Sporting Memorabilia & Equipment
This sector of the art and antiques market often generates big headlines in the general media – not least when an auction record for 1966 World Cup is set for example. But the market is extremely wide and varied. Here there really is something for everyone at every price level, whether a buyer focuses on football programmes, historic golf clubs or fishing tackle.
Valour revalued
18 December 2003The date of November 5 seemed apt for Spink’s (17.65% buyer’s premium) 623-lot sale of Orders, Decorations Campaign Medals and Militaria (ODM), the fireworks of Guy Fawkes Day recalling the whizz-bangs and crashes of wartime when many of these medals were won. Some of these bangs and crashes left themselves to metaphor, as records were falling all over the place.
The Story of the Golf Ball
09 December 2003The Story of the Golf Ball by Kevin McGimpsey, published by Kevin McGimpsey in association with Philip Wilson Publishers. ISBN 0856675661 £49hb
Pioneer’s fish lands a bid of £4500
23 October 2003Historians of the craft of fish carving currently believe that the Scotsman John B. Russell (1819/20-1893) was the first professional maker of such models. Working with carver John Tully at the Fochabers Studio, which made models for Farlow & Co. into the 1930s, Russell is known to have been producing these fine trophies from around 1880, although the early date to the example pictured here suggests some rewriting of the literature might be required.
Ludgrove’s plan 2004 tour after well-played London test
05 September 2003The market for cricket memorabilia is dominated by Australian and UK collectors who battle every summer for the best entries in London’s major June and July sporting sales. This year Melbourne-based Ludgrove’s (15% buyer’s premium) joined the major houses and held a Literary, Historical and Sporting sale on July 29 at St James DeVere Cavendish Hotel.
VC boosts total to £1m
20 August 2003Well, it’s happened at last! The first £1million sale of campaign medals and awards (ODM) has taken place. It took Dix Noonan Webb (15% buyer’s premium) 1155 lots to disperse this assemblage. The total was £1,013,510 and this is the hammer total so there was no fudging with the buyer’s premium to jack the total over the magic number.
Downing The Don
24 July 2003It is one of the best known moments in sport. Donald Bradman, batsman without peer, arrives at the crease in his final test match at the Oval on August 14 1948, requiring just four runs for a Test career average of 100.
A sculptural speciality
30 June 2003Apart from their specialist commemorative medal sale, Morton & Eden (15% buyer’s premium) busied themselves with a general 1025-lot sale on May 21 which made a total of £592,877. This fine result was coupled with a reasonably small failure rate of just 12 per cent. This is about the norm for more specialised events but hard to achieve in a general sale.
Hunting the big provincial game... Loyal following for field sports at bi-annual themed sale in Somerset
21 May 2003THE bi-annual West Country Sporting Sales have acquired a character of their own since their inception six sales ago, finding a niche in what has become a crowded field by focusing upon hunting antiques in addition to the traditional summer sports.
Beetles on the ball at £42,000, and shirt proves its Vava voom at £12,000
24 April 2003Pictured right is the highlight of Christie’s South Kensington’s (17.5/10% buyer’s premium) first football memorabilia sale of 2003 on March 26. A Cup Tie at Crystal Palace, Corinthians v. Manchester City, by Charles Ernest Cundall, in oil on panel 231/4in x 2ft 51/2in (60 x 75cm), signed C. Cundall lower right, set a new auction record for the artist when it was knocked down to London dealer Chris Beetles for £42,000, double the upper estimate.
Too much to swallow – the fish, not the story
03 October 2002Fishermen’s tales are usually too tall to swallow, and the following account of a frenzied struggle on a Dorset riverbank in May 1912 would be scarcely credible were it not for the stuffed and cased evidence, right.
A cup that pours forth joy and sorrow in equal measure
01 October 2002THE Coppa Italia is the Italian equivalent of the English FA cup. When the example shown right was won by Torino in 1943 it was the second occasion on which they had taken home the trophy.
Patchy results for summer’s sports
28 August 2002The extraordinary prices realised for football memorabilia such as the £140,000 bid at Christie’s South Kensington for Pele’s Brazilian 1970 World Cup Final shirt reflect sporting collectors’ current obsession with the beautiful game.
Golfing rarities by C.B. Clapcott
14 August 2002IN A July 15 Golfing Memorabilia sale held by Bonhams Chester (17.5/10% buyer's premium) a scarce copy of C.B. Clapcott’s The History of Handicapping, a 10pp booklet of c.1924, secured in cream card covers by now rusty staples, was sold at a ten-times-estimate £4000, and one of 500 limited edition copies of a 1935 book by Clapcott, Rules of the Ten Oldest Golf Clubs from 1754-1848, a near fine copy in glassine wrappers, reached £1350.
Tilt-head is tennis tops
12 July 2002The World Cup may have come to a disappointing close for English fans, but sporting enthusiasts can now look forward to a summer of Wimbledon and cricket Test matches.
Coming up in Cheshire...
28 June 2002A veteran of golfing sales, Bob Gowland has been involved in this specialist field for the past 30 years. With stints at both Phillips and Bonhams under his belt, he has been acting independently for the past 18 months as Bob Gowland International Golf Auctions.
Specialists get a result thanks to fans’ loyalty
15 May 2002THIS rugby and football memorabilia sale of just over 500 lots was not one of the specialist sporting auctioneer’s most spectacular outings, dominated as it was by paper ephemera rather than expensive medals and silverware, but the turn-out and take-up were as strong as ever.
Late 18th century cricketing badge enjoys long innings
17 April 2002The season has not quite begun, but this late 18th century cricketing badge enjoyed a long innings at Duke’s Dorchester salerooms on April 11-12.
Well-pitched football collectables prove they have a large fan base
12 April 2002While Pelé’s shirt received nearly all the post-sale plaudits, it wasn’t the only piece of football history to go under the hammer at Christie’s South Kensington (17.5/10% buyer’s premium) last week, and CSK was not the only London room offering a sale of football memorabilia.
A unique piece of soccer history
03 April 2002In the week when the death was announced of Kenneth Wolstenholme – the man whose legendary utterance “They think it’s all over... it is now!” capped England’s 1966 World Cup win – what could have been more appropriate than a world record for a football shirt at auction.
Programmes in the Big League
04 March 2002FOOTBALL programmes were the mainstay of this mixed book, card and ephemera sale for Acorn Auctions in Trafford Park, but though one job lot of two dozen Manchester United programmes of 1960s-80s vintage did sell for £620, a similar number of single sheet programmes of 1945-46, valued at up to £2000, failed to sell, and for once it was Manchester City who came out on top.
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