Antique Trader January 15, 2022

1. Captain America’s movie shield sold for a Marvel-ous $259,540 at Hake’s Auctions in November. 2. Original Ted Hake Americana & Collectibles button. Hake started his auction business in 1967. 3. Gangster Al Capone’s monogrammed Patek Philippe pocket watch sold for $229,900 at Witherell’s last fall. 4. A lady head vase dubbed the “Ghost Girl” by collectors is worth about $275. 5. A Napier charm bracelet from the 1950s. 6. Wing lounge chair designed by Vladimir Kagan, 1970s, valued at $10,000. 7. An ancient Chinese bowl from the 1400s bought at a yard sale for $35 sold for more than $700,000 at Sotheby’s. 8. A Super Mario 64 video game sold for $1.56 million at Heritage Auctions. 9. An NFT (non-fungible token) of Chris Torres wildly popular Nyan Cat, an animated ›ying cat with a Pop-Tart body, sold…

In the latter half of the 19th century, there were limited job opportunities for people with disabilities, so when he carved his career path, Andrew Clemens turned to the hobby he enjoyed during his summer vacations from school — sand art. A self-taught folk artist, Clemens’ delicate craftsmanship of his sand art, contained in small apothecary bottles, is desired by collectors and some examples sell at auction for six figures. Four of these bottles, in fact, set world records in 2021, on the heels of another record-breaking bottle in late 2020. During Skinner Auctioneer’s online Americana sale in November, three of Clemens’ sand bottles sold for a total of nearly $1.8 million, a record for sand bottles sold in a single sale, and two of them sold for more than $850,000 each. Skinner…

The memories come tumbling back like so many falling dominoes picking up speed, fast becoming blurred moments in motion until – splat! – they stop with a sudden click in 1976 when The Poster was first spotted in a buddy’s bedroom. A year later it was everywhere. Bedrooms. College dorm rooms. Garages. You could find The Poster plastered anywhere and everywhere: Cascading blonde hair, impossibly white teeth and a perky, sun-kissed face framed by a red swimsuit. The suit was modest, revealing just enough to mesmerize. If you were there, you could never forget when Farrah Fawcett arrived. The best-selling pinup poster of all time cemented the deal. From that moment on, no one bothered with her full name. It was simply ... Farrah. With her wholesome, girl-next-door sex appeal, she had reached…

Mr. Spock may have thought it all “highly illogical,” but when it comes to fans of Star Trek, the legendary 1960s TV series, it makes perfect sense. A Phaser Rifle, an original, one-of-a-kind prop used by William Shatner in his debut as Star Trek’s Capt. James T. Kirk, sold for $615,000 at Heritage Auctions Entertainment and Music Auctions in November. What makes the Phaser Rifle special in the eyes of fans and collectors is that it was used in the second pilot episode in 1966, entitled “Where No Man Has Gone Before,” effectively launching the show as fans know it today. The episode also kickstarted Shatner’s memorable career as Kirk, who replaced Capt. Christopher Pike as the swashbuckling commander of the starship USS Enterprise. This original series prop comes from the Azarian Collection,…

Everyone who’s been close to me knows I’ve always lived and breathed airplanes. Whether it be working on them, flying them, photographing them, writing about them, or reading about them, airplanes have always been part of my life. What everyone doesn’t know is that I’ve also had a passion for trains; I was just too busy dealing with airplanes to bring trains into my life, except for one semester in college when I took an Intermodal Transportation course (air/sea/land/rail) while earning a degree in Air Commerce/Transportation Technology. Now that I’m retired and spending about a third of each year touring the country in a travel trailer, I’ve got plenty of time to explore train museums and rail yards. I also recently bought a vintage N-scale (1:160) model train set at an…

NEW YORK CITY — In exchange for returning millions of dollars of antiquities, financier and philanthropist Michael Steinhardt will avoid prosecution. Under an agreement with New York City prosecutors, Steinhardt turned over 180 stolen antiquities valued at $70 million. The deal was reached in early December after a multiyear investigation into his activities. It also slaps Steinhardt with a lifetime ban on collecting any other historical relics. Among the stolen antiquities the former hedge fund manager returned are a ceremonial cup from Turkey in the shape of a stag's head; three death masks, likely unearthed from the mountains of Israel, dating back to 6000 or 7000 B.C.; and an ancient Greek chest for human remains. Steinhardt will now avoid prosecution for what authorities have called his “rapacious appetite for plundered artifacts” that crossed…