Rolex wristwatches. TAC Estate Auctions Inc. image. WAKEFIELD, Mass. – TAC Estate Auctions Inc. will conduct an auction Wednesday, May 29, titled “Antiques, Decorative Arts, Interesting & Unusual Things.” The auction will begin at 6 p.m. EDT, 3 p.m. Pacific. LiveAuctioneers.com will provide Internet live bidding.
Auctioneer Tonya A. Cameron indicates that items are drawn from Wellesley and Wakefield, Mass., estates as well as Maine.
Other choice selections include a one-owner collection of more than 40 antique bisque dolls and vintage toys. Also featured will be original Woody Woodpecker oil paintings, drawings, cels and posters signed by the cartoon character’s creator, Walter Lantz. There are also two life-size Woody Woodpecker theme park costumes.
The more than 250 lots include a huge dinner service of American Marine by Ashworth. There are many lots of Inuit carved whalebone sculptures and a fine collection of arrowheads in shadowboxes. A Native American feather headdress will also be sold.
There are assorted lots of fine jewelry and a man’s and a woman’s vintage Rolex wristwatch.
Antique weapons include Civil War-era guns and swords.
Additional toys include tin windup and friction toys, vintage Hubley and cast-iron fire truck and wagons.
Wayne Morrell and Bertha Perrie are among the listed artists represented. Many Sawyers and Nuttings will be sold in one lot.
Furniture highlights are a mahogany dining room set, several occasional and side tables, bookcases and wrought iron garden sets.
Rounding out this full auction are a collection of War World II books and scrapbook albums, sterling silver, huge coin lots, stamp albums, mantel clocks, shorebirds, Venetian glassware and a large Della Robbia plaque.
For details contact TAC Estate Auctions Inc. at 781-233-0006 (office) or 781-632-2112 (cellphone) or log onto www.tacauctioneers.com.
View the fully illustrated catalog and sign up to bid absentee or live via the Internet.
Greek Corinthian bronze helmet, est. $30,000-$45,000. Antiquities Saleroom image. BOULDER COUNTY, Colo. – Two premier collections of art and artifacts from ancient civilizations combine to form the core of Antiquities Saleroom’s June 13-14 auction, which also includes an outstanding selection of natural history and mineral specimens. Many of the 400 lots entered in the absentee, phone and Internet auction come from the meticulously documented, investment-grade collections of two Hollywood insiders – an Emmy Award-winning executive producer/writer, and a producer/director who specializes in movie trailers. Part I of both these collections anchored Antiquities Saleroom’s extremely successful Feb. 1 auction.
Internet live bidding will be provided by LiveAuctioneers.com
“This is our largest auction ever and contains some of the finest classical antiquities we’ve ever had the pleasure of offering,” said Antiquities Saleroom co-owner and acquisitions director Bob Dodge. “Every category contains pieces that collectors dream of owning but never see at auction or anywhere else.”
The session will open with gems and minerals, led by a beautiful pallasite meteorite, 4.5 billion years old, which quite literally is the remnant of an early planet in our solar system. The iron-based meteorite is infused with amber-hued olivine gem crystals and was discovered in Russia in 1967. The consignor is a well-known dealer who has conducted business with Antiquities Saleroom for many years. The specimen is estimated at $1,000-$2,000 – a very affordable price range, Dodge noted. “In all of our sales we make an effort to include nice pieces for every level of collector. In our June auction there are things that will sell for well under a thousand dollars, and for the advanced collector, there are highly important pieces valued in the tens of thousands of dollars.”
The sale will then move into human cultures, with the highlight being a fantastic Egyptian rarity – a pottery seal mold from “The Boy King,” Tutankhamun (1332-1323 B.C). The pottery mold from Tut’s royal workshop is deeply impressed with four elements: ra (sun), kheper (beetle), men (upward rake) and neb (bowl).
These four symbols and their specific arrangement uniquely represent Tutankhamum, Bob Dodge explained. “Pottery molds were used to create scarabs, seals or anything with the pharaoh’s cartouche or name on it. This particular mold probably would have been used to create faience amulets that were passed out as souvenirs to commemorate the reign of a pharaoh, in this case King Tut. In the 25 years I’ve been in this business, this is the first time I’ve seen a genuine King Tut artifact come to auction. It’s from the most important period in terms of Egyptian art, and it’s insanely rare,” Dodge said.
The mold comes directly from the family of the late Philip Mitry, who was an antiquities dealer in Cairo during the 1950s. At that time, the sale of Egyptian antiquities was legal and, in fact, state sponsored. When Mitry moved to the United States in the 1950s, he brought his massive collection with him. The King Tut mold, which became part of Mitry’s collection in 1953, will be auctioned with documentation from Mitry’s family and a lifetime certificate of authenticity from Antiquities Saleroom. The estimate on the piece is $10,000-$20,000, but as Dodge explained, “We think of this as being priceless. It could go far in excess of expectations.”
Another Egyptian rarity is a large scarab impressed with the very clear cartouche of Thutmose III – who, like Tut, was an 18th Dynasty pharaoh. It retains a narrow band of gold on its exterior, and at the bottom is a scene of a monkey in adoration of a horse, symbolizing Thutmose’s much-admired military prowess. A book example, it is expected to make $3,000-$5,000.
The Greek section contains two impressive battle helmets, each exhibiting a different style. One is a Corinthian helmet with a distinctive long nose bridge, sixth to fifth century B.C. “It would have been worn by a Hoplite soldier. They would walk in unison in a group of 20 to 100 men, each carrying a 16-foot-long spear. Then they would hunker down and, at the right moment, attack. In their day they were invincible,” Dodge said. The helmet’s estimate is $30,000-$50,000.
The second helmet is Illyrian and made during the same time period as the Corinthian helmet, but of bronze. It features a squared-off style with interior leather padding. Its estimate is $20,000-$30,000. Another helmet of note is French, of hand-hammered steel with handmade rivets and a retractable visor. Although a much later production that the other two helmets, dating to the 14th-15th century, it is a rarity, as few French or British helmets of that period have survived. Estimate: $10,000-$20,000.
Approximately nine rare and desirable pieces of Greek pottery will be auctioned, including three Athenian (Attic) vessels. One is a slender jar known as a lekythos, which was designed to hold precious oils. Considering how Attic art can run into the millions of dollars, it presents a rare buying opportunity with a presale estimate of $9,000-$14,000. A particularly fine kylix wine cup, fourth-sixth century B.C., features black images on red, against a black ground. Estimate: $20,000-$30,000. The third example is an oinochoe, from which wine was poured at the dinner table. Its estimate is $11,000-$16,000.
The Roman category contains one of the most exciting museum-quality artifacts ever to cross the auction block at Antiquities Saleroom. From the first century B.C., Lot 89 consists of a pair of large, highly detailed bronze fittings that would have adorned either side of a chariot’s hub. The decorative fittings depict the mighty Pericles (Hercules). “The Greeks were superb with pottery,” Dodge said, “but the Romans may have outdone them with bronze work. This pair of fittings is truly gorgeous. It came from a New York City dealer who obtained them from a private collection on the East Coast.” The estimate for the pair is $40,000-$60,000.
The auction also includes three Roman marbles. A second century marble head of Eros is estimated at $14,000-$20,000, while a smaller marble head of Jupiter from the same century is expected to make $5,000-$7,500. A double-faced marble head of the god Janus could easily surpass its estimate of $3,600-$5,400.
The next portion of the sale is devoted to selections from the “Hollywood” pre-Columbian art collections mentioned above, with additional choice consignments. Virtually every pre-Columbian culture is represented, in silver, copper, gold, stone, pottery, textiles and wood. There are 3000 B.C. artworks of the Valdivian (Ecuador) culture and Peruvian artwork and pottery dating from 1200-1500 B.C. A wonderful collection of pre-Columbian gold includes earrings, a crown, and an exceptional three-dimensional bird inside a gold ring, with dangling objects beneath it. Dodge believes it may have been an earring or perhaps a temple ornament. The beautifully detailed bird appears in the book Oro del Antiguo Peru and is estimated at $15,000-$30,000.
Of the Mayan pieces in the sale, Dodge is most enamored of a set of four circa 500 B.C. carved stone monkeys from Mezcala, Mexico. “They’re incredibly well detailed, with very thin tails and openwork. Even modern carvers with sophisticated tools would have difficulty creating pieces like this. To think that carvers with such rudimentary tools did this work is remarkable,” Dodge said. The lot is estimated at $15,000-$25,000.
A prominent politician’s collection of West Mexico pottery is also featured in the sale. The collection includes Colima figural dogs and a rare, 14-inch-long standing duck vessel with a spout in its mouth for pouring fermented beverages. “I’ve seen small ducks and double or triple ducks, but this large duck standing on legs is very unusual. I could see it blowing through its $5,000-$7,000 estimate,” Dodge said. Another important pottery work, a seated shaman is entered with hopes of reaching $6,000-$9,000.
Antiquities Saleroom’s June 13-14 auction will commence at noon Eastern Time on both days. Bids may be placed absentee (including absentee online), by phone or live via the Internet on auction day through www.LiveAuctioneers.com. The entire auction catalog may be viewed online at www.LiveAuctioneers.com. Tel. 720-890-7700 or 720-502-5289. Email antiquitiessaleroom@gmail.com. Web: www.antiquities-saleroom.com.
1931 Leica III ‘Luxus’ camera, gold plated and trimmed in brown lizard leather, with two lenses. Price realized: $683,000. Image courtesy of Westlicht Photographica Auction. VIENNA (AFP) – A 1931 Leica camera has sold for 528,000 euros ($683,000) at an auction that included rare photos and the camera that snapped an iconic shot of an American sailor kissing a nurse the day World War II ended.
The rare Leica, which belonged to German winemaker Karl Henkell, fetched more than three and a half times the expected price at the Vienna sale held by auctioneers Westlicht on Saturday. LiveAuctioneers.com provided Internet live bidding.
Other models by the famed German camera firm also fetched far higher prices than expected.
A prototype Leica M3 estimated at 70,000 euros sold for 432,000 ($556,213), and a prototype Leica Reporter 250 estimated at 30,000 euros fetched 240,000 ($308,991).
The camera used by German-born American photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt to shoot his famous picture of a U.S. sailor bending over and kissing a young nurse in New York’s Times Square during victory celebrations after Japan surrendered on Aug. 14, 1945 sold for 114,000 euros ($146,771).
A signed print of the photo itself sold for 24,000 euros ($30,899).
A 1949 photo by American photographer Irving Penn of his wife, Woman in Chicken Hat, went for 66,000 euros ($84,973).
1931 Leica III ‘Luxus’ camera, gold plated and trimmed in brown lizard leather, with two lenses. Price realized: $683,000. Image courtesy of Westlicht Photographica Auction.
The Edvard Munch painting ‘Madonna’ is in the collection of the Munch Museum in Oslo. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
OSLO, Norway (AFP) – The city of Oslo said Tuesday it had clinched a deal to build a new museum housing the biggest collection of works by Norwegian expressionist master Edvard Munch, bringing to an end years of political squabbles.
A majority in the city council agreed to a project dubbed Lambda, a futuristic crooked glass building to be erected on the shores of the Oslo fjord, near the capital’s celebrated new opera house.
The city council has been at loggerheads for several years over the location, the cost and even the need for a new museum to house Munch’s works.
Munch, who died in 1944, bequeathed an enormous collection to the city, consisting of 1,100 paintings, 3,000 drawings and 18,000 etchings, and including two versions of The Scream, perhaps the most famous expression of existential angst.
The current Munch Museum, constructed cheaply after World War II in a rather rundown Oslo neighborhood, is not considered to do justice to the priceless trove.
It was also the scene of a spectacular robbery in 2004, when thieves made off with The Scream and Madonna, both recovered two years later.
The city council was in 2008 in favor of moving the museum. It gave the green light for the Lambda project a year later, but eventually put the project on hold because of disagreement on various issues.
The tussle has been an embarrassment for Norway, as it is celebrating this year the 150th anniversary of Munch’s birth, and as the current museum is struggling with serious budgetary woes.
In a bid to get the ball rolling again, Norway’s government announced in March that it would help finance a new museum, the cost of which is estimated at around 1.6 billion kroner (215 million euros, $278 million), although it did not specify how much money it was willing to inject.
Under the city council deal announced Tuesday, left-wing members agreed to the Lambda project in exchange for a commitment to refurbish the rundown neighborhood of Toeyen where the current Munch Museum is located.
The Lambda project, designed by Spanish architecture firm Herreros Arquitectos, is expected to be completed in 2018.
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
The Edvard Munch painting ‘Madonna’ is in the collection of the Munch Museum in Oslo. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
The Madison Hotel at 123 S. Illinois Ave. in Atlantic City. Image by Smallbones, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP) – A historic Atlantic City hotel has been sold at auction for $4 million.
The lone bidder for the Madison House was not identified. But a representative for the buyer told The Press of Atlantic City that the new owner intends to resurrect the hotel.
Known for its grand stairway, marble floors and ornate chandeliers, the 14-story Madison House overlooks the beach block of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, giving it a prime location in the heart of the city. It has been largely shuttered since 2006, but remains one of the few survivors of Atlantic City’s dramatically changing landscape.
The Madison opened as a luxury hotel in 1929, just months after the stock market crash plunged the nation into the Depression. It then made it through a bout with bankruptcy in the 1960s and avoided the fate of most old hotels when the casinos first arrived in Atlantic City in the 1970s and ’80s.
It was its partnership with the Sands Casino Hotel that allowed the Madison to continue operating after the gambling era began. The Sands used the adjacent Madison as a companion hotel for its customers, sinking $7 million into the boutique property in 2004 to transform it into all-suite lodging.
But when the Sands closed in 2006, so did the Madison.
Robert Salvato, a Ventnor real estate broker who conducted the auction, told the newspaper that the Madison still has “good bones.” He estimates that the building would need about $1 million in renovations to reopen.
Original Apple 1 computer, 1976. Auction Team Breker image.
BERLIN (AP) – An auctioneer says one of Apple’s first computers—a functioning 1976 model—has been sold for a record 516,000 euros ($668,000). LiveAuctioneers.com provided Internet live bidding.
German auction house Auction Team Breker said Saturday an Asian client, who asked not to be named, bought the so-called Apple 1, which the tech company’s founders Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak built in a family garage.
Breker claims it is one of only six known remaining functioning models in the world. Breker already sold one last year for 492,000 euros.
It says the computer bears Wozniak’s signature. An old business transaction letter from the late Jobs also was included.
The Apple 1, which was sold for $666 in 1976, consisted of only the circuit board. A case, a keyboard and a screen had to be bought separately.
View the fully illustrated catalog for Aution Team Breker’s sale May 25, complete with prices realized, at LiveAuctioneers.com.
Copyright 2013 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
AP-WF-05-25-13 1536GMT
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
Original Apple 1 computer, 1976. Auction Team Breker image.
The main building of the Detroit Institute of Arts, designed by French-American architect and industrial designer Paul Philipe Cret. Detroit Institute of Arts image.
DETROIT (AP) – The Detroit Institute of Arts’ collection could be sold to help satisfy creditors if the financially troubled city of Detroit seeks bankruptcy protection, officials said.
The city’s state-appointed emergency manager Kevyn Orr is considering whether the collection should be considered city assets that could be used to cover Detroit’s long-term debt, the Detroit Free Press reported Friday. That debt is estimated at more than $14 billion.
Orr spokesman Bill Nowling told The Detroit News that Orr told the museum it may face exposure to creditors if Detroit seeks bankruptcy protection. Nowling said the notification is a “precautionary measure” and there’s “no plan on the table to sell any asset of the city.”
“We have no interest in selling art,” Nowling told the Free Press. “I want to make that pretty clear. But it is an asset of the city to a certain degree. We’ve got a responsibility under the act to rationalize that asset, to make sure we understand what’s it’s worth.
“We have to look at everything on the table.”
The DIA said in a statement Friday that it “strongly believes that the museum and the city hold the museum’s art collection in trust for the public.”
“The city cannot sell art to generate funds for any purpose other than to enhance the collection,” the statement said. “We remain confident that the city and the emergency financial manager will continue to support the museum in its compliance with those standards, and together we will continue to preserve and protect the cultural heritage of Detroit.”
The museum said it has hired New York bankruptcy attorney Richard Levin to suggest ways to protect the collection from possible losses. Levin has been involved in bankruptcy case involving General Motors and other high-profile cases.
The city owns the Detroit Institute of Arts’ building and collection, while daily operations are overseen by a nonprofit. The scope of Orr’s power as an emergency manager to sell the collection or any other major assets, such as the city’s water department, likely would be tested in court.
Founded in 1885 and located in the city’s cultural center, the DIA has a collection of more than 60,000 works, including the first Vincent van Gogh painting to enter a U.S. museum and Diego Rivera’s Detroit Industry murals. It displays American, European, modern and contemporary art, as well as significant African, Asian, Native American, Oceanic, Islamic and ancient collections.
The museum doesn’t estimate how much its collection might be worth, and any sale price for specific items would depend on market conditions.
Republican Gov. Rick Snyder in March appointed Orr as emergency manager, giving Orr the final say on Detroit’s fiscal matters. The city’s budget deficit could reach $380 million by July 1, it could run out of cash before the end of the year, and bankruptcy hasn’t been ruled out.
Under a Chapter 9 bankruptcy filing, neither a judge nor creditors can force the city to liquidate its assets, but bankruptcy experts tell the Free Press that a judge and creditors could push for a sale. Some creditors have already asked Orr whether the DIA collection is “on the table,” Nowling said.
The head of New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art came to the DIA’s defense on Friday, predicting that the “disheartening reports out of Detroit today will undoubtedly shock and outrage the city’s residents.”
“Even in the darkest days of New York City’s fiscal crisis of 1975 and the national economic meltdown of 2008, the cultural treasures closely identified with our own city were never on the table—never considered an asset that might be cashed-in during a crunch to bridge a negative balance sheet,” Met Director Thomas Campbell said in a statement.
Billionaire developer A. Alfred Taubman, a patron of the museum, said that “it would be a crime” to sell any of the DIA’s collection to satisfy city creditors.
“I’m sure Mr. Orr, once he thinks about it, will certainly not choose that as one of the assets,” Taubman said. “It’s not just an asset of Detroit. It’s an asset of the country.”
Copyright 2013 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
AP-WF-05-24-13 1801GMT
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
The main building of the Detroit Institute of Arts, designed by French-American architect and industrial designer Paul Philipe Cret. Detroit Institute of Arts image.
This lamp, created from a figure of a bronze woman and an iridescent gold glass shade made by Loetz, is 14 inches high. The signed lamp sold this spring for $3,750 at Rago Arts and Auction Center in Lambertville, N.J.
BEACHWOOD, Ohio – Electric lights were first marketed to the public about 1880. It is said that Louis Comfort Tiffany’s famous lily lamp with glass shades for light bulbs was the first lamp with a shade that projected light down, not up, like a candle flame. Other lamps of the early 1900s were adapted to accept bulbs by removing the older light source, like a candle, then wiring the lamp for electricity and adding a bulb and shade. Others were made in entirely new shapes.
During the Art Nouveau period, sensuous women with curves were part of the designs used for glass, ceramics, bronze figurines and even furniture. So it is not surprising that a variety of lamps designed to feature women also were made. The Loetz glass factory (1840-1940), in what is now the Czech Republic, made art glass. At around the turn of the 20th century, workers there designed a figural lamp with a bronze base shaped like a woman holding an iridescent gold glass shade above her head. The glass resembled Tiffany’s, but it was actually made at the Loetz factory. It was signed by Peter Tereszczuk (1875-1963), a well-known Ukrainian sculptor who made bronze figurines and other decorative bronzes.
Bell collectors prize his bronze electric call buttons that look like a small child on a rocky base. The lamp sold for $3,750 at a Rago Arts and Auction sale in 2013.
Q: My old gate-leg table has a label that says it was made by the John D. Raab Chair Co. The finish on the table is a bit worn and marred. I have been considering refinishing or painting it, although I think this would decrease its value. What do you think?
A: The John D. Raab Chair Co. was in business in Grand Rapids, Mich., from 1906 to 1924, when it was taken over by the Furniture Shops of Grand Rapids. If you like the table and plan to use it, go ahead and refinish or paint it. “Brown furniture” pieces like your table are not selling for much money today, and many people are buying them at bargain prices, then refinishing or painting them to either use or resell.
Q: I would like information on a metal toy roller coaster that was given to my son in the early 1970s. It was made by J. Chein & Co., of Burlington, N.J. It’s about 20 inches long, and has two cars propelled by an elastic band wound by a key. A ticket booth, hot-dog stand, cotton candy stand and children are pictured around the sides. Is it valuable or collectible?
A: Julius Chein emigrated from Russia in 1893 and opened his toy company in New York City in 1903. The company moved to Burlington in 1949. The roller coaster was one of several amusement park toys made by Chein. It was designed by model-maker Eugene Bosch in 1949 and was made until the late 1960s. The lithographed pictures around the base were changed several times, and different colors were used. A 1950s version pictures a sideshow. Chein stopped making toys in the 1970s. The company was sold in 1987, became Atlantic Cheinco and filed for bankruptcy in 1992. The sideshow version from the 1950s sells for $150 to $400. Your version with a hot-dog stand is less than $100.
Q: I would like to know something about the maker of a platter that has been in my family for years. It’s marked “Greenwood China, made for P, JB and Sons, Hotel Department,” and “Greenwood China, Trenton, N.J.” is impressed on the back. Can you tell me how old this is?
A: Greenwood Pottery was founded in 1868. It began marking pieces “Greenwood China” in 1886. During the early 1900s, Greenwood Pottery and Greenwood China were listed at separate addresses in Trenton, although they were under the same management. Dinnerware, hotel ware, restaurant ware and other items were made. Hotel china was marked with the letter “P” underneath “Greenwood China.” The pottery also made porcelain marked “Greenwood Art Pottery.” The art pottery ewers and vases can sell for more than $1,000 each. Greenwood Pottery was out of business by about 1933.
Q: We own an Art Nouveau vase signed “Val St. Lambert.” It’s 16 1/2 inches high. Can you tell us something about it, including what it’s worth?
A: Val St. Lambert Cristalleries (glassmaking factory) was founded near Liege, Belgium, in 1826. The only glassmaking company in Belgium, it still operates today (visit Val-Saint-Lambert.com). The company is best known for its Art Nouveau (c. 1895-1905) and Art Deco (c. 1925-1935) glassware. The size and style of your vase may mean that it could sell for more than $1,000. Have an expert in your area take a look at it.
Q: I found a $1,000 certificate from the Bank of the United States among my father’s things after he died. It’s dated Dec. 15, 1840, and is No. 8894. There are portraits of six men along the sides. The only one I recognize is Benjamin Franklin. Is this certificate valuable?
A: The Bank of the United States was chartered in 1791 in Philadelphia, which was the United States’ capital at that time. The men pictured on your note are David Rittenhouse (the first director of the U.S. Mint), William Penn, Thomas Paine, Robert Morris, Benjamin Franklin and Robert Fulton. An original bank note would sell for more than $100, but this particular bank note is a commonly found fake.
Tip: Be careful when handling birdhouses, birdcages and bird feeders, old or new. It is possible to catch pigeon fever (psittacosis) through a cut or even from breathing the dust.
Terry Kovel answers as many questions as possible through the column. By sending a letter with a question, you give full permission for use in the column or any other Kovel forum. Names, addresses or email addresses will not be published. We cannot guarantee the return of any photograph, but if a stamped envelope is included, we will try. The volume of mail makes personal answers or appraisals impossible. Write to Kovels, Auction Central News, King Features Syndicate, 300 W. 57th St., New York, NY 10019.
CURRENT PRICES
Current prices are recorded from antiques shows, flea markets, sales and auctions throughout the United States. Prices vary in different locations because of local economic conditions.
Woven bamboo wedding basket, brass mounts, four tiers, handles, Chinese, 39 x 34 inches, $355.
Oil wedding lamp, white opaline reservoirs, brass burners, Ripley, E.F. Jones, 1859, 13 3/4 x 9 1/2 inches, $575.
Chief Rain-in-the-Face and wife wedding photograph, silver gelatin, 6 x 8 inches, $590.
Stove plate, “The Wedding Dance 1746,” cast iron, 26 x 22 inches, $1,420.
Special offer. Free gift bag when you buy The Label Made Me Buy It, by Ralph and Terry Kovel. It’s a picture history of labels that once decorated products from cigar boxes to orange crates. The 320 full-color labels picture Native Americans, famous people, buildings and symbols. Learn how to identify and date labels, or just enjoy the rare pictured labels (hardcover, 224 pages). Out-of-print but available at KovelsOnlineStore.com. By mail, send $40 plus $5.95 shipping to Kovels, Box 22900, Beachwood, OH 44122; or call 800-303-1996.
This lamp, created from a figure of a bronze woman and an iridescent gold glass shade made by Loetz, is 14 inches high. The signed lamp sold this spring for $3,750 at Rago Arts and Auction Center in Lambertville, N.J.
