Colonial Williamsburg, Hour 3

♪ ♪ CORAL PEÑA: "Antiques Roadshow" is exploring history-- and making it-- on our first visit to Colonial Williamsburg.

Nah, come on.

Seriously?

Seriously.

Holy cow!

"Hallelujah," I was hoping you were going to say.

(laughing) ♪ ♪ PEÑA: Some places really know how to bring history alive.

And if you're intrigued by the period of British colonial rule in North America, Colonial Williamsburg is certainly one of the best places to visit.

This living history museum has over 350 interpreters demonstrating trades and speaking to the lives of actual 18th-century inhabitants of Williamsburg, Virginia.

Plus, history is literally being unearthed at archaeological sites, like this one at the site of the original First Baptist Church of Williamsburg, founded by free and enslaved Black worshippers around 1776.

There are just so many more treasures to discover here, including the treasures people are bringing to "Roadshow" today.

Check it out.

WOMAN: So I brought in an original serigraph by Sister Mary Corita Kent that I acquired either the summer of '66 or '67.

I went to an art show at the Immaculate Heart of Mary College in Los Angeles.

Was lucky enough in the midst of seeing all of her prints and serigraphs to find this one little one on a table in the middle of the room.

And I took it over to the lady who was taking our money, and thinking I could never, ever afford it-- I was a college student-- and she said, "$35."

And I think I wrote a check off my parents' account... (chuckles) ...to pay for it.

Why were you drawn to it?

Why did you buy it?

So I had been interested in her for quite a while.

I think what attracted me to her was that A, she used really bright colors to try to make religion relevant.

And she introduced people to a, a modern take on, on religion at that time.

The reason she used the serigraph process, which is silk screening, was that it was the least expensive and most economical, and easy to produce a lot of prints.

So she did that specifically so more people could enjoy and afford her work.

Oh.

So it was such a surprise to you that it was affordable, but you really, you, you must have made her so happy, because that was exactly what she wanted from her work.

Oh, that's cool.

It's from 1965, and like almost all of her pieces, it is hand-signed in pencil, but it's not numbered.

We know she printed more than one because she was trying to get her art out into the masses.

And in 1965, she was doing a series of works, uh, with the title "Power Up."

Ah.

And "Power Up" actually is taken from popular culture.

And her work was influenced by Andy Warhol.

It was influenced by the Pop Art movement.

"Power up" was the slogan of the Richfield Oil Company.

When the Richfield Oil Company used it, it meant, "Power up, fill your car with our gasoline, power it up."

Mm-hmm.

But Corita took it to a level where "power up" had a higher meaning, a more spiritual meaning.

And the phrase "power up" appears on several of her works from the mid-1960s.

Some are accompanied by quotations by famous pastors.

This one in particular is accompanied by a quotation from Rainer Maria Rilke, from his book "Letters to a Young Poet."

And on the top, it says "December 25, and always interested in birthdays."

And of course, we know whose birthday was on December 25.

Exactly.

It was the birth of Christ.

And so I think it's a wonderful example of how Corita wraps up the secular and the religious into this one piece and presents it in a modern way.

This is really introducing religious themes to the masses in a way that can be very easily absorbed.

So Corita was also a prolific artist.

All told in her career, she designed almost 800 different serigraphs.

Oh, my goodness.

In the years after you bought this, she rose to somewhat of a, of a meteoric level of fame.

In 1964, she was chosen by the Vatican to design a mural for their pavilion at the New York World's Fair.

In 1966, the "Los Angeles Times" voted her one of the nine most influential women of the year, along with Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Jean King.

Wow.

And then in 1967, she was on the cover of "Newsweek" magazine.

So she really was a superstar.

Throughout my years, 24 years being on the "Antiques Roadshow," a lot of works by Sister Corita have come through the doors.

Ah!

And for years and years, I would say to the people, "This is really lovely.

"This is really nice.

(chuckles) "But, frankly, religious art doesn't carry much weight in the market."

And only recently I've had an epiphany, if you will.

(laughs) What I like to call a come- to-"Antiques-Roadshow" moment.

And in fact, the, the market has reevaluated her work.

This particular piece has never come up for sale before.

Oh, wow.

It is small for her work.

At auction, I would estimate it between $1,500 and $2,000.

Holy cow!

(stammering): I'm shocked.

"Hallelujah," I was hoping you were going to say.

(laughing) The high-water mark for her works, in 2020, one of her works sold for $10,000.

Holy cow.

MAN: I was a young Naval officer attached to my first command, which was in Key West, Florida, on U.S.

Forces Caribbean.

I had just come off duty, and here's this tall, kind of jovial fella... (chuckling): ...who says, "Hey, Navy guy, can I buy you a beer?"

And we got to be sort of friends.

It was Mel Fisher, who had not found the wreck at that time.

He and his family were operating a salvage operation out of Key West.

He was, at the time, I would put him in his early 50s, maybe, mid-50s.

He was interested in the Navy's access to charts in the Keys off Florida, because they were still searching for artifacts.

I helped him get some charts and we got to be sort of friendly.

And he invited me over to his warehouse operation, where he showed me his charts, where they had pins punched into a chart where they were finding artifacts.

So we chatted a bit, and then he said, "Why don't you invest in this thing?"

It was $1,000 investment, which was to us a lot of money.

So I called my wife at home.

She said, "Well, I'll, I'll send a check, whatever you think."

So I sat on it for a week and said, "Okay, here you are."

And a week later, they found the wreck.

And then about a year and a half went by when they got up all this treasure, and they got into a long legal battle with the State of Florida.

And they codified all of these artifacts and attach point values to your investment amount.

And about a year and a half later, called me and said, "Come down and get your stuff."

And this was the largest of the items.

It was mostly just kind of a fun adventure.

The Atocha, as it's always shortened, is Nuestra Señora de Atocha.

Oh.

Which is Our Lady of Atocha.

Atocha was a shrine in Madrid.

Oh.

And it was a wonderful ship.

It took almost two months just to load it, it had so much gold, silver, emeralds.

Therefore it got a really late start.

And in September of 1622, on the second day out, it hit a hurricane.

Mm-hmm.

And it sunk it.

Hm.

Outside the Dry Tortugas.

And it was, I think, 1969 that Mel Fisher started his Treasure Salvors... Mm-hmm.

...to try to find this wonderful treasure.

Most people got coins or ingots, but very few people got candlesticks.

Mm-hmm.

The candlesticks that come up on the market are never complete like this one.

There's pieces of bases, there's pieces of tops, but the fact that you have the whole candlestick is great.

So you have a Dutch silver candlestick from the 17th century.

The artifacts all had certificates of authenticity.

And I love the fact that the numbers on the certificate of authenticity match up with the numbers on the candlestick.

So as they were recording the inventory, they added the catalogue numbers.

It can't get lost because it helps the value of this piece.

Hm.

And the reason I say that is because if this was out of context, just as a Dutch 17th-century candlestick, it would have a value in this condition of maybe $300, $350.

If this piece was to come up at an auction, I would put a pre-sale estimate on it at $7,000 to $9,000.

Mm-hmm.

It could well bring over $10,000.

It's just such a special piece and you're so lucky to have it.

Yeah, well, we feel lucky, yeah.

It is in the "Guinness Book of Records" as the biggest find ever.

Yeah.

And they evaluated it at about $400 million.

PEÑA: The First Baptist Church of Williamsburg on Scotland Road is one of the oldest African American congregations in America.

Two buildings used by former churchgoers were known to be on this active archeological site nearby, at Colonial Williamsburg, one dating back to at least the early 1800s, and the other a church that was constructed in 1856 and demolished about 100 years later.

The archaeology project is a joint effort between Colonial Williamsburg and the current First Baptist Church of Williamsburg.

Together they are working on how to interpret the space and learn more about the church's past.

MAN: This is a painting of a, a relative of mine.

The painting goes back 234 years.

Oh, my goodness.

He was a lawyer in New York City.

He was appointed to the, uh, New York Supreme Court.

Oh, wow.

Unfortunately, he died about a month before he could serve.

So he never served.

To the family, he's still The Judge.

And what was his name?

His name was John Cozine.

And the painting has been in the family for the whole time.

The painting is actually signed in the lower left.

R. Earl pinxit, meaning painted, 1787.

The painting is oil on canvas.

He was from, uh, Worcester County, Massachusetts, and he came from a very wealthy family.

He was due to inherit his father's lands when his father passed away, but he decided to become an artist.

And his parents didn't like that very well.

They didn't think it was a respectable profession.

So he was ostracized.

And in addition to that, during the revolution, his father was head of the militia, and he refused to join the militia.

And he actually left home and went to New Haven to live.

He painted his famous portrait of Roger Sherman, who was a signer of the Declaration of Independence, uh, for Connecticut.

He was establishing a good reputation, but at some point he was accused of being a traitor, and he had to either join the militia or go to England.

And so he left for England.

That was where he started studying with Benjamin West, and where he developed a lot more of his sophisticated style than what he had had before, which was a little bit more primitive.

He later, then, comes back to the United States around 1785, and he goes to Boston, and then Providence, and then finally settles in New York.

And it was at that time that he was put in debtors' prison.

Mm-hmm.

And that was because he had borrowed money for his passage from England, and he, uh, failed to pay the person from whom he borrowed the money.

This piece was actually done during that time, between 1786 and 1788, when he was there.

Mm-hmm.

There was a, a society that helped prisoners at the time, and it was called the Society for the Relief of Distressed Debtors.

Hm.

And there were very prominent people who were part of it, including Alexander Hamilton.

So they tried to help prisoners in terms of improving the conditions in prison, but also getting them to raise money in order to get out and to, to take care of their debt.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

So they enabled him to paint portraits while he was in prison, and he did about 20 of them.

It's not as elaborate as many of his portraits, which are three-quarter-length and which show backgrounds like the outside of the home.

Mm-hmm.

The artist actually lived from 1751 to 1801, and he died in Bolton, Connecticut, uh, from alcoholism.

Mm-hmm.

He was sort of a bad boy.

(chuckles) He was a Loyalist and against his, uh, the wishes of his family, he was a bigamist, and, uh, he was a debtor.

The market for 19th-century and, and 18th-century portraiture was very, very popular in the '70s and, and '80s, into the early '90s.

But since then, this type of painting is not as much in vogue.

In today's market, it would probably sell in the range, uh, in a gallery, in the range of $50,000.

Mm-hmm.

Well, that's nice.

That, that's nice.

It's not going anywhere, but it's nice.

Yeah.

I would place a, a value of $65,000 for insurance.

Oh.

Okay.

Okay.

Wow.

Probably in the '80s, it, it might have been more like $75,000 or, or closer to $100,000.

Mm-hmm.

You've brought in this great 1984 National League Championship ring given to members of the Padres.

How did you get this ring?

I was working in the front office in media relations.

And Joan Kroc bought 200 rings for every employee of the organization.

Championship rings today are very large and very blingy.

But this one hearkens back to the days of school rings.

That's what it looks like.

Yes.

And we've got ten-karat gold here.

We've got onyx.

And then we have the diamonds for the "S.D."

APPRAISER: It's a painting by Bernique Longley.

It was done in 1953 and she signed Bernique.

So she was like Oprah.

(laughs) Just one name.

She was known by her first name, Bernique, in the Santa Fe art colony.

She sold a lot of paintings in her life... Mm-hmm.

...but there isn't a whole lot on the secondary market.

WOMAN: This is a ring that belonged to Joe "Iron Man" McGinnity.

He is a Hall of Famer, and this ring was given to my great-great-great-grandfather.

He was the brother-in-law of Joe.

It was passed down to my dad and then down to me.

Joe, as you say, was a Hall of Famer.

Yes.

Pretty incredible guy.

How did he get his nickname Iron Man?

Well, he worked in an iron foundry.

Yeah, because a lot of people think because he was a great baseball player with, you know, durability and longevity, they think that's how he got the name.

Right.

Right.

But it actually came from his job in the off-season.

Yes.

That's right.

Serpent rings throughout history, for thousands of years, have this mythological mystery about them.

In 1839, Prince Albert gives Queen Victoria an engagement ring, which is a snake ring with her birthstone in it.

And all of a sudden, with fashion in anything, it becomes popular.

You start to see three-headed snakes emerge in that Victorian period in England.

This ring was probably manufactured in the late 1800s.

It could be right around 1900... Mm-hmm.

...because you're starting to see the incorporation of platinum with what looks like 15-karat gold.

The diamond in the center is an old European cut.

It weighs 0.35 carats.

So about a third of a carat.

And then you have the ruby and the sapphire, which are just under half a carat each.

There's no hallmarks inside, but they were probably there at one time.

And because the ring has been repaired so many times and it's been sized a few times-- I can tell-- they may have disappeared with all that work, but the ring looks English to me.

So when we value something like this, we have to factor in the fact that it was owned by him.

It's not a baseball ring.

And actually, back then, they really didn't give rings that much.

They gave pendants.

Yeah.

Figuring that it belonged to him, I think it adds ten percent more...

Okay.

...to the value.

So for auction purposes, I would say $3,000 to $4,000.

Wow.

That's great.

WOMAN: I have brought two sets of bookends that, at least the top parts of them, were from the White House and they were salvaged when they renovated the White House in 1950.

President Truman, being a history buff, really was interested in saving everything he could.

My dad worked for President Truman, and he was kind of a take-care-of-whatever-it-was guy.

I think they were given possibly as gifts.

I'm not so sure.

As you said, the White House was renovated under the Trumans.

They moved out.

Mm-hmm.

The entire interior of the White House was removed.

It was a huge empty shell, and they in fact dismantled bulldozers and other heavy equipment to bring it in through tunnels to work inside the shell of the White House, because President Truman didn't want a hole cut in the exterior of The People's Mansion.

MAN: We were at the beach, and we were carrying all of our stuff over the dunes, and there was a little bitty part of brown in the dune, and there he was.

And where was this?

This is in Cape Hatteras, North Carolina.

It's a Zemí figure from the Taíno people.

And the Taíno were Arawakan people from the Greater Antilles.

And they lived in Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico.

And they were around from the tenth to the 15th century.

Normally these figures, the Zemí large figures, have a place on the top for a tray, and they would use a vegetal entheogen called cohoba, which they would grind up, put on top of the tray, and they would inhale it through tubes.

It was a hallucinogen, and the results of that can be seen by the figure, the emaciated look.

It's not large enough for that.

It doesn't have the position for the tray, but does have this classic Zemí figure and the pointed headdress on the top.

I have to say that this culture is probably faked more than any ethnographical culture out there, especially in shell and in stone, and very much so in wood.

The early ones are made of a guaiacum, which is lignum vitae, which is a very, very hard wood, indeed, much of which has disappeared from this part of the world.

And as soon as I picked it up, I realized it's lignum vitae.

So this is good news.

And the majority of these figures that are found in wood, the early ones, don't really bear any trace of burial at all.

Many of them are found in caves.

There are enough things going for it-- the carving, the positions-- for me to suggest that you need to have it carbon-dated to try to get the date right.

Most of the fakes are from the 19th and 20th century.

But if this turned out to be from the tenth to the 15th century, it would be the real McCoy.

Much of it really falls into place as an early figure.

The ones that we know at the British Museum and the Metropolitan are extraordinary figures.

These areas here would have had inlays of shell or sometimes gold, even.

I'll turn it over and you can see that it's fairly simple on the back, but that also is totally in line with the earlier ones.

This is a difficult one for me, because as a figure, and if I saw this on the market, I would be very comfortable pricing it at about $3,000 to $4,000.

That's the retail price.

If it was discovered to be an early piece, I think you'd probably be looking in the region probably of about $20,000.

That's an incentive.

(laughing): That is a great incentive.

I can't imagine carbon dating costs that much.

Um, carbon dating, I think, is going to cost probably about $500 to $800.

There's definite age in this piece.

There's no doubt about it.

It's just how much age is, that's what... That's what we'd like to find out.

PEÑA: This incredibly rare 1792 George Washington Peace Medal is one of only six of its size known and one of perhaps 12 medals of any size created in that year.

The medal was handcrafted and engraved, and depicts George Washington supporting a pipe being smoked by a traditionally dressed Indigenous leader.

This medal would have been given to tribal leaders as a diplomatic gesture on behalf of the United States government.

♪ ♪ WOMAN: I brought a music box that's been in my family for a long time.

The story I was told was that my grandfather got it at a pawn shop back in the '40s or '50s for his then-daughter-in-law.

We would refer to this as a cylinder musical box.

Okay.

Typically, musical boxes like this are made in Switzerland, but they're a little tough to date.

They variously date between 1850 and 1900.

Oh.

This one is distinguished from most of the musical boxes made during that period by a number of characteristics.

First and foremost is the beauty of the wood that's used to make it.

The exterior is covered with a burl walnut veneer and inlaid with, with stringing and some other things.

But it's really the quality of the grain of the wood that speaks to why this piece is better than a typical musical box of the period.

Okay.

If we, if we open it up, it says on the tune card here that it plays eight different tunes: some airs.

It looks like a polka, as well.

Um, a couple stood out to me, one... One of them is number eight, "Marche Américaine."

There's also a, a possibility, because it has a tune in there called the "Marche Américaine," that it was actually intended for an American audience.

We can't prove that.

And the other one here, number five, is an air from the, called the "Duo de la Mascotte."

"La Mascotte" was a French opera written in 1880.

Okay.

So we know that this musical box dates to the later part of that range that I talked about before.

Okay.

Let's say the date of this might be around 1880 to 1900.

It's also distinguished from other musical boxes, and the most important way it's distinguished is, it has a percussion section.

It has some mechanisms inside that play a drum.

Right.

That play six engraved bells.

That play a little wooden item over here called the castanets.

Those are all things that would have, at the time, been more expensive for a musical box.

It is quite literally the bells, but not the whistles.

The comb is in particularly good condition.

In fact, the, the musical box overall is in very good condition.

It works well.

It sounds great.

It's in a wonderful case.

If this were to come to auction, we'd give an auction estimate of $2,000 to $4,000.

Wow.

Okay.

I had no idea.

(chuckling): I thought a few hundred dollars.

Yeah.

It's just been in the family forever, so... No, it's a lovely example of, of what it is.

Yeah, we like it.

(chuckles) (playing slow tune) APPRAISER: Your doll is, is an early doll.

WOMAN: Mm-hmm.

It was made in the early 1900s... Wow.

...by the Horsman Doll Company in their Babyland rag doll series.

Oh.

I get a lot of creepy doll comments on our dolls.

(laughs): Yeah?

A lot of people believe that they're, they're haunted and so forth, but they're truly works of art.

Mm-hmm.

They're wonderful historical timelines.

They let us know about fashion.

They let us know about hairstyles.

She's super-pretty.

Uh-huh.

I think this is a very friendly, little, endearing face.

Okay.

Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: So your grandfather was one of these hotshot scientists recruited by Oppenheimer into the Manhattan Project.

It says October 1, 1945.

So really soon after the atomic bombs are dropped...

Right.

...on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the program is winding down.

The war is over, the young people are leaving, they're moving on to other positions, and Oppenheimer issues certificates to everybody who participates in the program.

But for the certain few, the talented few, he also writes letters of recommendation.

They are fairly rare.

There are not a lot of these on the marketplace.

WOMAN: Well, I brought a, uh, Combination table.

And about 40 years ago, I was starting my first professional job as a teacher, and a friend of mine had this with paint all in it stored, and she wanted to get rid of it.

And, uh, I loved it, so she gave it to me.

APPRAISER: So what we have here is a Combination table made by the Combination Table Company.

And it's got two patent dates, if we look at the plaque, of 1893 and 1896.

Which is sort of two designs, refined designs and patents.

Oh, okay.

And it's classic turn-of-the-century furniture.

Here we have, it's just simple oak shelving and turned base, which is all machine-made.

This is classic American ingenuity at the time where mechanization and manufacturing in furniture and design was coming to the forefront in the American landscape.

With a simple thumbscrew on, on your side, we can, we can convert this to a shelving unit... Mm-hmm.

...or a table.

They usually have sort of about three positions: the, the flat table; and if we move it up, you can leave it like this.

And these were often used as store displays.

If you think of pharmacies and things like that... Oh, okay.

...great way to display your products.

And what's so neat, and special, ingenious design is that you can place something on the shelf and convert it to a table and it won't fall off.

There's not a lot known about the Combination Table Company.

We, we do know is, that company was bought out by the Yesbera Company.

And I just think it's just a killer piece.

If this piece were to come to auction, I'd probably estimate it at $800 to $1,200.

(laughing): Okay.

Oh, that's better than I thought.

But... And for that kind of money, you know, you couldn't not own it.

(laughing): It's yours.

(both laughing) MAN: My father got that watch in 1969 in Hong Kong on his way to Vietnam.

He wore it all through Vietnam and gave it to me when I graduated high school.

And I wore it while I went through the Naval Academy and to Iraq and through a 20-year career in the Navy.

So, and I'm planning to pass it on to, uh, one of my kids at some point in the future.

I know it's a real Rolex.

(chuckles) Um, got a little bit of slack for that in the Navy.

But, uh, uh, no, I, I really don't know a whole lot about it other than he preferred, uh, not having the date rather than having the one with the date.

What did your father do in the Navy?

He was, uh, a dentist, and he did facial reconstruction while he was in Vietnam.

It's a 1969 Explorer, referred to coll, by collectors as an Explorer I.

The model, though, has been made since 1953 continuously.

Okay.

It's still very popular today.

It is a little bit smaller than the other sport model sizes.

Mm-hmm.

But extremely popular.

It has a Jubilee Swiss bracelet, which is a Rolex bracelet.

Mm-hmm.

But I don't believe it originally came on that watch.

Looks like a little bit later bracelet.

Do you know why your father picked the Rolex and the Explorer model in general?

I, I don't, and I... Yeah.

I know you mentioned he didn't like the, he liked that it didn't have a calendar.

Correct, uh, but other than that, no, I don't know, he just, that's what he liked.

Unfortunately, he passed away in 2010.

I think he probably liked it because of the black dial, and it was easy to read the, uh, the face of the watch.

Mm-hmm.

The numerals and hands would, would, uh, glow in the dark.

Mm-hmm.

So if, if he was working at night, he could, uh, easily see what the time was on it.

It's a pretty neat piece.

Rolex came out with it in 1953 because of all these explorers climbing mountains.

Mm-hmm.

And it was actually worn in quite a few expeditions.

Okay.

Any idea of a valuation on it?

I think $7,000 or so.

Just about what it would be to replace it.

You know what your father paid for it?

I do, actually.

He paid, he said he paid $110 for it in 1969 in Hong Kong.

They're quite collectible-- your watch, easily at auction, $12,000 to $15,000 is what it would sell for.

Oh, wow.

That's awesome, thank you.

Great piece.

Thank you.

Glad you brought it in, and thank you very much for your service.

PEÑA: The 1799 portrait of George Washington by Charles Willson Peale served as the basis for Peale's numerous and nearly identical paintings.

This version by Peale hung for more than 100 years at Shirley Plantation, Virginia's first plantation, and still a family farm.

Commissioned by the Supreme Executive Council of Pennsylvania to honor Washington, it is considered to be America's first state portrait, and was an immediate success at the time.

The original painting now hangs in the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia.

WOMAN: This is a book, a thesis project from undergraduate school.

It is called "Concerning America, Alfred Stieglitz, and Myself," by Emmet Gowin.

It was a gift to me in 1965.

Emmet is a close friend, he and his wife.

Uh-huh He gave it to me and my husband as, as just a gift.

I met Emmet on the campus of Richmond Professional Institute.

He and my husband were apartment mates and best friends.

My husband and I got married in 1964, and two weeks later, my husband was Emmet's best man.

Emmet forgot the wedding ring.

So my ring was used to marry Emmet... (exclaims) ...and his wife, Edith Morris.

Oh, my gosh!

Emmet was like a big puppy.

Right.

And he was always happy, in perpetual motion.

Not at all arrogant.

He was excited about everything going on around him, and that's why he had his camera with him at all times.

Emmet Gowin is a very, very important and famous 20th-century American photographer.

His work is housed in many, many museums around the country and the world, but this is essentially his very first publication.

And this book in particular has actually been the subject of exhibitions in various places.

Emmet wanted to photograph what was real.

Mm-hmm.

He never staged photographs.

He is renowned for having this interest in trying to capture a distinct moment in a cryptic way, in a way that is a little ambiguous, and there's a, an open-endedness to it.

Yes.

I mean, like, a picture like this, which could be interpreted as ominous and, and threatening or could be a pantomime, or a Halloween costume.

You're right.

And it brings this sort of ambiguity which he's very well known for.

And this emerges in this first production that we have from his undergraduate thesis.

Um, and here we have some young African American children in a church.

Whether they are chosen to be portraits or not is a matter of uncertainty.

There are, as I believe, 14 prints in here...

There are 14.

...that he, that he selected for the publication.

We were responsible for our thesis projects, and he had it printed in Richmond.

These prints are all tipped in, made from photographs with his Leica camera, usually.

Right.

And I think what's quite fascinating about this is, he's added a, a, a, a pen-and-ink sketch to the cover.

We see here writing that is "an aerial view of the park."

Yes And we see that we have what appears to be a photographer with a camera floating up above a scene in a park in, I assume, in Danville, Virginia.

Or Richmond.

Possibly Richmond.

When we were in school, there was a park nearby with benches.

We know that, from the historical record, that he only produced 100 copies.

I assume that most of them were distributed to friends and family and acquaintances.

I think so.

And that's what makes these kinds of works so rare.

Most of these are now in museum collections around the country, and it, it really becomes something that is truly very, uh, collectible for individuals interested in photography books.

We only know of about ten copies that have ever come for auction... Really?

...um, in the last 40 years.

Given its importance, the fact that it's the germinal work of one of the most important photographers of the 20th century, it would likely, at auction, conservatively, have a value between $20,000 and $30,000.

Really?

(laughs): Yes.

Oh, well, you know, I, I'm so glad for Emmet that it, that people are recognizing how wonderful his work is.

Because of your long relationship with him, I assume you probably would keep it, in which case you might want to consider an insurance value.

And that would probably be in the range of about $50,000.

Really?

Because they're so rare and hard to find, and they're basically irreplaceable.

So, uh, you may want to consider that if you hold onto it.

Emmet and Edith are irreplaceable friends, and I certainly will take good care of it.

WOMAN: My sister and I have had this knife for many years.

My stepfather was retired from the Navy and the Army, and when he was stationed in Korea in 1951, he purchased this dagger.

He passed away in 1985.

Since 1987, it has been sitting on a shelf in either my house or my sister's house.

It is Korean.

It was purchased in Busan, Korea, according to the tag, which is in South Korea and right along the coast.

These daggers-- there are other versions of them-- uh, primarily were brought up from tomb sites from tombs in Korea, but also in Japan, where Japan and Korea are closest to one another, primarily in Fukuoka, which is a coastal city in Japan.

The daggers are based on Chinese bronze forms, but it's not bronze-- it's stone.

It's slate.

They were based on Zhou Dynasty Chinese bronze daggers, which is roughly from the 11th century to the third century B.C.

Gosh.

(chuckles) How old do you think this dagger is?

In any minor research that I did, I was thinking between 500 and 700 B.C.

You are exactly right, almost right on the money.

Get out!

So it's from a people, they were called the Yayoi people.

They were an ethnic group that were in the Korean peninsula and traveled to Japan.

The Yayoi people were copying the Chinese bronze daggers and swords and making them in stone, because they didn't yet have bronze.

This dagger is so finely crafted, the recessed areas right here, the raised bands... Uh-huh.

...would have taken a craftsman a huge amount of time to make.

It still retains some of the original surface, and if you touch it, it's silky smooth.

Exactly as it would have been when it first was made.

The edges of the dagger are still sharp!

And a lot of these are broken.

But I examined yours and it's not-- it's complete.

I don't think that yours would have been utilitarian.

Okay.

It's too finely crafted.

I believe that this was more likely something that was for ceremonial purposes, which would explain why it is in such a, such great condition.

And it makes sense that it was purchased in Busan, and likely was brought up from a tomb site around there, which, during the 1930s and 1940s, Japanese were in Korea, and they loved Korean artifacts.

So they were having tomb sites dug up.

Dolmens, which are the raised tombs, were opened up and the artifacts were brought out.

Daggers like these would have been brought out at that time.

1950s, after the Japanese were defeated, the antique sellers in Korea, many of them were the fellows who had been digging the graves during the '30s and '40s.

They knew where to find things, they found them, and they had a ready market in the American military officers who wanted to bring back a piece of history.

I think this one would have been from the Yayoi people in Korea.

Gojoseon period, 1000 B.C.

to about 500 B.C.

Whoa.

What do you think it's worth?

$5,000.

Okay, objects like this are extremely rare.

The sale of Korean objects that were brought out during World War II, at this time, there are no real rules or regulations that would stop you from selling it, were that to be what you wanted to do.

This was brought out of Korea at an appropriate time.

There are difficulties in other areas, repatriation of objects, mostly from the Middle East, war-torn regions, but also in America, with Native American tomb sites that were dug up and the objects were taken out.

So it's good to do your research and make sure that everything is proper.

There are similar examples of this, more plain, damaged, that sell for about $5,000.

Okay.

I think it is likely that your dagger, were it to go to auction, would sell for between $20,000 and $30,000.

Holy... Oh, my God.

(inhales) Nah, come on.

Seriously?

Seriously.

Whoa.

I'm thrilled.

My sister is going to be thrilled.

(breathes deeply): Thank you.

If you have an insurance agent, I would call them and ask them to add a $50,000... Maybe more, $60,000, uh...

Okay.

...price tag onto this fellow.

I'm thinking of the stepfather, who was not a favorite of mine, and now has become one.

(chuckles) Mr. Charles Loman owned the department store in Brooklyn, New York, that sold very expensive dresses.

He was my student, so he came to me and he said, "I will give you a dress "if you get me on the Arthur Murray dance show doing the Viennese waltz, because I love it."

I asked Mrs. Murray, she said yes, and he was on the show, and I got the dress.

When you wore this, you could see you in the back of Sam Cooke singing in October of 1958.

You're standing there with your beautiful dark brown hair, in this beautiful blue dress, and it just pops.

MAN: I thought it was a Steiff, but it wasn't.

Uh, and I, you know, kept looking at the ears.

APPRAISER: Right.

And, uh, no holes, and so I assume that it's an Ideal, uh, production.

Ideal manufacturer?

Yeah.

A competitor of Steiff.

Uh-huh.

Uh, not as desirable, but still made attractive bears.

Based on looking at the piece, between the quality of the bear itself, the stitch work, and just the facial expression and the look of it as a whole, I actually do think it is in fact a Steiff.

Oh!

Even with, uh, the absence of the button in the ear.

I believe it probably had a button at one point, and potentially came out very carefully, and did not disrupt the ear at all.

I would certainly date this circa 1910, and probably a little before.

MAN: These are comics that I collected as a young lad in the late, uh, mid-to-late 1960s.

The interesting thing is that I bought all these at a secondhand store for five cents apiece.

Whoa!

Really?

Yes.

On the cover, they're all 12-cent books.

Mm-hmm.

And what we have here in front of us are all books published by Marvel.

And they're from what we call the Silver Age of Comics, which spans from 1956 to 1970.

But for Marvel, it didn't technically start until November 1961, with the first appearance of the Fantastic Four.

"Fantastic Four," issue one.

Prior to that, Marvel had gone by Atlas Comics, and prior to Atlas, the original title of the publication house was Timely Comics.

Hm.

Your comic books here range from 1963 to about 1968.

When it comes to determining a comic's value today, we have three different components.

It's A, why is the book important?

Why is it a key issue?

And what a key issue means is historical significance.

First character appearance, maybe there's a costume change.

Uh, maybe it's the number one issue, a change in the title, something that makes that particular book important.

The second factor is the age.

The modern-day superhero was invented in 1938, Superman, "Action Comics" one.

It's the book that lit the world on fire.

So when you get to 1968, you know, that's 30 years of comic books being published in the United States, which brings me to my third factor in how we determine if a book is worth money, the condition.

If you have a book that's really historically significant, it can be very forgiving in the condition.

So the first book, all the way next to you, that is "X-Men" 12, 1965.

It's the 12th issue in the series.

It's an early X-Men book.

Now, looking at that book, it is in really rough condition.

When we grade comic books today, we grade them on a numerical scale that's between 0.5 and ten.

Now, ten is theoretically possible, but it's so hard to get a ten.

The pinnacle is 9.8.

Now, when we look at the "Juggernaut" book here, it's approximately at about a 2.5... Hm.

...to 3.0 condition, but still, on today's market, that's a $500 to $800 book on its own.

(wheezing) Yeah, that's pretty exciting, right?

Yeah, I did not expect that.

And I'm starting... (laughs): I'm happy you didn't expect it.

And here's the exciting part, I'm starting from the bottom and working my way up.

The second book here in front of us, "Amazing Spider-Man" 20, is the first appearance of the Scorpion.

It is slightly better than the group.

It's 3.0 to 3.5 condition.

It's a $600 to $900 comic book today.

For collectors who can't obtain or can't afford such high-grade copies but want to have the first appearance... Hm.

...low-grade key issue books, it grants collectors a lot of accessibility.

Which leads me to my favorite of the whole batch.

And I don't even know... Do you know why "Strange Tales" 110 is on the board?

That was the one I thought might have some value, because it's the first appearance of Doctor Strange.

Bingo!

Yes, it is first appearance of Doctor Strange.

You look at the front, you go, "Man, this book presents really nice."

However, we turn it to the back side... ...where we could see there is a loss to the back cover.

The back cover is forgiving, but the loss also goes to the last and the second-to-the-last page.

We would say this book grades to about a 2.0 to a 2.5, because that beautiful front cover is the saving grace.

This book is worth $2,500 to $3,500 at auction today.

Oh, my gosh.

If you were to have this book in 9.2 condition today, which would be very, very high grade, looking like it almost just came off the newsstand, that would be a $50,000 to $80,000 comic today.

Outside of the three key issues, you have some really great Fantastic Four, I mean, early Daredevil, some other "Amazing Spider-Man" books.

When we look at the whole package, your collection today at auction would be $6,000 to $9,000.

Very nice!

Any one of these books, if they're in absolutely mint shape, they're worth tens of thousands of dollars.

WOMAN: It was my mom and dad's painting, and my father passed away a number of years ago.

Mom just passed away last year, and I found it in a closet when I was cleaning out, packing up after she passed away.

I had heard this story when I was a child about how they were on a road trip.

It was probably the late '50s, maybe early '60s.

My dad was stationed in Connecticut at the time and they were on a cross-country road trip, and Dad saw this old barn, dilapidated building of some sort, that had a trash pile and he could see this painting in the trash pile.

Dad was an artist, so he thought it was interesting, and he stopped and, uh, picked this up, put it in the car, and they went on about their road trip.

And it stayed in the closet the whole time I was a kid.

I remember seeing it in the closet.

Never really thought much about it.

Well, it's signed down here, John Rae.

John Rae was born in 1882, he studied in New York at the Art Students' League under a well-known American illustrator named Howard Pyle.

And he contributed illustrative work to about 50 books, and did a lot of work for magazines, as well.

Wow, I didn't know.

He also wrote and illustrated children's books, and he did write a book about Alice.

He seemed to be somewhat obsessed with Alice, I think.

He felt that the two books written by Lewis Carroll, "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking-Glass," just weren't enough.

So he wrote this book called "The New Adventures of Alice."

It was published in 1917 and it was one of the first to put Alice into a different setting, and she encountered various characters from Mother Goose in this book.

Hm.

I did buy a copy of the book that he wrote, and this is not in the book, but through some more research, I found that what this is is kind of a mash-up of the two books by Lewis Carroll.

So at the end of "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland," there are all these cards that fly up towards Alice.

So here you see the jack of hearts.

Mm-hmm.

Then, in the beginning of "Through the Looking-Glass," Alice has an encounter with the Red Queen.

So he's kind of combined the end of one book with the beginning of the next book.

While we don't have an actual date of this painting's execution, based on the fact that the artist was born in 1882, and he published his book in 1917, I would think it might be early 20th century, maybe circa 1915.

The painting is oil, and it's actually painted on artist board.

This jack of hearts is an actual playing card.

So this is oil with paper collage, we would call it.

Later in his life, he got interested in portraiture, and he painted such luminaries as Albert Einstein and Carl Sandburg.

He also did a very nice portrait of the real Alice in Wonderland, Alice Liddell, who was Lewis Carroll's next-door neighbor.

She was the child that Lewis Carroll wrote the books for.

There were a lot of other artists who illustrated "Alice in Wonderland."

John Tenniel was the original illustrator for the two "Alice in Wonderland" books.

Arthur Rackham, even Salvador Dalí.

Yayoi Kusama also did illustrations for Alice.

Although John Rae is a very good illustrator, he's not quite as famous as some of the other people who did illustrate Alice.

It's a little bit dirty and a little bit beat-up.

I think in a retail setting, the asking price might be around $10,000.

Wow.

Not bad for something rescued from the trash!

(chuckles): Not bad, not bad for the trash, no, yeah.

That's surprising, wow, wow, yeah, didn't know.

PEÑA: Political statements on wearable pieces are nothing new.

This 1827 abolitionist work bag was made by an English women's organization to raise funds and build awareness of the cruelty inflicted upon enslaved Black Americans.

Printed on the silk taffeta is an image of a kneeling enslaved person chained to the ground.

American abolitionists used these types of objects and literature from across the Atlantic to support their cause to end slavery.

MAN: Well, it's a Tibetan Buddha.

It's quite old-- 17th century, I've been told by a couple of art connoisseurs from the museum of art in Richmond.

I bought it in Nepal, uh, I paid $150 for it.

In, in Nepal?

In, in, in Kathmandu, yes.

I went to, uh, Columbia University studying Asian religions, so I knew quite a bit, and I've had to teach, you know, Buddhism, Hinduism, Chinese and Japanese religions.

So I came to William and Mary in 1970, and this came with me.

The way that they cast the metal in all this detail is amazing to me.

Do you happen to know what the figure is holding to its waist?

The wheel of life, basically.

Yeah, the Dharma Wheel.

It's representative of Buddha's teaching... Mm-hmm.

...and the moral world.

It's commonplace that Buddhas that were parts of sets... Mm-hmm.

...and in, in China, they often had sets up to 2,000... Wow, didn't know that.

...of cast deities behind a central deity as a, as a backdrop, and they're often numbered, but they get broken up.

It is unfortunate that, that, primarily in the 20th century, commercial enterprise or commercial necessity forced these devotional objects to be broken up and to be liquidated.

And this is all hand-chased work.

And then on the drapery to the shoulder, and the jewelry to the chest is beautifully chased, as well.

There's something different about the face and the crown.

There's a slight matte finish, so they were painted at one point.

Yes.

And it is to give a humanistic or a, an earthly tone to the face, a serene contrast to the gilt bronze.

The bead to the base here is very, very tight.

It's very, very good.

It's not un-uniform or sloppy, or falls into itself.

On inferior 20th-century bronzes, often they omit work to the back.

It's time-consuming, it's expensive.

So 17th-, 18th-century bronzes will show a continuation of their chase work, a continuation of jewel drapery to the waist.

And again, that beadwork continues and is beautiful, you know, circumference to the base.

Now, there is a tag on the right arm.

Um, do you happen to know what that tag represents?

Yes, when I bought it in Nepal, I was told that I needed that to get it out of the country.

Mm-hmm.

Because they didn't want any of their own Nepalese art and precious things taken out.

You're right, these were done so objects were easily identified as ready for export.

Mm-hmm.

Or to be able to be exported.

They add no real value to the bronze.

No, you're right.

I think in today's market, it would have a, a retail replacement value... To go and buy it now at a, at a good, reputable dealer of Buddhist works of art, it would be valued at $100,000.

Mm, yes.

In an auction setting, it's likely to have an estimate of between $30,000 and $50,000.

That's all?

Hm!

Some would think that's a good return on investment-- even with inflation.

Ah, huh.

Well, thank you very much.

PEÑA: And now it's time for the Roadshow Feedback Booth.

I am just ecstatic to be here, finally.

I've always wanted to get this piece appraised, and to finally have it done by somebody who is legitimate and trustworthy, um, I'm just, I'm honored and thankful.

We're fans of "Roadshow" from season one, and it's been so exciting to come here and be a part of this today.

We were so excited to people-watch and see all of our favorite appraisers.

It was a great time, I highly recommend it.

I think I want to donate her to where she came from, the Magnolia Grange.

Um, it's a museum now in Chesterfield County, Virginia, and I think that she needs to go back there where I found her.

This was a great experience today.

Um, showed off my ring, got to wear my shirt, had a great time.

Hello to all Padre fans everywhere.

I am such a "Roadshow" geek.

I have had an absolutely fabulous time.

The object will go back on my wall, and I'm going to stick out my tongue at my daughter and my son who have always pooh-poohed this thing as just an interesting piece of art.

It was worth more than we thought, but the experience of being here, priceless.

(laughs): And it's really fun to see all the appraisers that we've seen on TV.

So we drove 1,000 miles to be here, our item's probably not worth that, but, as Jeff said, priceless.

PEÑA: Thanks for watching.

See you next time on "Antiques Roadshow."