeah, she's in the front and the center.
04:04That's a picture when my grandmother and great-grandmother and great-uncles
04:08were on a house party out in the country with Margaret Mitchell.
04:12And we think that's maybe her first husband before they were married.
04:16It's a 1920 photograph.
04:17So they were 20 years old.
04:19And she's wearing pants.
04:21I read that her skirt caught fire when she was little
04:23and her mom was so afraid that she dressed her in pants
04:27and they called her Jimmy.
04:28Interesting.
04:30Which is just the cutest thing.
04:31Have you ever thought about value of a signed first edition of Gone with the Wind?
04:36We've thought about it.
04:36We were guessing $1,000 if we're happy if it's that or more.
04:40Well, all of the special features of your grandmother's copy,
04:44an auction estimate would be $20,000 to $30,000 for your little book.
04:51That's fantastic.
04:52If I would have been happy with 1,000, I'm 20 to 30 times happier.
04:56I like that.
05:02It's kind of a long story, but it was in a house and I rescued it from what it turned
05:07out a couple weeks later to be certain doom.
05:10And to be honest, for all the research I've tried to do, I really can't figure out what
05:15it is.
05:16I don't know if it's a game or if it's something for writing.
05:19I'm not really sure.
05:24The most interesting thing about it is it never happened.
05:27Since the 1976 Winter Olympics, they were supposed to be in Denver, Colorado,
05:31but the city defunded it.
05:33That's about the extent I think it was Helsinki, but that might be totally wrong.
05:37So I just kind of wanted to get a little bit more info and I thought it was pretty neat.
05:46I've got a basketball signed by the 92 Dream Team.
05:49My father-in-law immigrated to the States.
05:52He's Dutch.
05:53And he did that in the early 90s.
05:57And he's been telling me that he has a basketball signed by Michael Jordan and the Dream Team.
06:01And I never believed it.
06:03Last week I told him that we were going to the roadshow because we're big fans.
06:07And here it is.
06:07It's been in his attic since then.
06:10He just said he got it as a gift from a friend when he moved here.
06:13Hey, that's a pretty good gift.
06:15Yeah.
06:16This is a basketball signed by the 1992 Dream Team from the 92 Summer Olympics in Barcelona.
06:22This ball would have been made available at the 1992 Tournament of the Americas in Portland, Oregon.
06:27It was a qualifying tournament before the Summer Olympics in Barcelona.
06:31It's a limited edition.
06:33200 of these were made available.
06:34When it comes to the Dream Team, Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen, Larry Bird, Clyde Drexler, David Robinson, Charles Barkley.
06:42I mean, it is, as a nerd, it's like the Avengers of basketball assembling on the court.
06:49The Dream Team, they're literally, when you talk about domination, they were straight steamrolling the competition.
06:56Average of 44-point lead for every game.
06:59In the final gold medal game versus Croatia, I remember the score being 117 to 85.
07:05So even in the end, it was just total annihilation.
07:09They were incredible.
07:10And being in the 92 Olympics, this was the first time FIBA, International Basketball Federation, allowed for players from the
07:18NBA competing in the Olympics.
07:20When it comes to a package, this being a known addition, you really can't get any better.
07:25In terms of marketing as an auctioneer, this is a slam dunk for collectors today.
07:30Conservatively, at auction, you would easily see this ball in the $30,000 to $40,000 range.
07:40That's amazing.
07:41What a gift, right?
07:42Yeah, what a gift.
07:50The Central Railroad and Banking Company became the Central of Georgia Railway Company in 1895.
07:59The railroad was really critical to Savannah and to Georgia.
08:03It was developed in order to transport the goods from the interior of the state, from farms and plantations, to
08:10the port.
08:11Savannah is a port city.
08:13And so then those goods would go on a ship and be transported across the ocean or to other parts
08:18of the country.
08:19In 1963, the Central of Georgia ultimately closed the repair facility.
08:24And it was left vacant for many years.
08:27And these properties really fell into disrepair.
08:30And so when the property was being demolished for the very valuable Savannah gray brick and scrap metal that was
08:37here,
08:38the city of Savannah stepped in and halted demolition.
08:41And we're able to save it.
08:43And we've operated this property as a museum ever since.
08:51I brought a wristwatch my dad gave me in high school that has a slide rule around the outside.
08:59When I was taking trigonometry, he was a Methodist preacher and couldn't afford good things.
09:05So he gave you quite a gift?
09:08He did.
09:09Have you worn it or used it since?
09:10Not so much.
09:12Okay.
09:13It's made by Juvenia, a very fine Swiss watchmaking company.
09:17They were founded in 1860.
09:19This particular model is called the Arithmo.
09:22Comes from the word Arithmetik.
09:25They introduced this in 1945.
09:28It's in a stainless steel case.
09:30It's a 17-joule automatic self-winding movement.
09:35This was a calculator.
09:39This company, Juvenia, they proclaimed theirs to be the best.
09:43Solid, nice construction.
09:46The rotating bezel.
09:47So you can do your calculations by moving it around.
09:52Currently, it's not moving.
09:54It's not working.
09:55It's probably gummed up, which is very common with these watches.
09:58It happens.
09:59And a cleaning and an overhauling, it'll be working just fine again.
10:03This watch today, retail, this will sell for between $7,000 to $8,000.
10:11Wow.
10:13It's priceless to me because my dad gave it to me, but that's wonderful to know.
10:20And I made an A in trig, so it helped.
10:24I guess it worked.
10:25It did its job, didn't it?
10:26It did its job.
10:28So this is what I believe might be an animation sell from Disney's masterpiece, Fantasia.
10:35I picked it up in an antique and bookstore in Philadelphia, where we're from.
10:40And it was the shabby little store, had great, wonderful treasures.
10:43I picked up so much stuff over the years.
10:45And I thought this was just a sketch, and then I took it home, open it up, and it's translucent.
10:49It's on a translucent film, which looked like a good design.
10:52So we'll see.
10:54Yeah, we're just happy to be here.
10:55We love it.
10:56Fantasia's my favorite movie, so I know this guy's Chernabog from The Night on Bald Mountain.
11:02So me and my mom were yard sailing one day, and we were on one side of the highway, and
11:07she saw the lamb across four lanes of traffic, and we did maybe a little bit of a dangerous
11:12U-turn.
11:14And we jumped out of the car, and the guy told us it was $5.
11:17So, yeah, we took it home.
11:20So I would say that this is a sheep designed by Hans-Peter Kraft, and he has an apt last
11:28name, since this is a wonderful piece of Kraft work.
11:31Oh, wow.
11:32It was made in Germany, and it is done with this wonderful wool, boiled wool, and all of
11:41the legs are original in their ash, a wood, with his ears in leather, and those glass eyes.
11:50He's so alert.
11:53It's a spirited, wonderful, fun object.
11:56Well, you can see these, really, in a retail setting in the $4,000 range.
12:01Oh, wow.
12:02Yeah.
12:03You might just try to get his tail attached so you don't lose his tail, because that's
12:07important.
12:08Okay.
12:08This muzzle is a little dirty, and that's good.
12:11So, lovely, wonderful $5 yard sale find.
12:15Absolutely.
12:16Thank you so much.
12:18I brought in a cast iron mechanical bank.
12:21I got it in western New York.
12:23A friend of mine, who's an antique dealer, he borrowed money from me, and we were making
12:27a business investment into a friend of his.
12:30And a few months later, his friend died, and so did the business.
12:33He's kind of felt guilty a little bit about it, so once in a while, he'll give me a few
12:36items.
12:37So, what can you tell me about the bank itself?
12:39Well, it's a shooting bank.
12:40It'll shoot a penny from the rifle into the tree.
12:44First, you cock the holder back.
12:47You slip a penny on there, and see how the head went down.
12:51Now, you hit the toe.
12:54What did you find when you looked it up?
12:55The J.E. Stevens Creedmoor Bank.
13:22Creedmoor Bank.
13:23Creedmoor Bank was made by a Connecticut company, J.E. Stevens, and we see it quite often.
13:27It's a fairly common bank, a very popular bank.
13:311877, 1880, that's the time frame we see that bank and associate with that bank.
13:36However, there are slight differences between this bank and the Creedmoor Bank we normally
13:39see.
13:39They did make a few variations of this style shooting bank, with the figure wearing a different
13:45hat, and then right here on the front is a base plate.
13:50That's often where we'll see Creedmoor Bank, the new Creedmoor Bank, Volunteer is another
13:55name.
13:56I'm happy that yours is blank.
13:59And even though your paint is very thick, a bit drab in color, I believe the paint to be
14:04completely original.
14:06Oh, nice.
14:06The casting is also a little crude, a little more crude than I'd expect from the American
14:10cast iron manufacturers.
14:12This one, instead, is a cast iron mechanical bank, but made in Europe, either in Germany
14:18or in Austria.
14:19This bank was a few years later, circa 1890.
14:23This is actually much, much rarer than a Creedmoor Bank by J.E. Stevens.
14:27Oh, wow.
14:27Yes, much better, much better example here.
14:30I'll turn it around so we can see the back side of the bank as well.
14:32Another characteristic which is different is the color of his uniform itself.
14:37It's almost in a reverse painted colors.
14:39We have a red robe, and he has white pants.
14:42Normally, we'll see a gray, red, and blue, but in a different configuration than that which
14:47he's wearing.
14:48Now, this bank is quite dirty.
14:49I do believe it will clean up very nicely with a little time and energy, but you have to
14:57be careful what you're doing.
14:58You don't want to disrupt the original paint.
14:59Now, a normal J.E. Stevens Creedmoor, there are thousands of them out there.
15:03Of course, condition is king, but you can pick up a Creedmoor Bank around $300 to $500 range.
15:10When it comes to the variations, they're much scarcer and hard to come by.
15:14Anyway, the paint on this example is quite chipped and worn.
15:18However, it's authentic, and I would value this with an auction estimate of $1,000 to $1,500.
15:25Well, that's good news.
15:26That's awesome.
15:27Yeah, it's cool.
15:35My husband is a retired surgeon.
15:38He had a patient who gave it to him at the end of her life.
15:43He had taken care of her for many years, and it was a thank you from her to me for
15:50all the
15:50hours that he had spent with her in the hospital and making house calls.
15:54And when was that?
15:57Hmm, 2019.
15:58She said that her husband had had it made for her.
16:02The bracelet is made by Jean Schlumberger by Tiffany & Company.
16:07It's in 18-karat gold, some full-cut diamonds, and cultured pearls.
16:13It is made in New York, and it came in this Tiffany box that is original to the bracelet.
16:19It's stamped 18K with the maker's mark on the clasp.
16:23He was from France.
16:24He began working for Tiffany in the 1950s and created this amazing sort of latticework bracelet.
16:30His main goal was to have natural motifs and naturalistic, organic designs.
16:36It was just a beautiful sort of way of approaching jewelry.
16:40The name of the bracelet is Heliodor, or Gift of the Sun.
16:45It's actually articulated all in the center.
16:48These little pearls, everything sort of rocks back and forth.
17:21Right.
17:22It would be between $20,000 and $30,000.
17:25Wow.
17:25And people covet his jewelry designs, so it's quite a collectible piece.
17:30It is beautiful.
17:31Thank you so much.
17:33A roundhouse is a building where locomotives are maintained and repaired.
17:39The turntable behind me is essentially the heart of a roundhouse.
17:43Without a functioning turntable, you can't get the locomotives in and out of the roundhouse.
17:48So why a roundhouse?
17:50It's the most efficient way to house and repair and maintain a large fleet of steam locomotives.
17:56So this turntable had to be expanded twice in its history.
18:01The original turntable is only 50 feet long.
18:04It was also manually operated.
18:06And what that meant was the steam locomotive had to be centered on the table and perfectly balanced.
18:11Each end of the turntable had a handle that stuck out.
18:14And you would have a couple of men on each end that would push on that handle.
18:18And they could actually turn the locomotive manually.
18:21Later, the turntable was steam-powered, air-powered, and now it's electrically powered.
18:34That's a pickle jar that originated in Dahlonega, Georgia.
18:38At one point, it was used to serve the Yankee soldiers pickles at the end of the Civil War.
18:43When it was over, soldiers left, and my great-great-grandmother wound up marrying one of them and took off
18:49with him.
18:50Oh, my goodness.
18:53How was the family feeling about that?
18:55I'm sure it all worked out for the best because here I am.
18:58So how do you know that the Union Army ate pickles out of this?
19:04There was a document in there that was written by my great-great-grandmother.
19:08She detailed what took place at the Mint City, as it was known, as Dahlonega.
19:14The first thing I look at when I look at a piece of glass like this, I look at the
19:20coloration and what it is.
19:23But I also look all around all four sides to make sure that there's not any broken places in it.
19:31But, you know, the kicker on this is to look up under the bottom and see if it has wear.
19:41Yeah, there is some.
19:42Look right there.
19:43You see all that wear?
19:45Right.
19:45This bottle was molded, and it was made in a factory.
19:50There's no way to know for sure which factory made it, but I'm 99% sure that it's an American
19:56bottle.
19:56This is the size bottle that would have sat on the countertop in a country store in the 1860s or
20:0170s.
20:02Right.
20:03If you look at the pattern, it's called cathedral, but it goes right along with the Gothic style of decorative
20:11arts
20:11that was real popular in America and England in the 1840s and the 1850s.
20:17And the color is called light aqua.
20:20But the thing that really makes this neat is that story.
20:23So if we went out of here today, we could probably find one of these bottles for sale, retail, for
20:31$300 or $400.
20:32But I think with that story, to somebody who values that history, it's probably more like a $1,000 bottle.
20:40I would have thought if I walked into an antique store, it would be $40 or $50.
20:45And that would have been my thought.
20:47Well, we can add a zero at least.
20:49Well, that's good news.
20:57It is an enamel by Alexander Fisher that was purchased by my husband's grandfather in 1926.
21:09You brought this wonderful enamel plaque set in its original architectural bronze frame.
21:17He did sign the plaque and dated it 1901.
21:22He is an Englishman born in 1864.
21:28He died in 1936.
21:30And he was a master of the enameling technique.
21:37Fisher won a scholarship to attend the National Art Training School in London, where he studied in the mid-1880s.
21:45And part of that then became a traveling scholarship to go on and study enameling in France and Italy.
21:51But I think it was with the French masters that he really developed the techniques that he brought back to
21:56both create works with and to teach others about.
21:59After his studies in the mid-1880s, he came back to London and established his own studio where he both
22:07created enamel and taught enameling.
22:10This form of enameling is painted enamel.
22:13And the depiction comes from the verse from Genesis.
22:17Under it, the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair.
22:22It's a magnificent, magnificent example of his work.
22:26And you have this letter from Fisher dated 1926, in which he writes how special this work is.
22:34P.S. I am so glad the enamel is a pleasure to you.
22:39It was a great effort as a piece of enamel.
22:43There is nothing like it in the world.
22:46While we know there are other Fisher enamels out there, that says something that he said that a hundred years
22:52ago.
22:52Despite the very minor condition issues, it's a magnificent item.
22:56This truly is a museum-quality work of art.
23:00Do you have an idea of what it would cost originally?
23:04We don't have a receipt, but we were told he paid $8,000 for it.
23:08And in about what year?
23:101926, when the letter was written.
23:13Well, that would have been a lot of money back then.
23:15But that's appropriate because, again, at the time, he was an important creator of these things.
23:20This should be insured for $100,000.
23:25Woo.
23:27That's quite a bit, yeah.
23:29Wow.
23:30Well, I guess we better up the insurance a little bit.
23:35Wow.
23:37Well, this is a letter written to my wife's foster uncle in 1957 when Kennedy did the commencement speech at
23:47the University of Georgia.
23:48He didn't get to talk to him when he came there, but he wrote him a letter and said he
23:53was sorry he missed him.
23:54And they discussed what they did in World War II.
24:03Well, I do a lot of thrifting and estate sales, and I just, this is from a home in Williamsburg,
24:10Virginia.
24:11An old lady, her mom, it was her mom's, and she, her mom passed, and that's pretty much all I
24:17really know about it is that it was her mom's.
24:21It was probably about $80.
24:26Christmas of 1978, my mother and dad decided that instead of giving us a bunch of stuff that wouldn't last,
24:34they would give us some art.
24:37And so these four squares are a sculpture from Carl Andre.
24:42And, of course, when they gave them to me, I had no idea who Carl Andre was.
24:48I took him back to college with me.
24:49I took him to graduate school after that.
24:51When I tried to explain it to my fraternity brothers or friends, they said it looked like drink coasters to
24:58me.
24:59And they have been used as drink coasters.
25:02Came back, moved back to Savannah, got married, had four children, and I sort of forgot about it.
25:07And then last year I read in the New York Times that he died, and so I remembered that I
25:13had him.
25:13So they are by Carl Andre.
25:15He was the leading minimalist artist.
25:17Right.
25:18And we're showing him this way, but let's show the way it's really supposed to look.
25:23I have the receipt, but I don't have it with me.
25:26The picture with the receipt has a picture of it arranged like that, so I've assumed that that's the way
25:32it was meant to be.
25:33His work is meant to be flat on the ground.
25:36Right.
25:37The larger works can be 10, 15 feet square.
25:40He felt that people should be able to walk on them.
25:43Wow.
25:43This minimalist movement was a reaction against abstract expressionism, and the idea was to reduce art to the most simple,
25:51basic forms.
25:52He was very prominent.
25:54He had exhibitions in major museums, the Guggenheim, the Tate.
25:57He's quite controversial in his personal life.
26:00I read a little bit about that in the Times.
26:03Right.
26:04Carl's wife was Ana Mandietta, and she was a very prominent Cuban artist.
26:09She was well known for her Earthbody series.
26:12His wife died, and he was tried for secondary murder, and he was acquitted.
26:19But many, many people in the art world felt that he was guilty.
26:25And as a result, every time he showed after that, this was in the 1980s, there would be huge protests
26:31saying that he really was guilty.
26:34He went off to Europe.
26:35He stopped showing, and his career was really in decline.
26:40Do you know who your father bought it from?
26:43After I got more interested in it, I found out that the art director had introduced him to a friend
26:48of his, Angela Westwater, in New York.
26:51And she was a very prominent art dealer at that time.
26:55Right.
26:55So it has that really great provenance.
26:58And I understand you have all the material.
27:01We do.
27:02And I can't remember how much he might have paid for them.
27:06If I had to guess, I'd probably say maybe $2,000 or $3,000.
27:09His work is very desirable, very, very collectible.
27:12I think an insurance valuation would be in the $10,000 range.
27:17Probably shouldn't use them as drink coasters anymore.
27:21Unless it's a really fine wine.
27:27This I actually ended up finding at a rag house.
27:30And it had a piece of paper in the pocket.
27:33And it has a stamp here from Marseille.
27:35And I ended up looking everything up.
27:37Amazingly found a lot of information.
27:40It was made for the archers in a parade for a town in France's tricentennial.
27:46And I actually found a video of the guys marching in it.
27:49So I have a great story.
27:50It's beautiful and it fits me like a glove.
27:53She wears it around the house.
27:55I do wear it around the house.
27:59This is an Andy Warhol collection of prints.
28:04My grandmother met Andy at one of his exhibits in Sacramento, California.
28:11And had him sign the front of this collection for my mother Catherine.
28:16And that's about all I know.
28:19So I'm nervous.
28:23So Andy Warhol is one of the most desirable American artists.
28:27Not just for the 20th century.
28:28I think overall.
28:30This is one of the most iconic groups that Andy Warhol put together later in his career.
28:36It's called Andy Warhol Myths.
28:39So in this case, it was really terrific that he signed the cover of this group as well as the
28:48image of Howdy Doody.
28:50What I thought the most striking image, actually, is that Andy Warhol included himself in the group of portraits.
28:58You get the shadow on the wall and him sort of looking into the picture.
29:03These are essentially postcards.
29:07And the group was an advertisement for large poster-sized lithographs that numbered and signed.
29:15This was done in 1981.
29:17And then, unfortunately, he passed away in 1987.
29:20It was a collaboration between Warhol and his gallerist, Feldman, who was the publisher of the cards as well as
29:31the lithographs.
29:32Have you ever had them appraised?
29:34No.
29:35They've been sitting in storage in my mother's house.
29:38And I've only heard about them.
29:42This is like the longest I've spent time with them and seeing them and looking at them.
29:48Uh-huh.
29:50At auction, I would place an estimate of about $2,000 to $3,000 on this group of guys.
29:55Okay.
29:55Great.
29:56Thank you.
29:57Thank you for bringing me this.
29:58Oh, yes.
30:04I brought in a brooch that could also be worn on a pendant.
30:09I've had it for approximately four years, and it was given to me by my former fiancé.
30:18He passed away about two years ago.
30:21It belonged to his mother.
30:23Now, he was 95 when he passed away, and so you can imagine how long this has been with her.
30:33So I was thrilled to have it.
30:36When the jewelry moves, when you're walking, when you're dancing, it's scintillating and catching the light.
30:42I love the use of the baguettes, kind of ribbon-like.
30:46And then you have marquees, cut stones, you have pear-shaped stones, and it's all set in platinum.
30:55Most people who come in to see me in my regular everyday life, and they have this brooch or something
31:01like this,
31:02they always come in and they tell me I have a piece of Van Cleef and Arpel's jewelry.
31:07And if you turn around and you look at the back, it looks like it says Van Cleef.
31:13It's signed Van Cleef. This is his full name.
31:18Howard George Bud Van Cleef.
31:22He was a jeweler from the same state that I come from, New Jersey.
31:26Okay.
31:27He was born in Union City in the early 1920s.
31:31He had an office in New York in a manufacturing facility, 609 Fifth Avenue.
31:38And he was in the business for 50 years.
31:42Oh, that's a long time.
31:43And he made a lot of fabulous jewelry like this.
31:45I bet so.
31:46I think this was probably made in the early 1960s.
31:50You can find comparable things like this for sale, and they're around $40,000 to replace this today.
31:58It's a beautiful price.
32:00Yeah.
32:00I mean, look, if it was at auction, I would probably put it in for $12,000 to $18,000.
32:08I see.
32:09If it was Van Cleef, it'd probably be $60,000 to $80,000 for an auction estimate.
32:16Retail would be $100,000 and over.
32:19It's not.
32:20It's not, but it's still fabulous.
32:22It is.
32:22It looks very Hollywood.
32:25Okay.
32:26What we have here is a 1964 Crucinelli 702V.
32:30It was made by the Crucinelli Company in Italy, and they were most famous for actually making accordions.
32:35And it's pretty comparable in appointments to Gibson in the period, though it was much cheaper at the time.
32:41And it sounds like a million bucks.
32:50They said that this guy was, like, they didn't know how somebody could taxidermy this toad.
33:00And this guy might be worth at least $100, but she is blowing my mind.
33:06But when I got him at the store, he was either $24 or $20.
33:12Ribbit.
33:14Ribbit.
33:23In 2021, my father-in-law passed away, and my husband inherited this artwork.
33:30The artist is Alexis Jean Fournier, and as we went through a collection of things of my in-laws,
33:36we also saw some other pieces that had his name, his picture.
33:41And so it really had me interested in digging.
33:44And so I did an ancestry dive, and come to find out, the artist Alexis Jean Fournier was married to
33:52my husband's great-aunt, Emma Frick, was his first wife.
33:55This is a wonderful oil painting.
33:58It's by Alexis Jean Fournier, as you know.
34:00He was born in St. Paul, Minnesota.
34:02On July 4th, 1865, he trained first in Minneapolis, and then, as so many 19th-century American artists did,
34:11he went to Paris to train, and he went first to the Académie Julienne.
34:15He then traveled around Paris and northern France, and he was especially interested in the Barbizon painters.
34:22And over the 1890s and the 1901s, he did a whole series of paintings.
34:30He called the series the home and haunts of the Barbizon masters.
34:33And given the architecture and the style, we know that it's clearly something that would have been painted in France,
34:40probably would have been painted in the 1901s as part of that series.
34:44What makes it special is its light.
34:47That light is just beautiful, but it's a light that's more very late 19th-century or in early 20th-century,
34:55and so that's part of the key to knowing about when it would be dated.
34:58It's had a troubled past.
35:00It's had some condition issues.
35:01Okay.
35:02And you know what?
35:03When you're 100 years old, you end up with condition issues.
35:06But if you look closely, you can see there's a fair amount of retouch.
35:10If we look up here, you can see sort of some discolored areas.
35:13It's especially obvious here if we look along the edge.
35:16You can see where it's been retouched.
35:18The other thing that's going on, especially with the sky, is the painting is starting to cup.
35:23So instead of lying flat on the canvas, the edges are just starting to cup up.
35:28Right now, it's pretty stable, but at some point, you will probably lose more paint.
35:33Condition affects value.
35:34Other than condition, the thing we tend to harp on is provenance.
35:39This was in the artist's family.
35:42You can't get better provenance than that.
35:44In its current condition, if it were to be brought up at auction, we'd estimate it at $20,000 to
35:49$30,000.
35:50I would recommend conservation.
35:54When everything is properly laid back down and consolidated, you're probably looking more like $35,000 to $55,000 for
36:02an auction estimate.
36:03Okay, wow.
36:12Another integral part of the operation of the repair shops was this 125-foot-tall smokestack.
36:21The smokestack exhausted the smoke and hot gases from the forges in the blacksmith shop and also the boiler and
36:30the boiler and engine house.
36:32It did this through Bernoulli's principle, which is a movement of air from high pressure to low pressure.
36:39So those fires in the forges and in the boiler create a high pressure system.
36:44And at the top of the stack, there's a low pressure system.
36:47The air is cooler.
36:48The breeze is blowing.
36:49And it sucked that smoke off of those fires and exhausted it up into the air to keep that out
36:55of the shop complex so it was a little bit more comfortable for people to work here.
36:59This was the height of technology in the 1850s when this facility was built.
37:08I brought a belt that I acquired in the 1980s.
37:13I really wanted to know more about the belt.
37:15Okay.
37:16Where did you buy it?
37:17I bought it in a pawn shop.
37:19Really?
37:19Yes, I did.
37:20And where was that?
37:21In Atlanta.
37:22Oh, wow.
37:22And what drew you to it?
37:24It reminds me of items that I collect from North Africa.
37:28Well, it is in fact Ottoman.
37:30So that means it's from Turkey and more specifically the Caucasus region.
37:35It's silver, silver gilt, also niello worked, which are these beautiful oval panels here picked out in black.
37:44It's also got filigree on it.
37:45And each one of these panels is cast and made individually and then worked together with a pin along each
37:52one.
37:52So it creates a belt shape.
37:54And niello work is characteristic of pieces from this region and from this time.
37:58So each one of these has a slightly different decorative element to it.
38:03You have a little foliate motif in a sort of star shape.
38:06You also, interestingly, have a stylized tugra mark on several of them.
38:11And that is the symbol for the Ottoman sultan who lived in Istanbul.
38:15And it is marked behind the buckle in Arabic or script.
38:20How much did you pay for it when you bought it?
38:22Well, when I bought it, I bought it for the weight of silver.
38:25Ah, okay.
38:26So I paid less than $100 for it.
38:29Interesting.
38:29Okay.
38:30But I think this is worth much more than the silver content.
38:33I think a retail price for this today should comfortably sit within $1,000 to $1,500.
38:40Very good.
38:41Thank you.
38:42Thank you very much.
38:43Thank you very much.
39:17This is a gramophone.
39:19Mm-hmm.
39:20We picked it up maybe 25 years ago in Ljubljana, Slovenia.
39:25Okay.
39:25We had just completed a week-long hiking tour of the Slovenian Alps.
39:31And it was Sunday morning.
39:33And they had like a flea market set up with booths and tables along the river.
39:39And this was all polished and shined up and caught the sun.
39:43And it caught my husband's eye.
39:45And it was going to go home with us.
39:48Okay.
39:49We think we paid around $100 for it.
39:52But we're not sure.
39:53Right.
39:53And we know that we made the vendor's day.
39:55Because within 10 minutes, he had folded up shop and went home.
39:59And I have to settle a bet between you and your husband?
40:03My husband has always been convinced that it's got to be authentic because it came from Europe.
40:08Right.
40:08And I know that there are all kinds of knockoffs that look exactly like this that are worth about $100
40:14a piece.
40:15So you can settle that for us.
40:18Well, I'll try to do my best.
40:20So I remember when I first did the first season of Roadshow, these gramophones would come in.
40:24And they were always a big hit.
40:26Now, the markets have changed since then.
40:29And there are also real ones and later productions.
40:32Uh-huh.
40:33I think you're both right.
40:34I want to settle this.
40:35Oh, you're a diplomat.
40:36I did not want to offend anyone.
40:39But there's a couple of things that I want to point out.
40:42First of all, this label in green, that is a later reproduction of the piece.
40:48I would date this in and around the 1940s.
40:52Okay.
40:52The other part of it is the back mounting that's holding up the whole horn is either replaced or a
40:59later production.
41:00Okay.
41:01You also have this dog.
41:03And tell me the story about this.
41:05That dog I found at an outlet store in Savannah.
41:10This is Sparky.
41:12He should have his head cocked and the sound of my master's voice.
41:16Right.
41:16The mold maker thought that the dog was defective because his head was cocked.
41:23So he changed the mold and made all of them with their...
41:27So I have a Sparky with his head on straight and he's probably not worth very much because of that.
41:31Well, his name is actually Nipper, not Sparky.
41:36Oh.
41:36So it was Nipper.
41:37And even on the record, you can actually see that he is there with his head cocked.
41:42Right.
41:42And that's Nipper.
41:44Also, he has the black spot around his eye, which he shouldn't because that Nipper never had that.
41:50And also the way that this is painted, you can see that there's the paintbrush.
41:55They paint it outside of the lines.
41:56So this is the knockoff Nipper.
41:59So this is the knockoff.
42:00This is a later production.
42:03However, with everything together with the gramophone and the reproduction Nipper, I would put an auction estimate in the $800
42:10to $1,200 price range.
42:11Really?
42:12Yes.
42:13Okay.
42:14So am I right or is my husband?
42:18That is the question.
42:20I think you're both right.
42:22Okay.
42:28This painting was bought in Sumner, Georgia.
42:33It had an antique shop.
42:34My son bought it for $37.
42:36I don't know anything else about it other than that.
42:45We inherited it from my grandmother.
42:49And we have a picture of it from the early 1890s in the home that it was living in at
42:58the time in Wisconsin.
43:00It's so nice to have a picture of a clock in its original setting.
43:04It really places it time-wise.
43:06And my aunt and uncle told me that it had been in the family since the 1800s.
43:13Do you know about its origin at all?
43:15I do not.
43:16Okay.
43:17Do you know who made it?
43:18No.
43:18Never had it appraised at all.
43:20Okay.
43:21Well, this is a figural clock.
43:23And it was made by the Ansonia Clock Company in New York.
43:27And it really was made to sort of be less expensive than a French clock.
43:32But it's still a beautiful thing.
43:34It's one of these clocks that's worth fixing because it'll be a good timekeeper for years to come.
43:38So it's worth putting money into the movement and having it restored.
43:42I can see that the movement is a little bit grungy or dirty.
43:45It hasn't been attended to in a long time.
43:48So it might be time to get that done.
43:51A clock like this in a retail situation would probably be priced anywhere from, oh, $550 to $850.
44:00And you've got to know that the market's down right now.
44:02It used to be more valuable.
44:03And I'm sure it will come back.
44:05But right now, these figural clocks are a harder sell to younger generations.
44:10I actually found it at a thrift store.
44:13I think it may be attributed to the artist Frank Stella.
44:16And how much did you pay for it?
44:18$3.99.
44:20So what you have here is a color screen print with pencil marks by Frank Stella,
44:27a great post-war abstract artist.
44:30You recognize it right away.
44:31A very modern, mid-century look.
44:33And Frank Stella was a pioneer of abstraction in the 1960s.
44:38He was one of the first artists to do non-objective painting.
44:43And this is a print version of some of the paintings he did.
44:48It's a 1967 screen print called Fortin de las Flores.
44:53And it comes from a portfolio called Ten.
44:56It included ten works by ten different artists.
44:59Works by Roy Lichtenstein and Robert Rauschenberg.
45:03Really, at the time, the cutting-edge artists.
45:06Published by the Leo Castelli Gallery in New York.
45:09And it was published to honor their 10th anniversary.
45:13It was printed in an edition of 200.
45:16It's initialed and dated and numbered in the lower right in brown ink.
45:20And it has the embossed mark of the printer, lower left.
45:24The colors are really strong.
45:26It's got a great color.
45:27It has pop.
45:28And it's on this great graph paper.
45:30So this is a color screen print, which is a print made through screens, individually printing each color.
45:39And they're separated by fine lines that were done by pencil.
45:43Someone would have done that by hand.
45:44It's well documented as a screen print of Frank Stella.
45:48It's in many museum collections, including the Museum of Juan Rock.
45:52Frank Stella rose to prominence in the late 60s in New York.
45:57And this is also from 67.
45:59So this is an early work by him.
46:01So it's really a great example.
46:03This is a Kulik frame.
46:04It's a classic mid-century design frame that was actually pioneered at MoMA.
46:11Kulik was a frame maker.
46:13He was also a painter, but he was a frame maker who pioneered this frame was cutting edge in the
46:1960s.
46:20And quickly adapted by many contemporary artists and galleries.
46:23Do you have any sense of the value?
46:25Somebody had mentioned like $2,000 to $5,000 for Frank Stella.
46:30So if it's more than what I paid for it, then I'm happy.
46:35Well, I think it's in good condition.
46:37We see that with the bright colors.
46:39There's a little dust inside the frame.
46:41It's dirty.
46:42But I'm glad you didn't touch it.
46:43I would estimate it at auction at $5,000 to $7,000.
46:47Nice.
46:48That is wonderful.
46:51I'm thrilled.
46:57We got it at an estate sale a few years ago.
47:00I don't think more than $5.
47:02I have no information about this thing other than it's pretty and I like it.
47:15We inherited it from my mother and it was by far the most expensive piece of art she purchased.
47:22I believe it was 1992 and she paid $16,200.
47:29Okay.
47:30So not nothing.
47:31Not nothing, especially for her.
47:33She liked having women artists in her house, their artwork anyhow.
47:40And this we knew was a woman from Chile and it's something that always got a lot of attention.
47:47And who is the artist?
47:48Olga de Amaral.
47:51Yes.
47:51So Olga de Amaral is a quite well-known fiber artist and actually from Colombia, not Chile.
47:58Oh, really?
47:59And is still living and actively working.
48:01She is 93 years old, still has her Bogota workshop.
48:06This work is signed on the reverse, so we do have a date, May 1992.
48:10It comes from her series called Lost Images or Imagen Perdida.
48:16That was a series of about 17 works, at least that many are known, and some are in museum collections.
48:23Really?
48:23And it was a traveling exhibition at the time that went to several venues throughout the U.S., including the
48:31Allrich Gallery in San Francisco, where your mother had acquired this.
48:35And where was this piece displayed?
48:37In her bedroom, actually.
48:40And she spent the last years of her life in bed, so it was significant.
48:44It was an important piece for her.
48:47When this came in, I kind of couldn't believe what I was looking at.
48:53I did not think I would get this close to a work by damn at all.
48:57Get out of here.
48:59This is really exciting.
49:01Really?
49:01And what do you think this material is?
49:04Well, it looks like leather, but I'm sure it isn't.
49:09Exactly.
49:10It's not leather.
49:10It definitely has that look to it.
49:12It's cut strips of linen that she has gessoed, painted, and then gilded.
49:19And before the last gilding, she's also pulled out threads in a weaving process called drawn work.
49:26And so she's cut and drawn these threads out to create little breaks in between each square of gold.
49:35Now, going back to what your mother paid, remind me again?
49:39$16,200.
49:41Okay.
49:41So about $35,000 today.
49:44That's not nothing.
49:46That's a decent price.
49:48Taking into consideration that it does need some conservation, I'm going to be very conservative.
49:54Conservative.
49:55Conservative.
49:56In this condition, untouched, I would say easily, comfortably, an estimate at auction of $150,000 to $250,000.
50:07Yikes.
50:08All right.
50:12It's worth doing the work on it.
50:15Definitely.
50:16I think you wouldn't need to spend more than a few thousand to get it really in tip-top shape.
50:21Would that change the value?
50:23Oh, yeah.
50:24Again, I'm going to say conservatively, I'd add another $100,000 to that.
50:29$250,000 to $350,000.
50:31I see why people cry on Roadshow.
50:37I would insure it for $500,000 because her works have gone for well above that number at auction in
50:45recent times.
50:46Oh, my.
50:47They're very sought after.
50:49Thank you.
50:49Thank you very much.
50:53And now, it's time for the Roadshow Feedback Booth.
50:56And this is my grandfather's watch.
50:59It's about 100 years old.
51:02And it's just a family heirloom.
51:05And it wasn't worth much, but it's worth the world to me.
51:10This Charles Lindbergh chair is one of a kind and heavy to carry, but this ring is worth more than
51:15it.
51:16It's $2,000, and it was a lot lighter.
51:18The item we thought was going to be a million-dollar winner for us was about $150, but since I
51:26paid a dollar, that's fine.
51:28This was a wonderful 50th anniversary trip.
51:31We appreciate it.
51:33Yes, and I bought this ring watch.
51:35It's worth a couple hundred dollars and found out this was a reproduction.
51:39And I bought this cup, and they told me it's only worth about $12.
51:43So, we had a great time, though.
51:45Yes.
51:46This is my antique rattan hat, and I asked how to keep it clean, and they said it don't matter,
51:53because it's only worth $50.
51:56Womp, womp.
51:57I brought this clock that belonged to my grandfather, and it's worth about $100.
52:03And I brought Tom.
52:04He's priceless.
52:07We wanted to come to the Antiques Roadshow for a long time.
52:11And we brought these timepieces.
52:14And we had the time of our lives.
52:16Thank you, Antiques Roadshow.
52:18Thanks for watching.
52:20See you next time on Antiques Roadshow.
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