Santa Clara Newps and Space Memorabilia pickups.

[SkyMan]

Boy, it was a busy long weekend.

 

On thursday Superior had their Santa Clara auction. There were a variety of enjoyable lots to browse through, but those lots in general were priced beyond what I was willing to bid. I did end up buying 2 lots at the auction; an NGC PR66RB 1905 Indian, and an NGC XF45 1855-O W/Arrows SL Half dollar.

 

On friday Goldberg's held an auction of space memorabilia in Beverly Hills. I bid over the phone and was Quite surprised at how little action there was. There was a Heritage space memorabilia auction on 10/7/08 where the prices were quite strong, but Goldberg's was dead... which needless to say was GREAT for me. I think the economic uncertainty has finally hit collecting in this field. It was the first auction I've ever bid on where I got EVERYTHING I wanted, and for substantially below low end estimated prices.

 

I got 3 numismatic items; a "short snorter" (I'll tell you what this means when I eventually post it) autographed 1957 silver $1 certificate, a Roosevelt 1961-D that was flown on Gus Grissom's Liberty Bell 7 Mercury flight, and a Robbins (the manufacterer) Apollo 7 flown medal. This medal is in the shape of the mission patch. These medals were quite small, on the order of 1" in size, as weight was THE major factor for all space flights. 100 of these medals were flown on Apollo 7 and the one I bought is #46. There will be more pictures of items mentioned in this thread in later posts, but I'm not happy with auction images of some of the items, so they are not being posted in this thread. Anyhow, here's some pix of the medal:

 

 

 

For non-numismatic items I got: a WE7 book about the 7 Mercury astronauts. The book was owned by Bill Dana, the comedian who played "Jose Jimenez" the reluctant astronaut. It was signed by 5 of the Mercury astronauts who were big fans of Bill, and comes with a picture of him holding the book and holding up 8 fingers to signify that he was the 8th Mercury astronaut, which was a designation the other 7 gave him.

 

 

 

A Gemini 7 primary and backup crew Polaroid picture that Ed White's (the first American to walk in space) family had kept. While you might occaissionally see a spoof picture of the astronauts where there eyes bug out or something of that sort, I've NEVER seen anything like this one where the astronauts "dressed up" for playing around. From left to right the astronauts are White, Borman, Lovell and Collins.

 

 

 

Some (non-flown) stamps that show the famous "Earthrise" image taken from Apollo 8. The 3 crew members have signed the stamps.

 

 

 

A piece of Moon dust (technically illegal to own) from Apollo 12.

 

 

 

And finally a Soviet era Space banner celebrating the Vostok flights signed by 3 Cosmonauts. The top signature is Tereshkova's (the first Woman in space), the middle signature is Gagarin's (the first Man in space), and the 3rd one is inaccurately listed in the auction catalogue as Titov (I know his signature and that is not it).

 

 

 

On saturday it was back to the action at Santa Clara where I picked up 3 more coins; an NGC MS62 1839 SL half dime, a 1921 Pilgrim in PCGS MS65, and a 1936 Long Island in MS65. All 3 coins have pleasant toning. I will have images of the above numismatic items taken and will post them to the boards later.

 

Regarding the Santa Clara show, it is definitely in a declining mode. I saw a lot of empty tables, and NGC didn't even bother to come to it. As far as stuff on the bourse, aside from the really pricey rarities my 2 favorite coins to see were both raw. One was a high grade IHC (can't remember the date) that was an absolutely killer green with assorted other color highlights. The second coin was a Hawaiian 1883(?) quarter that was just gorgeously toned. IMO both were no question NT.

 

So, it was a very busy and satisfying collecting long weekend.

[realone]

Very cool stuff regarding the space material thanks for sharing.

As to Superior's auction, another reason why it may have been a slim number of collectors/dealers bidding at the auction is that for me the material that they carried was not their typical top shelf stuff. So it would make sense to me that it was not too successful due to the inferior product offered as opposed to believing that the economy may have negatively affected the auction's out come. Now I am not saying that the economy cannot be blamed but I can honestly say that lack of great product could be the issue at hand here.

[DirtyGoldMan]

Cool stuff, Sy.

 

Have you seen the HBO series, From the Earth to the Moon?

[SkyMan]

Cool stuff, Sy.

 

Have you seen the HBO series, From the Earth to the Moon?

 

Thanks, glad you like 'em. Yes I have seen the HBO series (I own the DVD's). Pretty cool stuff.

 

Realone. The Goldberg auction and the Superior auction were TWO seperate auctions. I would agree that Superiors material at it's Santa Clara auctions is, for the most part, second rate. As for the Goldberg space memorabilia auction, they did not have as nice stuff as Heritage's auction, but they certainly had some good stuff including a couple of Russian space suits. I would say that their lack of bidding had more to do with the economy.

[physics-fan3.14]

The moon dust is AWESOME!!!!!!

[EZ_E]

Skyman, I admit that I'm a closet space nut! Love your stuff! Especially the signed earth rise stamps. Awesome!

[ant]

great history! thanks for posting