Rare Book Monthly

Articles - September - 2018 Issue

Saturday Morning on Mainline Television

Many auctions, millions of dollars - for old and rare cars impeccably maintained or restored

Many auctions, millions of dollars - for old and rare cars impeccably maintained or restored

On a recent Saturday, flipping through the now hundreds of TV channels looking for something worth watching I chanced across the future of important rare and collectible paper auctions.  There, at noon on the NBC affiliate covering the San Francisco Bay Area was an auction, yes an auction.

 

It was the Saturday Mecum Car Auction at Pebble Beach held during the antique car get-together where astounding classic cars are sold for even more astounding prices.  Pride of place during the weekend show went to a car that wasn’t made until I was sixteen years old, a 1962 Ferrari GTO 250 that brought $48.4 million.  More to my taste, if not my pocketbook, was a 1935 Duesenberg SSJ that changed hands for $22 million.  Personally, I preferred the 1934 Packard Twelve Individual Custom Convertible Victoria that sold for $3,745,000.  That would have been an excellent car for dating in my teens. 

 

What’s interesting about these sales is that if NBC can show a car auction it’s also possible for rare books to be on mainline television.  So, what would it take?

 

For starters it’s all about money, both the highest values and the number of lots showcased during say an hour.  The cars I watched each spent about five minutes in the pits.  For rare books, given that the values will be lower, the flow would need to be closer to one minute and even then, the material would need to be exalted, probably a ten-million-dollar minimum.

 

So, are there enough very valuable items that could be sold in that hour?   Yes but inevitably it will take not only exalted but also very famous material and that means we may not see a rare book auction on main line television until a Gutenberg Bible is offered.  The next copy, assuming it is sumptuous and very original, should bring fifty million dollars.

 

Such a sale would be very good both for the trade and for book collecting.  With all the collecting and gaming opportunities that abound book collecting can look like Grandpa’s thing.  But if rare books, maps, manuscripts and ephemera can break into the space where the current and future generations of collectors are relaxed and open to new perspectives collectible paper will make a very good case. 

 

Those of us of a certain age know that such material is exceptionally satisfying to study and collect.  Our challenge has long been attracting the attention of future collectors.

 

Therefore, if you have a Gutenberg, and understand it is different from a Duesenberg, think about selling it and suggesting the auction house you select use an hour of mainline television to showcase the experience to the emerging next generation of collectors.

 

It will make a difference.


Posted On: 2018-09-01 10:09
User Name: gallery18

Live-streaming of some auctions is already well established online. With the addition of enhanced production values and commentary and, yes, some stage craft, there's every potential for auctions to become engaging TV fare. In fact, I'm surprised we've not yet seen the creation of a dedicated Auction Channel.


Posted On: 2018-09-01 14:06
User Name: henryberry

As I've often said to my friends and colleagues in the ephemera and antiquarian book trade in and around Connecticut, one of my disappointments with this field is the lack of publicity and promotion in the media, or often amateurish or dull articles when they are seen. Though I'm seeing over the past couple of years much improved efforts, for example with some book shows and some dealers. Long involved in the field, just yesterday I created a blog named Ephemera Today (https://ephemeratoday.blogspot.com). I was inspired not only because of my indefatigable curiosity in books, maps, archival material, etc. — chronic reader, peering into any book I see disease, poring over areas of maps and their design malady, and such — but also because I would like to be doing something to spread news and reports about the commercial value of these materials. Being in the field entails not only challenges regarding knowledge, expertise, and the gaining of relevant experience, but also for serious dealers an investment mindset taking into consideration current and future market conditions, the relationship between social interests and sometimes mores and the affect of this on market value, and risk-reward calculations. I unapologetically bring together items of significant cultural worth and commercial value for such, though do not equate the two since a lot of this has to do with current and changing social interests, events, and demographics (i. e., generational preferences). I could go on... My first article at Ephemera Today to be written over the weekend and posted no later than Monday afternoon is titled "Uncertainties in the Black Americana Market." I'm interested in hearing from others about little-known or recently discovered ephemera, stories of discoveries, ideas for marketing, shaping one's business and managing inventory, emerging markets, and other topics of interest to dealers and the public (henryberryinct@gmail.com).


Posted On: 2018-09-03 01:05
User Name: hermeticsurveyor

Recently I spent some time on youtube looking at videos about book collecting. Almost without exception they were atrociously boring! Talking heads in front of a wall of books is boring, no?

Since then I've hired a videographer and we will experiment, there must be better ways of showing the world how fascinating old books and documents are. One of my favorite vidoes is the episode Anthony Bourdain did inside one of Zubal's warehouses, with the pipes still full of Twinky cream! Here is the 4 min vid. http://www.zubalbooks.com/article-anthony-bourdain.jsp


Rare Book Monthly

  • Freeman’s | Hindman
    Western Manuscripts and Miniatures
    July 8, 2025
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. FRANCESCO PETRARCH (b. Arezzo, 20 July 1304; d. Arqua Petrarca, 19 July 1374). $20,000-30,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF THE MASTER OF THE VITAE IMPERATORUM (active Milan, 1431-1459). $15,000-20,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF ATTAVANTE DEGLI ATTAVANTI (GABRIELLO DI VANTE) (active Florence, c. 1452-c. 1520/25). $15,000-20,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. FOLLOWER OF HERMAN SCHEERE (active London, c. 1405-1425). $15,000-20,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. An exceptionally rare, illuminated music leaf from a Mozarabic Antiphonal with sister leaves mostly in museum collections. $11,500-14,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. Exceptional leaf from a prestigious Antiphonary by a leading illuminator of the late Duecento. $11,500-14,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF THE MASTER OF MS REID 33 and SELWERD ABBEY SCRIPTORIUM (AGNES MARTINI?) (active The Netherlands, Groningen, c. 1468-1510). $10,000-15,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. Previously unknown illumination from one of the most renowned Gothic Choir Book sets of the Middle Ages. $6,000-8,000.
  • Forum Auctions
    Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    17th July 2025
    Forum, July 17: Lucianus Samosatensis. Dialogoi, editio princeps, second issue, Florence, Laurentius Francisci de Alopa, 1496. £10,000 to £15,000.
    Forum, July 17: Boccaccio (Giovanni). Il Decamerone, Florence, Philippo di Giunta, 1516. £10,000 to £15,000.
    Forum, July 17: Henry VII (King) & Philip the Fair (Duke of Burgundy). [Intercursus Magnus], [Commercial and Political Treaty between Henry VII and Philip Duke of Burgundy], manuscript copy in Latin, original vellum, 1499. £8,000 to £12,000.
    Forum, July 17: Bible, English. The Holy Bible, Conteyning the Old Testament, and the New, Robert Barker, 1613. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum, July 17: Bond (Michael). A Bear Called Paddington, first edition, signed presentation inscription from the author, 1958. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    17th July 2025
    Forum, July 17: Yeats (William Butler). The Secret Rose, first edition, with extensive autograph corrections, additions and amendments by the author for a new edition, 1897. £6,000 to £8,000.
    Forum, July 17: Byron (George Gordon Noel, Lord). Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, bound in dark green morocco elaborately tooled in gilt and with 3 watercolours to fore-edge, by Fazakerley of Liverpool, 1841. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum, July 17: Miró (Juan), Wassily Kandinsky, John Buckland-Wright, Stanley William Hayter and others.- Spender (Stephen). Fraternity, one of 101 copies, with signed engravings by 9 artists. £6,000 to £8,000.
    Forum, July 17: Sowerby (George Brettingham). Album comprising 22 leaves of original watercolour drawings of fossil remains of Cheltenham and Vicinity, [c.1840]. £6,000 to £8,000.
    Forum, July 17: Mathematics.- Blue paper copy.- Euclid. De gli Elementi, Urbino, Appresso Domenico Frisolino, 1575. £12,000 to £18,000.
  • Sotheby’s
    Books, Manuscripts and Music from Medieval to Modern
    Now through July 10, 2025
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Book of Hours by the Masters of Otto van Moerdrecht, Use of Sarum, in Latin, Southern Netherlands (Bruges), c.1450. £20,000 to £30,000.
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Albert Einstein. Autograph letter signed, to Attilio Palatino, on his research into General Relativity, 12 May 1929. £12,000 to £18,000.
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: John Gould. The Birds of Europe, [1832-] 1837, 5 volumes, contemporary half morocco, subscriber’s copy. £40,000 to £60,000.
    Sotheby’s
    Books, Manuscripts and Music from Medieval to Modern
    Now through July 10, 2025
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Ian Fleming. A collection of James Bond first editions, 8 volumes in all. £8,000 to £12,000.
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: J.K. Rowling. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, 1997, first edition, hardback issue. £50,000 to £70,000.
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: J.R.R. Tolkien. Autograph letter signed, to Amy Ronald, on Pauline Baynes's map of Middle Earth, 1970. £7,000 to £10,000.
  • Rare Book Hub is now mobile-friendly!
  • DOYLE
    Rare Books, Autographs & Maps
    July 23, 2025
    DOYLE, July 23: WALL, BERNHARDT. Greenwich Village. Types, Tenements & Temples. Estimate $300-500
    DOYLE, July 23: STOKES, I. N. PHELPS. The Iconography of Manhattan Island, 1498-1909. New York: Robert H. Dodd, 1915-28. Estimate: $3,000-5,000
    DOYLE, July 23: [AUTOGRAPH - US PRESIDENT]FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT. A signed photograph of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Estimate $500-800
    DOYLE, July 23: [ARION PRESS]. ABBOTT, EDWIN A. Flatland. A Romance of Many Dimensions. San Francisco, 1980. Estimate $2,000-3,000.
    DOYLE, July 23: TOLSTOY, LYOF N. and NATHAN HASKELL DOLE, translator. Anna Karénina ... in eight parts. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., [1886]. Estimate: $400-600
    DOYLE, July 23: ROWLING, J.K. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. London: Bloomsbury, 2000. Estimate $1,200-1,800

Article Search

Archived Articles