The Paper • Page 7 • May 23, 2019
Once In a Lifetime By Jeff Figler
It is only human nature to occasionally daydream. I do it a lot. I often wonder about many things. For example, would my life have been different if I had stayed in the Midwest instead of migrating to the Southwest and, later, to California? I always come to the same conclusion that I would not miss the weather. I think about what my life would be like if I had not met my wife. Of course, it would not have been as exciting and full of warm memories. Are you reading this, my dear?
But like most people I wonder what I would do if I ever won the lottery. Well, I try not to dwell on that idea too long because the chances of ever winning anything more than ten or twenty dollars is slim. Very, very slim. I can barely win at the horse races or at the slot machines, much less megabucks in a lottery. I rarely win a door prize at some activity after buying a string of tickets. So I have given up on the hope of winning millions.
However, I do constantly encounter people who tell me that their life would be different if they had a mother like I did, who never threw away their baseball cards or comic books. I caution them that they should not hold that against me. To this day, my mother tells me that she knew exactly what she was doing. And to this day, I doubt it. But I don’t tell her that. You just refrain from saying anything contrary to a feisty lady who is only a few short months from becoming a centenarian. I merely nod my head and agree with her. But every so often people tell me about an item that, much to this surprise, is worth more than a cup of coffee at Starbuck’s. One time a man told me about his grandfather’s old model train set that he was considering giving to a thrift store. Another man had a few first editions of Hemingway’s “The Old Man and the Sea”. And I remember the lady who saved her memorabilia from Woodstock.
Granted, those are exceptions. But let me tell you of a real life story that I read about.
In 1989, a gentleman is at a flea market in Adamstown, Pennsylvania, near Philadelphia. He is attracted by an old painting of a country scene. It is not so much the painting, but rather the frame that appeals to him. And the price is right. Only $4. But the painting appeared to have a tear in the canvas. He bought the painting and took it home. He tried to separate the canvas from the frame. He noticed an old piece of paper. After unfolding the paper, he saw what looked like the Declaration of Independence. The man’s curiosity got the best of
him. He did not know what to make of it. Maybe it was something valuable.
He went to a friend who collected Civil War Memorabilia. The friend told him that he would be wise to take the old document to have it appraised. Smart move. It turned out to be the missing copy of the original Declaration of Independence. Each of the original colonies was given two copies. One of the copies given to North Carolina had been missing for ages.
Legal battles ensued, as to whether the copy belonged to the man, or to the State of North Carolina. The man prevailed. The man who had spent all of four dollars on a painting in Adamstown, Pennsylvania because he liked the frame. The copy was offered for sale on June 4, 1991, and sold for $2.42 million. It was the highest price for any historical Americana item. It is one of only three remaining copies in private hands. Several years later the same document sold for $8.14 million. The television producer Norman Lear bought it, and it became the key item of the Norman Lear Center’s Declaration of Independence Road Trip which toured the country for more than three years.
The story makes you wonder if something similar to that can ever happen to you. Who knows?
And by the way, you might be wondering about whatever happened to the painting and the frame. The painting was kept. The frame could not be salvaged.
Jeff Figler is a professional certified appraiser. His latest book The Picker’s Pocket Guide to Baseball Memorabilia has been #1 on Amazon. He can be reached at info@jefffigler.com or at 877-472-3087.
Historically Speaking by Tom Morrow
The ‘Golden Age’ Depends Upon Your Age
We often hear the phrase “that was back in the ‘golden age’ (of whatever you want to discuss – television, movies, lifestyle, politics, cars). Probably the most commonly discussed “golden age’ has to do with communication – and, depending upon your age, that can take in a wide variety of subjects -magazines, newspapers, television, and radio.
Remember Collier’s, Saturday Evening Post, Life, or Look? No? Then you hadn’t made your arrival here on earth until after the 1950s. Among many others, these were popular weekly magazines that were the ‘People” magazines of their day. News magazines such as Time and U.S. News & World Report were in they heyday by midcentury.
One could say the late 1800s to the first half of the 20th century was the golden age of newspapers. Every major city in America had at least two newspapers. New York City had seven. Interestingly enough, today overseas cities such as London, Paris, Melbourne, Sydney, and Berlin each have more than four. Most of those cities sell their newspaper via street vendors. Door-to-door delivery seems to be an American thing. Today, Los Angeles has just one (there were three until the late seventies. Chicago still has three down from four, and New York City is down to three from seven until the seventies.
We’d have to include a golden age of automobiles during the twenties through the sixties. Some of the most inventive vehicles were born and sold. The Stanley Steamer (yes, it was powered by steam and went very fast). And there was the luxurious hand-built Duesenberg, which was a ‘real doozie.” There were a number of electric-powered cars. Those left from the “Greatest Generation” will remember the Graham, and the Cord. Those of us who have been around since the thirties, forties and fifties remember Packard, DeSoto, Willys, Kaiser, Frasier, Crosley, and, for a very short time, the Tucker? One of
the best-built, but ugliest was probably was Ford’s Edsel. It just didn’t attract enough drivers. The grill might have had something to do with it.
Radio’s golden age began in the late twenties and lasted little more than two decades (1930s through the 1940s). Many of future TV star performers, sit-com and drama formats were developed during this period. But anyone born after 1950 would probably not have experienced the comedy, drama, quiz shows and more that were given birth during that period. Many of us rushed home from school to listen in on “The Lone Ranger,” “Sky King,” “Sergeant Preston of the Yukon,” and “Straight Arrow.” On Sunday afternoons it was “The Shadow,” and “Nick Carter, Private Eye.” Weeknights it was “Johnny Dollar” and “Lux Radio Theater.” Every night “Fibber McGee & Molly,” “Bob Hope, “Jack Benny, “George Burns & Gracie Allen” made us laugh.
Nowadays when the “Golden Age” of anything is mentioned, the first thing that comes to mind is television. While most of us associate that time period with the fifties, it really isn’t true. Years from now people will look back on the present time period as “The Golden Age of Television.” Think about it – television sets, programming, and reception has never been as good as it is now. No more “snowy” pictures … “fade-outs,” or “test patterns.” Television sets are bigger, better, and lower-priced than ever before. Today’s television programming is far-reaching. There’s very little that you can think of that isn’t available on a wide variety of “streaming” channels. Movie theaters have all but been wiped because of today’s modern era of television. “On Demand” programming has new movies available while they’re still in the theaters – if you can find one that hasn’t closed down. Cable TV offers 24-hour news and talking heads spewing all sorts of opinions. In some ways, television, computers, cell phones, and video games are almost too good – they keep us on our butts and dangerously inactive. You could say we’re presently in the “Golden Age of Indulgence.” SCAG SEZ: “Have you ever noticed that the only people who don't think they're fat are fat people?” – Cecil Scaglione, Mature Life Features.
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