2001's Top Antiques Stories
The year that seemed so far off when it made movie headlines back in 1968 has come and gone. While manned space travel hasn't progressed swiftly as Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick prophesized in "2001 Space
Odyssey," super-computers like Hal 2000 seem, amazingly, already at our doorstep. In reflection, here is a sprinkling of last year's antique stories I found most interesting and newsworthy:
SIGN OF THE TIMES – The, circa 1830 Village Hotel and temperance house burned in 1876. It's double-sided 36 inches high x 56 inches wide sign featuring the words "Village Hotel" and "S. Judd" with an eagle in a boat, arrows, a lance, and an American flag was saved however. Good thing. It brought $302,500 at Northampton, Massachusetts, held the on-site sale in South Hadley on Saturday, June 9. American folk art was a hot market in 2001.
GOVERNMENT PROBE SNAGS MAJOR AUCTION HOUSES – This past December, according to an article in USA Today, A. Alfred Taubman, multimillionaire former chairman of Sotheby's auction house, was convicted by a Jury in the U.S. District Court of plotting with his counterpart, Sir Anthony Tennant at rival Christie's to fix the commissions paid by sellers of art and antiques. Taubman, 76, is set to be sentenced April 2. He faces 3 years in prison and a $350,000 fine. In the highly publicized three week trial the prosecution granted amnesty to Christie's and former Sotheby's CEO, Diana Brooks in exchange for their testimony. The conviction came at a cost. The Clinton Administration's 8-year "crack down" on companies like Microsoft, Phillip Morris, and Sotheby's took precedent over terrorism. Janet Reno's FBI was playing MONOPOLY while when the real game was RISK.
WESTERN ART CONTINUES ITS GALLOPING PACE – More than doubling the previous record price for a Russell watercolor $2,310,000 (includes buyer's premium) was paid for Charles M. Russell's watercolor A Disputed Trail, dated 1908 and estimated at $600,000/900,000. 600 plus bidders packed the Coeur d'Alene Art Auction at the Silver Legacy Resort in Reno, Nevada, on July 28 for the annual auction of classic western, wildlife, and sporting art. The total for the sale was $14,092,320. With wealth moving inward, away from the coasts to places like Montana and Nevada, cowboy antiques and art continued to outpace almost all other collectible markets in 2001.
DYNASTY WINDING DOWN: FIRM OF ISRAEL SACK TO "RESTRUCTURE" – By far the most influencial American antique furniture dealers of the 20th century announced in a December press release that; following the death of brother Harold Sack and the semiretirement of younger brother Robert, they were significantly scaling back their business. Eighty-six year old Albert Sack joked about his intention to sell off a huge chunk of firm and family's inventory at auction, "I'm eighty-six going on sixty-eight. The firm has to undergo a restructuring." Launched by legendary Lithuanian immigrant Israel Sack in the twenties, the evaporation of Sack Inc. denotes the end of an era.
DOT-COM WOES BYTE ANTIQUE INDUSTRY – Soethby's Online Auctions is floundering. Leslie Hindman's highly publicized Eppraisals went belly-up. Hundreds, perhaps thousands of Internet based antique businesses went under in 2001. Even promising eHammer went offline October 23. In a letter to stockholders, CEO Frederick Giampietro wrote, "No one could have predicted the twists and turns that the Internet has taken over the last few years. Since our inception, nearly four years ago, the Internet has gone from thousands of start-up entrepreneurs with ample access of funding, to a marketplace that is controlled by a few behemoth sites (namely eBay) and an absence of capital for new e-commerce solutions." Last year's lesson: high-tech doesn't necessarily entail high times.
HAIR LOOMS AS THE HOTTEST ANTIQUE HEIRLOOM – As reported by the Maine Antique Digest, "hair collecting—mostly the hair of the rich and famous—is quietly becoming one of the country's fastest-growing hobbies." $350 for a single strand of Beethoven's hair. $100 for seven stands of Henry Ford. A snippet of Marilyn Monroe fetches $300. And a whopping $50,000 is the reported value for a Lincoln lock. In the article, a collector explained last year's exploding prices, "The hair alone makes for a most fascinating and awe-inspiring viewing. Imagine actually having a real part of the person you most admire and hold sacred." Here's another explanation: genetic engineering. One day, tommorow's Princess Diana, will prove much more interesting than yesteryear's, Queen Anne.
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