Yale Wonder Clock in a Class by Itself Strikes It Rich at Auction

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Santa Fe, May 1, 2008–I love to run across unusual things I’ve never seen before.  It’s a real treat.

When you’ve been in the field for years there’s the tendency to get jaded.  Objects like the one I’m about to describe make me stand back and smile.

The Yale Wonder Clock is rare.  Talk about gimmicks and options.

This peculiar oak clock stands about 7 feet tall.  It’s a marriage of clock, music box, coin collecting, arcade machine and just plain fun.

When you insert a nickel-size, stamped aluminum coin into it–lights also flash, music plays, and a token drops into a reward cup potentially worth 5¢, 10¢, 15¢, or 25¢.  It’s a genuine get rich quick scheme from another era.

While all this is happening within the case, three numbered tiny reels spin, generating a random number between 000 and 999.

The store displaying this unusual clock probably posted a list of lucky numbers on the wall which gifted winners with a cash prize.  It’s quite the machine.

The inventor, Charles A. Yale, incorporated his company in Burlington, Vermont in 1900.  The main product appears to have been this remarkable timepiece.

Less than 1,000 Wonder Clocks were actually made, probably more like 600-700.  Of these, only about a handful survive today.

The Yale Wonder Clock is in a class by itself.  The one offered for sale at James D. Julia’s Winter Antiques and Fine Art Auction on Feb. 2, was early, with a low serial number, # 123.  It was also a real beauty.

The clock still works and sold in the auction for $86,250.

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“Iron Horse” Rides into Baseball History at Hunt Auction

Just walking up to the microphone was a struggle for the baseball legend.  Even so, Lou Gehrig dressed in his Yankee uniform slowly stepped up.  He tipped his head shyly, ran his right hand through his hair and wiped back the tears.

July 4, 1939 was Lou Gehrig Appreciation Day at Yankee Stadium.  Gehrig’s admirers were waiting.  Dead silence filled the stadium.  Even the men in the press box stopped typing.

Gehrig had written his feelings down but when it was time to speak the words simply flowed from his heart.

“Fans, for the past two weeks you have been reading about a bad break I got.  Yet today I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of this earth,” Gehrig said.  “I may have had a tough break, but I have an awful lot to live for.”

The sorrowful expression on his face never changed.  Gehrig went on to thank everyone from his fans and teammates to his coaches and family.

Truth was this was Gehrig’s last hurrah on the field.  Everyone knew it.

The first game between the Yankees and the Senators had just ended.  The whole team was there including Joe DiMaggio.  Even Babe Ruth showed up (the two had little use for each other) along with the mayor of New York, and Gehrig’s friends and family.

Over 60,000 fans in the stands didn’t know the baseball legend was dying.  Gehrig himself hadn’t been told the disease ALS was going to take his life.

But, he knew.

He couldn’t hit.  He couldn’t field.  He was losing weight.  His hair was turning gray.

He was stumbling and dropping things.

At age 36, Gehrig had been diagnosed with a rare and deadly disease of the central nervous system.  A disease that now bears his name.

During his 14 years as a first baseman for the Yankees, Gehrig never missed a single game.  Now he was facing the loss of his life.

After Gehrig finished speaking Ruth walked up to him, threw his arms around him and gave Gehrig a big hug.  The marching band played “I Love You Truly” and the fans roared, “We love you, Lou.”

It was one of those larger-than-life moments in baseball history that people couldn’t forget if they tried.  Despite his personal misfortune, Gehrig had been part of one of the greatest baseball dynasties in history.  His staying power won him the nickname “Iron Horse.”

His light was fading but the legend could never be snuffed out.

“Somehow I felt that at the Stadium yesterday they were honoring not a great baseball player but truly great sportsman who could take his triumphs with sincere modesty and could face tragedy with a smile,” said Richards Vidmer in The Herald Tribune.

“He has stood for something finer than merely a great baseball player-he stood for everything that makes sports important in the American scene.”

In December 1939 Gehrig was voted into the Baseball Hall of Fame and the Yankees retired his uniform.  It was the first time a major-league baseball team honored a player that way.

Gehrig died on June 2, 1941.

One of the most treasured pieces of Lou Gehrig memorabilia, his game-worn jersey, went on the block on Nov. 10 at Hunt Auctions Louisville Slugger Museum & Factory Auction in Louisville, Ky .

The 1938, pin-stripped, New York Yankees home flannel jersey sold for $402,500.  Its origin is equally interesting.

John Ryan of Passaic, N.J., was involved in forming an amateur baseball team for a church league in 1938.  Ryan went to the Yankees after the 1938 World Series and purchased the complete roster of used player jerseys for his church team at $9.00 each.

Gehrig’s shirt was saved for repair patches in case the other jerseys were damaged.  The team folded after one season and the Gehrig jersey remains intact for history.

Rosemary McKittrick covers the art, antiques and collectibles market weekly in her column.

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George Benson Guitars Rock Skinner Auction

George Benson was born with a pure soul voice and an un-nerving passion for the blues.  He won his first singing contest at four-years-old.  Even then he played to the crowd.

The musical prodigy grew up in Pittsburgh and hit the jazz scene at age eight playing ukulele and later guitar in corner pubs around town.

Like a bright star in the dreary sky above the steel city, there was no stopping the boy or his music.

Today Benson reigns as a jazz giant, one of the greatest rhythm guitar legends in history.  Best of all, he can play just about any style.

“I was an entertainer first,” he said.  “I’ve had the pleasure of playing with the baddest jazz cats on the planet.  But that doesn’t change my desire to entertain folks.  That’s really who I am.”

Benson’s early musical heroes included guitarists Charlie Christian, Wes Montgomery, Django Reinhardt, Hank Garland and Grant Green.  But he developed a style all his own.

“I’ve always liked the hot guitar guys, he said.”

As a teenager Benson sang and played guitar in a rock-and-roll band.  Jack McDuff heard him and it wasn’t long before Benson joined the organist’s jazz trio as a featured member from 1962-1965.

Talent scout John Hammond also heard Benson play and said he had the perfect combination of brains and flash.  He signed Benson to Columbia Records in 1965.

Benson made four highly acclaimed albums for Hammond and Columbia.

After a move to Warner Bros. in 1976 Benson recorded Leon Russell’s “This Masquerade” on his album “Breezin’” and the album climbed to multi-platinum status.

He followed up with “On Broadway,” and “Give Me the Night,” which completely engaged dancers.

Predictable Benson has never been.  In fact, some of his old fans were upset about his new “pop” success.

“I guess that’s the biggest crime I’ve made as far as jazz lovers go,” he said. “They don’t always like to see you play for the general public.  They want to be catered to.  But I’ve tried that approach and it doesn’t work for me.  Nobody can stay one way for 30 years. I’ve always tried to let my experience show itself.  You learn, you change. The door opened and I walked through it, he added.”

Walking threw doors led the guitarist to eight Grammy wins.

“I had to break a couple rules along the way,” he said.  “There was an unwritten law: be cool, don’t get too raunchy.  But jazz was once hanging-out music. And the easiest way to involve people is by getting ‘em tapping their feet. When they’re tapping a bit, they’ll go your way.”

One of Benson’s prize possessions was a Gibson L-5 guitar that belonged to jazz great Wes Montgomery.  It was the guitar Wes recorded many of his hits on like “Goin Out of My Head” and “Windy.”

The guitar was pictured on the album cover of “Movin Wes.”  It was also the same one Benson used for a tribute concert for Wes at the Hollywood Bowl.

On Oct 14, Skinner Auctioneers, Boston, Mass., featured the guitar for sale in its Fine Musical Instruments auction which included the collection of George Benson.  The guitar sold for $41,125.

Here are current values for other Benson guitars and instruments sold in the auction.

George Benson Collection

Guitar; American Guitar; Epiphone Incorporated; New York; 1946; Model Emperor; $4,700.

Guitar; American Guitar; James D’ Aquisto; 1968; New Yorker Special; signed and dated; ex-collection of Dick Sierota;  $35,250.

Trumpet; B Flat; Martin Company; circa 1980; ex-collection of Miles Davis; engraved with his personal request for the crescent moon and stars on blue lacquer;  $41,125.

Guitar; Gibson; Kalamazoo, 1966; Model Johnny Smith; custom guitar made for Ike Isaacs; leading British jazz guitarist for generations;  $41,125.

Rosemary McKittrick covers the auction market in her weekly column.

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Magic Posters Mystify Readers at LiveAuctionTalk.com
It was the greatest trunk mystery the world had ever seen.  That’s what the advertising handbill called it.

“The Houdini’s Original Introducers of Metamorphosis.  Exchanging Places in 3 Seconds,” the poster said.

At the top Harry Houdini’s vignette could be seen with the words “Harry the King of Handcuffs” underneath.  In the bottom right was a vignette of his assistant and wife Bess and the words “Beatrice Queen of Mystery.”

Harry Houdini, the muse of magic, had done it once again.  His new trick mystified the world.

Metamorphosis was its name.

Onstage Houdini climbed into a sack that was placed inside a large wooden traveler’s trunk.  Audience members tied Houdini’s hands behind his back as he crouched inside close to the row of air holes along the bottom.

The sack was shut and tied securely with ropes.  Finally, the lid to the trunk was also closed along with the stage curtain.

“Now then, I shall clap my hands three times and at the third and last time I ask you to watch closely for the effect,” Bess said.

She quickly closed the curtain and vanished from sight.  Instantly the curtain was reopened not by Bess but by Houdini himself.

But Bess was now gone.

Houdini turned toward the trunk.  He reopened the lid and inside knelt Bess with her hands tied behind her back.

The switch was made.  But how?

What the audience didn’t know and couldn’t see was the secret panel.  The trunk might be locked but Houdini could escape from inside by pulling open the panel.

His hands were also tied in a way he could easily free himself.  Then he opened the bottom of the sack with a knife and exited through the trunk’s secret panel.

Bess quickly took his place inside the trunk which was also quickly unlocked.  By the time the trunk was reopened, Bess was already inside the sack.

How did the Houdini’s make the shift in three seconds?

Bess, at barely five-feet-tall was waiflike and fast.  Plus, Houdini had been performing magic since his teens and learned the one supreme secret of the art.

He knew how to misdirect audience attention.

In most of his press and advertising he talked about a “secret.”  Not a bag of magicians’ tricks but a very mysterious “secret” by which he worked his wonders.  It was the most artistic type of misdirection.

If Houdini suspected audiences were figuring out his tricks, he also changed his technique.  The Houdini’s took their show on the road to beer halls and dime museums and wowed vaudeville audiences worldwide.

Just seeing a Houdini advertising poster in 1895 was often enough to coax people to buy a ticket to the show.  These posters were the mainstay of promotion at the turn-of-the-century.

Never meant to be saved, most of them disappeared.  Nowadays they’re highly collectible.

On Oct. 25, Swann Galleries, New York, featured the poster described in The Christian Fechner Collection of American & European Magic, Part III.  The 28 by 20 ¾ inch poster sold for $60,000.  This was the third annual sale from this important collection.

Here are current values for other Houdini items sold in the auction.

Houdini

Photographic Portrait; manacled Houdini being restrained by French policemen; circa 1905;  5 inches by 7 inches;  $2,160.

Pitch Book; “The Adventurous Life of a versatile Artiste”; illustrated; 32 pages; signed bust portrait of Houdini; circa 1910;   $3,840.

Photogravure portrait; Houdini holding a copy of his book “The Unmasking of Robert-Houdin; printed signature beneath portrait; circa 1908; 10 inches by 7 inches;  $4,800.

Lithographed Poster; Harry Houdini, King of Cards; linen-backed; with a signed note in the margin by Houdini’s brother Hardeen, Chicago 1938; 27 ¾ inches by 20 ¾ inches;   $13,200.

Rosemary McKittrick covers the auction market in her weekly art, antique and collectibles column.

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Book of Mormon Merits Rave Reviews at Auction

Feb. 23, 2008–Like a lot of things in life-Mormon history started out simply.

The story goes that in a grove of trees behind his father’s log house in Palmyra, N.Y., in 1820 14-year-old Joseph Smith, Jr., knelt praying.

He prayed for guidance.  He described his experience years later.

“I saw a pillar of light exactly over my head, above the brightness of the sun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me.”

In the vision Smith said God told him to reject all the religions he had heard about.  In time Smith would discover, what was for him the true Christian faith, The Church of Christ–later renamed the Church of Jesus Christ of Later-day Saints.

Over the years Smith said he had more visions.  During one an angel allegedly appeared to him and spoke about hidden gold plates with ancient writing.

The writing contained the history of the original people on the North American continent during the time of Christ.  The angel also told Smith where the plates were buried.

Smith went to the west slope of a hill called Cumorah.  Using a stick as a lever, he moved a stone and uncovered the box.

There he reportedly found plates made of pure gold and bound with three huge wire rings. According to Smith, they were about the size of book pages and no thicker than sheet metal.

He spent years translating the plates and his translations were published in the Book of Mormon in 1830.

Mormon faith is rooted in the Book of Mormon and about 88 million copies have been published since 1830.  It’s the early copies that command attention on the auction block now.

On Oct. 11, PBA Galleries, San Francisco, featured a first edition Book of Mormon.  The plain 588-page text sold for $103,500.  Printed in 1830, only about 500 are estimated to survive today.

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