Collectables

CONDITION is nine-tenths of the law in toy collecting and that explains the remarkable level of interest in this No.2 Special Pullman train set, pictured right, which turned up at Bonhams Edinburgh (17.5% buyer premium) on March 25.

A children’s and illustrated sale held by Pacific Book Auctions of San Francisco on May 13 included a collection of Oz books by L. Frank Baum.

AN April 29 sale held by Bloomsbury Auctions presented an enormous selection of children’s, illustrated and private press books that ran to nearly 900 lots. While there was much to admire in the other sections of the sale, I shall concentrate on the children’s books for this report. A great many of the lots came from one fine collection in which many of the books contained a bookplate designed by Pauline Baynes.

The ABA’s annual Antiquarian Book Fair, which this year will be opened by the writer Frederick Forsyth, will run from June 3-6 at Olympia. Illustrated and/or very briefly described here are half a dozen items promised by dealers from Britain and the USA.

MORTON and Eden continue to make great strides considering how short a time they have existed. On April 22 they held their first sale abroad – in Milan in collaboration with Sotheby’s. Indeed, that firm is descended from the now closed Sotheby’s coin department.

IN this busy spring season – the busiest for some years – Spink’s have been batting hard. March 31 saw a fine sale which netted £626,750. But, not content with that, they fielded another 632-lot sale a fortnight later, on April 15. Again this sale referred mainly to British and related coins. However, the first 131 lots were devoted to the ancient world.

SALES of Victoria Cross groups continue to set new auction records.

AT Gorringes’ (15% buyer's premium) April 27-29 sale, specialist Aaron Dean was satisfied with the reaction to some 200 lots of silver but, with the market for routine tea services and so on remaining fairly moribund, it is the smaller collectables which catch the eye.

Despite the important nature of many items being sold to militaria and weapons specialists at the Marlow rooms of Bosleys (15% buyer's premium) on March 10, there were, as usual, a number of more domestic objects included.

MOVING just South of the Border to Jack Dudgeon (10% buyer's premium) in Berwick-Upon-Tweed, and echoes of one of the key incidents of the Second World War provided keen specialist interest at their April 19 sale.

THE first part of the Maurice F. Neville collection of modern literature, which sold for a premium-inclusive $5.22m (£2.95m) at Sotheby’s New York on April 13, was primarily but certainly not wholly focused on the work of American writers. Seen here are two of the English books that brought strong results.

Pictured right is a Fokker cylinder from a WWI German triplane that made £3600 at Bonhams Oxford (17.5% buyer’s premium) sale of arms and militaria on April 13.

A 1937 FIRST edition of The Hobbit was always likely to be the big story in the April 14 books and collectables sale held by David Lay of Penzance. In a jacket with some chips and losses, notably towards the spine ends, and showing an ink correction to the mis-spelt version of Charles Dodgson’s name on the back flap, it duly sold at £10,500.

RONALD W. Coleby of Houghton in Cumbria, who died last year, just a week after completing the memoir of his wife that had occupied much of his time in recent years, became a full-time bookseller in 1972, specialising in hunting, shooting and, above all, fishing.

THE opening map and atlas section of the Bonhams Bath sale of April 26 included a copy in rebacked contemporary calf of the first and only published volume of the 1675 first edition of John Ogilby’s Britannia with its general map and 100 engraved strip road maps, at £7000.

DIX Noonan Webb’s March 17 sale offered exactly 1700 lots, making for a very long day. But just about every branch of numismatic endeavour was catered for. So comprehensive was this sale that only a flavour of the dispersal can be covered here.

NEARLY 1300 lots were offered by Anthemion Auctions of Cardiff in an April 21 sale of sports memorabilia and among the soccer programmes, there was a bit of a shock when a 1945 programme for a Newport County v Chelsea match, valued at £30-40, was bid to £2600!

THIS spring season Spink’s have had some hard-hitting sales and it has to be said that the market for the best British material has become very buoyant over the last year or so.

IN the centennial year of his birth in 1904, a provenance to George Formby came with the sale of a ukelele which sold for £1750 (estimate £100-150) at Gorringes Lewes sale on April 27. The C.F. Martin & Co. 3K lte ukelele was bought by Bernard Dyke, a past president of the George Formby Society. The uke came to sale via the vendor’s father, an Arthur Rank chairman in the late 30s/early 40s to whom George presented it at a film preview at a Rank cinema in Essex.

AS USUAL at the March 18-19 sale held by Neales (15% buyer's premium), the spring event was led in price terms by furniture – but in terms of selling rates and the degree of competition in the room, the Nottingham event was more notable for the smalls and collectables.