When my buddy Janet and I started going to auctions years ago, we’d wait around for hours until the last of the box lots were sold. By then, many of the buyers had gone home, overwhelmed with fatigue and too much time wasted.
But we were new and fresh to the auction game, and it didn’t bother us. We had learned pretty quickly that the longer we stayed the cheaper the boxes became. So we sat through the grueling hours waiting for the payoffs. Most times, it worked out well for us.
At auctions, the auctioneer and staff go through the stuff that people bring in for sale on consignment, with the auction house getting a percentage of the sales. Items that are expected to draw high bids are sold by themselves. The stuff that doesn’t appear to be worth much is sold together in box lots, sometimes for as little as a buck – if buyers can’t find anything in a box worth re-selling – to much more if two or more people recognize an expensive item.
One of my most memorable box-lot items was an automaton cat buried deep among some stuffed animals, including two Steiff teddy bears that had lost their fur, under a table. I bought the box primarily for the Steiff bears, but when I transferred the stuffed animals to a plastic bag to take them home, I kept hearing a noise. It was coming from a furry white cat whose arms moved when I jostled it. I learned that it was a Roullet and Decamps automaton cat that was a cobbler. It was a major find with a lot of history.
I don’t hang around auctions to the end anymore. Now, I buy selectively, either looking for items to write about or to sell on eBay (where I sold the cat). When I find something that interests me, I leave an absentee bid and then head home. Most times, I get the bid, making it pointless for me to hang around.
Recently, I arrived early at auction to preview – as I usually do – and saw a box with a plethora of small items in a case behind the counter at the auction house. I recognized some if the items but not others.
The box reminded me of those early box-lot days. I had no intention of waiting around and bidding on the box, but I was curious about what the items were:
This looked like a door plate but I found out that it was the back plate of a Victorian brass letter/paper clip in the shape of a woman’s hand. It was inscribed (faintly): J&E Ratcliff, Patentees, Birmingham. A complete one on sale at a British auction set its manufacturing date as circa 1865. This one looks like it has been painted. The hole at the top allowed it to be hung on a wall.
This brass case (for cigarettes?) appears to be a souvenir from the Panama-Pacific International Exposition or World’s Fair in San Francisco in 1915. The fair was held to celebrate the completion of the Panama Canal the year before and to show off the rebuilt city of San Francisco after the 1906 earthquake. The brass case was inscribed: Are you ready? 1915. San Francisco. Panama.
A Lufkin Rule Co. tape measure and a metal scoop. The Lufkin company has been around since the 1880s, and one of its earliest tape measures, from the late 19th century, is in the Smithsonian National Museum of American History collection.
This metal anvil and hammer were likely an advertising paperweight distributed by a company that made medicine for iron deficiency. It may be a salesman sample. It was inscribed: Ferancee – HP for Iron Deficiency Anemia. On the flip side: Stuart, apparently the name of the company.
Wooden nickels. Don’t take any – unless you know they’re a souvenir, as in this case for the West Chester (PA) coin club.
