Wisconsin Auction News

The Minocqua Antiques Show will be held at the AmericInn on Hwy. 51 right across from Torpy Park.

General Store Antiques of Kewaskum, WI
(3) Baseball cards - 1955 Ted Williams; 1955 Jackie Robinson; 1955 Harmon Killebrew; & various coins including morgans & mercury dimes.
Contact: Kewaskum Police Department at 262-626-2323 Cheif Knoebel

Blackhawk Antique Market, Inc. of Milwaukee, WI
Jewelry
Believes that this could possibly be a 3 person crime (2 men, 1 women), using two vehicles. A red pick-up described below & a silver pick-up.
Milwaukee Police Department at 414-935-7222
Contact: Detective Gonzalez Marty case #07-194-0125

The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company , the exclusive tire supplier of NASCAR’s top three racing divisions, today announced that the Goodyear ‘Get there’(TM) Charity Auction raised $20,000 for The NASCAR Foundation and its driver affiliated charities. As a result of the funds raised through the auction, Goodyear was awarded with the honor of being named a “Champion Friend of the Foundation” for the 2007 NASCAR NEXTEL Cup season — the highest level of participation that can be achieved by a one-time donor.

“As a long-standing supplier of NASCAR, we’re very proud to help support The NASCAR Foundation and its important mission,” stated Stu Grant, Goodyear’s general manager of global race tires. “Goodyear would like to thank all the fans who bid on these unique race-used Eagle tires and helped us raise so much money for The NASCAR Foundation.”

The Goodyear ‘Get there’ Charity Auction provided fans the opportunity to bid on 43 authentic Goodyear tires individually autographed by the top NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series drivers. Each autographed race-used Goodyear Eagle tire was accompanied by a certificate of authenticity, which included the driver’s name and car number, the race in which the tire was used, the driver’s finish in that race and the tire’s RFID number. The top ten most popular tires in the auction belonged to Tony Stewart, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Juan Montoya, Elliott Sadler, Jamie McMurray, Jeff Gordon, Matt Kenseth, Paul Menard, Carl Edwards and Kyle Busch.

A former state prison was sold at auction for $89,500 , the butey plans to renovate the 27-acre compound that hasn’t been used in four decades.

Linda Gebhart of South Zanesville plans to refurbish the two houses that formerly housed Roseville State Prison wardens and use the surrounding grounds to park flatbed trucks for an Illinois-based trucking company.

“We’ve got a lot of possibilities,” said Gebhart, who wants to turn the ground floor of one of the four red-brick prison buildings into a restaurant. “It’s going to take a lot of hard work.”

About 40 people attended the auction Saturday in this village about 65 miles southeast of Columbus

Rudy Franchi, longtime appraiser on the PBS series “Antiques Roadshow,” has just launched a new Web site, Poster Appraisal.com (www.posterappraisal.Com) which will answer queries about the value of original old posters plus other 20th-Century collectibles.

The prices of vintage film, travel and war posters has been escalating at a rapid rate over the past year, with several examples of large format advertising and propaganda ephemera selling for hundreds of thousands of dollars while a wide variety of posters are routinely selling in the ten to fifty thousand dollar range.

Mr. Franchi recently sold The Nostalgia Factory and its associated Web site nostalgia.com. He continues to work as a consultant to Heritage Auctions of Dallas, the firm he now represents on “The Roadshow.”

Explaining why he started up Poster Appraisal.Com, Mr. Franchi said “all those years of dealing in pop culture have been pretty good to my wife Barbara and I, and I’d like to give something back. Also, I’m a bit obsessed with old stuff and hate the thought of really good pieces being tossed or lost. Finally, in connection with my Roadshow career, it’s a great way to keep up on what’s happening in the field now that I don’t buy and sell on a daily basis.”

Poster Appraisal.Com is an information only site. Approximate values of what an item would fetch at auction will be given, but nothing will be bought or sold. Mr. Franchi will offer advice as to the best way to realize the value of the item, but he will not be involved in its actual disposition.

Mr. and Mrs. Franchi had run the Nostalgia Factory for 36 years and the Web site since the mid nineties. They are authors of Miller’s Movie Collectibles, a major text on collecting movie posters. The couple ran poster auctions for Skinner of Boston, Heritage of Dallas and Christie’s New York. They have done appraisals of posters and ephemera at several major institutions and Mr. Franchi regularly speaks before groups about trends in collecting.

The site contains links to a large number of other poster information sites as well as a guide to poster sizes and formats. There is also a link to Poster News Bulletin, Mr. Franchi’s widely read and often acerbic blog.

The Sister Bay Lions Club has sponsored this entertaining & educational event since the mid 1970.s. This Door County tradition is a fund raiser for the “Leader Dog For The Blind Program”.  Door County puppies are trained for one year here & then sent to Michigan to complete their training to assist the visually handicapped. Maggie Weir, Door County Director of this program will be on site with her newest puppy trainee on Thursday of the show to answer any questions you may have regarding this program.

The Wisconsin Auctioneer Association held it’s First Annual Ringman Contest last week at it’s 2007 Summer Social naming David Koning of Monroe as it’s champion. Eight contestants participated, and contestants were judged by NAA Director E. Lance Walker, CAI, AARE, BAS and his wife Terri Walker, CAI, BAS from Memphis, Tenn. and Tom Seldutte  from Milwaukee Metro Auto Auctions (Koning’s employer).Koning will move on to represent the WAA in the International Ringman Contest in Nashville next July, sure to make us proud!

Recovered artifacts from the Titanic along with several other ocean liner memorabilia are being prepared for auction this week.

According to Christie’s, the deck log of the SS MacKay-Bennett - a rescue ship that showed up when the Titanic had sank, is most likely the most significant rescue ship artifact ever offered for sale.

Experts are saying that the log’s likely value is between 30 and $40,000.

Another extremely hot item is that of the Titanic’s first=class passenger list.  This list contains many prominent New York family names…Astors, Guggenheims, and Strauses just to name a few.  Auction officials expect the list to sell for 15 to $20,000.

An Oregon man, Trent Stewart, was crowned the ”2007 World Livestock Auctioneer Champion” in Springfield this last Saturday.

Stewart had gained the title at the 44th annual contest at the Springfield Livestock Marketing Center.

The “Reserve World Champion” was awarded to Ty Thompson of Billings Montana, and Tom Frey of Creston Iowa had the honor of being the “World Champion Runner Up”.

Curious as to what winning the World Auctioneer Contest will get you?  $5,000 and one-year use of a 2007 Chevrolet Silverado Extended Cab LT.  Not too bad, huh?  You’d better start practicing!