Here's a first look at our March 19 issue, a special for the Atlantique City Antiques Show, which is owned by Trader's parent company, F+W Publications.

It'll be a glossy front with an extra 5,000 copies distributed at AC on March 29-30, 2008 at the Altantic City Convention Center.

I'll be there. If you are around and want to say hi, please do...

I should probably preface this with saying that I spent the first 18 years of my life in Dallas.

The days of my youth were spent in downtown Dallas, in Deep Ellum and all around the Texas State Fairgrounds. I went to high school right down there, and it was a great landscape for young minds.

I drove that city for all those years, at all hours of the day and night, and worked at The West End Marketplace, a stone's throw from the book depository building where Oswald made his shot.



It was not, however, until the week before I left for college that, driving through Dealey Plaza with some friends that I realized that this was the road where Kennedy was killed, and there was the grassy knoll. Hundreds of times, I drove that road, used it as a landmark. Never, though, did I make the JFK connection.

It it thus that I've been reluctant to report on Jack Ruby's gun being on the auction as part of Guernsey's superb Pop Culture Auction, March 15 and 16, in Vegas - only appropriate somehow.



Here's a link to a story from the Dallas Morning News , via Denton - which used to take 45 minutes to get to and was nothing but open fields on either site of the expressway - about the gun and the sale.

I grew up in Dallas in the 70s, when the city was still smarting from the assasination and, really, nobody talked much about the JFK assasination, and your certainly never ever joked about it. I still wouldn't.

All the same, it is an important piece of history, and it's probably going to bring a fair amount of cash.  And that's what's important, isn't it?

At least in art officialy, but you gotta figure antiquities and antiques - which China has been placing ever-tightening restrictions on - make up a big part of this number, and represent a huge figure in and of itself.

This is interesting news released by China's official state news agency, Xinhua, about the mainland now being number three in art sales, displacing France.

The U.S. and U.K. are sitting pretty in first with huge market shares, but - as with almost every market - look out for the Chinese boom. I'm sure India isn't too far behind.

China has been ripe for a while for an explosion in art and antiques. When The Cultural Revolution destroyed thousands of years of Dynasty, a lot of the classic art and antiques went into hiding in the vast countryside. Now all of that has been coming out and the prices are exoribitant in many cases - that's if you can get it out of the country.

The government there knows now what it's cultural heritage is worth, even if they forgot for a couple of generations. Now it's cashing in.

This is a link to an article in the Sunday New York Times. A lot of you will remember when the Duncan House - one of Frank Lloyd Wright's 11 surviving Usonian houses - was dismantled and moved from Illinois to Western Pennsylvania.

The writer stayed at the re-assembled house, part of a trinity of FLW houses known colelctively as Polymath Park, where you can rent a FLW house for the weekend, enjoying the master's work, and taking in nearby Falling Water and Nob Hill during your stay.

For anyone enamored of Wright's timeless genius - and count me among them - it would be a lifelong dream come true to spend a few nights in one of his houses. Just as the writer describes it.

APPROXIMATELY 175 PIECES OF AMERICAN ART POTTERY STOLEN

HILLARD, OH - Between 3:15 P.M. on Monday, February 25, 2008, and 8:30 A.M. on Tuesday, February 26, 2008, approximately 175 pieces of American Art Pottery were stolen from Belhorn Auction Services, LLC in the Columbus suburb of Hilliard, Ohio.  Also stolen was a cargo trailer in which the pottery was loaded, which was secured and locked at Belhorn Auctions’ office.

Pottery stolen includes various examples of Weller, Roseville, Rookwood, Owens, Van Briggle, Hampshire, Pillin, Fulper as well as others.  Also stolen was an exhibit of fake and reproduction pottery assembled by the American Art Pottery Association for educational and presentation purposes.  The trailer is an unmarked, white American Hauler cargo trailer with fold-down rear ramp and a system of shelving on the inside.

“We are working closely with law enforcement and our property management company to review security tapes covering the area during the time of the theft,” said Belhorn Auction Services, LLC President Greg Belhorn. “All consignors affected by this incident are fully covered and will be reimbursed for any financial loss.  However, I do remain hopeful that the items will be recovered.”

Nearly all of the stolen pieces were slated for the American Art Pottery Association’s 2008 Auction to be held in conjunction with the organization’s Annual Convention on April 23-27, 2008, in the Greater Philadelphia area.  Belhorn Auction Services, LLC donates its time and resources to conduct this auction, which benefits the Association and its endeavors.  The full  commission and buyer’s premium generated from the auction serve as an important revenue source from the American Art Pottery Association.

A general list and photos of the stolen pottery will be made available at Belhorn Auction Services, LLC’s website at www.belhorn.com.  Anyone with information regarding this incident or who is approached by an individual with pottery for sale matching the description of stolen items should contact the Hilliard (Ohio) Police Department at (614) 876-7321 or Belhorn Auction Services, LLC at (614) 921-9441.  A reward is being offered for any information leading to the recovery of the stolen property.

This is truly one of the funniest things I've seen online in a long time and is a good - if somewhat amateurish - spoof of Roadshow, but dead-on in many respects and, if I didn't say it before, funny funny funny.

Check it out and enjoy. It's about five minutes long and is The Roadshow we've all wished we could see from time to time.

The best part is the end: "Don't give money to PBS! We're all going to die!"

This is just cool, plain and simple.

An Asheboro, NC man is displaying his massive, and ancient, arrowhead collection this weekend at the Asheboro public library. Some of these things are more than 6000 years old - making them ancient when the pyramids were being built... This event is annual in ASheboro and routinely brings out hundreds of folks.

I'd love to see this collection tour. It's a testament to human ingenuity and the incredible craftsmanship of Native Americans. Check it out. the pic below is of the gentelman with a particularly old example. If you're going to be in Asheboro this weekend, let me know how the exhibition is.

Very cool.

This is another blog I have been enjoying quite a bit over the last few weeks, and given how popular and collectible good art pottery is, this is a great resource.

Greg Myroth, who runs the site - and an art pottery business, I  might add - knows his stuff and has packed the page full of great detail and links to pertinent information about makers and styles. It's put together well and has a variety of info to help you on your quest, if your on a quest for this type of thing.

Check it out, let us know what you think... Happy hunting.

I’d be lost without my work Blackberry, or my personal cell phone, or any of the three email accounts I maintain on a daily basis, or without my ability to type my antiques-related feelings about various antiques-related happenings in the world on the Antique Trader Blog – www.antiquetrader.com/atblog, by the way…
 
I lie awake at night and wonder if I’ve sent this email or that, or if a certain press release was sent or of that PR contact responded to my query. As much as I don’t want to admit it, I’m 100% hooked on tech.
 
In fact, I’d say that, if all the technology upon which my work is predicated were to suddenly disappear into the ether, I’d probably wander around, bereft for some time, in the words of Beatrix Potter in Peter Rabbit, going lippity, lippity, lipitty…
 
Then, I reckon, I’d hitch up my jeans and get on with it, doing business the way it was done for thousands of years – in person, face-to-face. It might, in fact, be quite refreshing.

 

Here’s what Antique Trader want to know this week: How would your antiques business or hobby fare without technology? How exactly would you cope in the short term, and what would you do long term?
 
Let me know at noah.fleisher@fwpubs.com, or post your answer in the comments section here.

Preview of our 3-12 Trader, which just went to press yesterday.

Disgraced former Antiques Roadshow appraiser Russ Pritchard entered a guilty plea in a Bucks County, PA court yesterday, and is now on the hook for $6,800 to a woman he bilked when he sold her heirlooms and never paid up.

The sad thing - besides Pritchard's agonizing fall from grace - is that the amount he owes Sandra Udinson of Plumstead, is just a drop in the bucket of the hundreds of thousands of dollars he owes in civil damages already and which will probably be leveled at him when he faces similar charges to those in Bucks County in Montgomery County next month.

The article linked to above tells the story of his sentencing, the juiciest bit being the judge telling pritchard, "The most important thing is that the victim be made whole,” Heckler told Pritchard. “You will pay her, or you will end up in jail.”

I don't know Russ Pritchard, and he brought this on himself - for sure - but I can't help but find this whole thing a bit sad as it drags on and on...

Pictured below is Pritchard from his Roadshow days. The pic is from WGBH, so I'm not sure if it's one of his fake Civil War appraisals.

This was widely covered, and hailed in the MSM the last few days. I don't know... Philosophically speaking, I find it a little daunting and frightening. A tangible reminder of the damage that humans are wreaking on the planet at alarming places.

It's the Svalbard Seed Vault in Longyearbyen, Norway (nice name). You can see the below pics here.



Architecturally, though, I think - in fine Scandanavian Moderne fashion, I might add - the building is pretty awesome, a real tribute to the modern aesthetic, not that visitors to the planet eons from now will appreciate the differences in Lloyd Wright and, say, Gropius...

It's as if, in a million years or so - hopefully longer - if the planet is rid of humans and retakes everything, then we're visited by our future progeny returned to the homeworld to see exactly where they sprang from - stick with me - thart they would find not only the seed as proof that we wanted to preserve our existences, but a really cool building refelctive of the best of modern design of the time. Man... Won't those bionetic cyborgs be impressed.

Most importantly, the American eggplant will survive.

From the Web site:

    Svalbard Global Seed Vault: Arctic Seed Vault Opens Doors for 100 Million Seeds

    Ceremony Marking Unprecedented Effort to Protect Global Agriculture Draws World Leaders and     Seeds from Over 100 Countries

    LONGYEARBYEN, NORWAY (26 FEBRUARY 2008) - The Svalbard Global Seed Vault opened today     on a remote island in the Arctic Circle, receiving inaugural shipments of 100 million seeds that         originated in over 100 countries. With the deposits ranging from unique varieties of major African     and Asian food staples such as maize, rice, wheat, cowpea, and sorghum to European and South     American varieties of eggplant, lettuce, barley, and potato, the first deposits into the seed vault     represent the most comprehensive and diverse collection of food crop seeds being held anywhere     in the world.  

Just wondering, as I negotiate the explosion of sales and sites that have sprung up in response to eBay's "changes," what sites, exactly, are you going to either to supplement your eBay sales or to use as a whole other alternative?

I'd like to check them out, possibly start offering some reviews and interviews.

Anyone? Anyone?

Let me know in the comments section here, preferrably, or at noah.fleisher@fwpubs.com (as long as email's working by today...)

I know there are a lot of bargain hunters out there, and this sale looks like it could have some hidden gems. It's a big one, sent my way by a colleague here in the building, about a massive estate sale from AAA Estate Specialists out of Shreveport, LA.

It came our way too late to get into print.

Surprise, surprise: They have no Web site and no pictures, but this is going to be a wide and varied sale. If you're an interpid antiquer, and don't mind a bit of a chase, you could give them a call and see exactly what't on the block.

My thanks to Susan Sliwicki.

MASSIVE ESTATE SALE IN LOUISIANNA

A massive estate sale in Robeline, La., promises to offer something for nearly every collector’s tastes.

Everything from movie theater equipment and cotton gins to  glassware, toys, books and furniture are among the items up for sale from the historic W.W. Page Jr. estate, said Cindy Wilkinson of AAA Estate Specialists, the Shreveport, La.,-based firm handling the sale.

The sale is set for 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on March 7 and 8. To learn more about the lots and details of the sale, call AAA Estate Specialists at 318-393-0239 between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. CST, Wilkinson said.

It will feature a variety of lots from the family’s businesses, which included the Sabine Theater, Vernon Theater and the Page Store.

A variety of scales, including ones used for cotton, meat and candy, are part of the sale. A water fountain and the general store’s oak counter/seed bin also are part of the sale.

“From the candy store there’s the concrete top, it’s a big rectangle, and they would pour the fudge on that and cut it. That’s pretty neat,” Wilkinson said. “I think it’d be a great island top in a kitchen.”

Movie lovers will appreciate the lots from the theater, which range from the Art Deco era up through the late 1950s to early 1960s, Wilkinson said.

“There’s lots of parts still in the box that were never used,” Wilkinson said.

Collectors of general store and movie theater type memorabilia will definitely want to see what they can see about this one.

For more info, call 318-393-0239.

Hello everyone-

After a day off, spent in glorious chase of my two-year old daughter, and a week with e-mail problems here at AT World HQ, there will be posts coming today and so on and hopefully the end of email crisis as well.

A lot of what becomes blog posts comes from reader tips and rss feeds - dozens and dozens and dozens of rss feeds - from various places. Those, and any correspondence I've had from any of you over the last week are, sotensibly, lost in the ether in perpetuity throughout the universe.

Things will be coming! Put down those torches!

That record collection - easily the best record collection in one single place - was being sold by Paul Mahwinney out of Record Rama in Pittsburgh, PA (is there ay other?), which sold for $3M to an a buyer in Ireland on eBay last week?

Fraud.

I can't imagine that eBay, who has suffered so much bad press lately, can be terribly happy about this.



The "buyer" said that he was the victim of identity theft and that he got the invoice and couldn't believe it. I reckon that's possible, and a terrible email to get from PayPal, which is already such an unpleasant system.

Furthermore, it's reported that a rare Stones album, that Mahwinney has valued at $10,000, can be bought elsewhere on eBay for $599. Ouch.