August 29, 2025 • 39 mins
Bradley Jay Fills in on NightSide
Did you know that there is an encrypted sculpture at CIA headquarters, called “Kryptos.” The sculpture holds a special code that for 35 years codebreakers nor anyone has been able to break! Now the sculpture’s artist Jim Sanborn will auction off the solution on his 80th birthday through RR Auction. Bobby Livingston, executive vice president at RR Auction, joined Bradley to talk about not only the upcoming Kryptos auction but notable past and present auctions as well as some unique items that were up for sale.
Did you know that there is an encrypted sculpture at CIA headquarters, called “Kryptos.” The sculpture holds a special code that for 35 years codebreakers nor anyone has been able to break! Now the sculpture’s artist Jim Sanborn will auction off the solution on his 80th birthday through RR Auction. Bobby Livingston, executive vice president at RR Auction, joined Bradley to talk about not only the upcoming Kryptos auction but notable past and present auctions as well as some unique items that were up for sale.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's nice size with Dan Ray, I'm going you Beasy
Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Bradley J for Dan. How much would you pay for
a secret? How much would you pay for the ownership
rights to a secret? Would you pay millions for that?
Would you go to an auction and bid on the
right to know a secret which if you told wouldn't
be a secret anymore and it would be worthless? Well,
this is this is actually going down, and it's going
(00:27):
to happen with the our our auction house, and we
have Bobby Kingston here with us to talk about that
and so much more and that rarefied world of really
expensive stuff at auctions. This is gonna be great, my friends.
And if you have any questions, please, you know, jump
ahead of me, call in at six one, seven, two, five, four,
(00:48):
ten thirty and ask the question before I do. You're
gonna have fun. This is Friday Night. We'll call it
Friday Night Lights because there are light topics. I just
made that up on the spot. Our guess is Bobby
Kingston from our auctions.
Speaker 3 (01:02):
How you doing, Bobby good? But it's it's Bobby Livingston.
But I say you can make I say Bobby Kingston
that's good. I like it. I'll go with it.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
I actually had Kingston written down, Okay, living Ston very good,
and I apologize. So there's a thing. It's your job
now to explain what's going on with cryptos. What is
it and and what's going on?
Speaker 3 (01:26):
Well, Cryptos is our installation. It's cryptos with a K
that the United States government hired our client, Jim Samborn,
to put an installation in Langley, top secret CIA headquarters.
And there's a sculpture there that the public can't see.
And it's inspired by cryptology and code breakers, because of course,
the CIA prided itself on being able to listen in
(01:50):
on their adversaries and break codes.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
As I understand that there are four panels, each with
its own code. Three of them, I guess it was
a challenge to break the code, and three of them
were broken by various entities, but the fourth remained a secret.
And now the sculptor is going to sell the solution
to that code. Is that correct?
Speaker 3 (02:13):
Well almost, it's the it's like the password. It's like,
in order to read what it says, there's a passcode
that decrypts it. So you're going to get the pass
god and be able to read the fourth panel of
this sculpture.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Yes, I read that. There's as a copper piece with
that you put up over the existing letters and then
you're able to read it. It's kind of like one of
those Raiders of the Lost archetype of situation for sure.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
And and you know, being able to be a code breaker,
you know, it's tough work and it's it's been you know,
secrets have been kept for millennium and so this one
has not been cracked. Everybody's been trying to crack this
particular code and it has never been done. Now he's
eighty years old and he's kept this locked up in
a safe. The answered that you know how the past
(03:02):
key to read this, and it's time for him to
sell it. He's ready to move on because people are
there's so many people write them every day like I've
got the I've got it, I've got it, and he's like, no,
you know, no, you don't, and so you know, he's
gonna go ahead. And because there's so many people focused
on cracking this code to keep it going instead of
just revealing it, he wants to auction it and get
(03:22):
it in the hands of someone that will be the
keeper of that code for the next generation.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
It is the sculptor's hope that the purchaser of the
secret will keep it a secret.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
Well, I would think if you're going to pay the
kind of money it's going to be, you're gonna want
to keep the secret and be the person that that
is the gatekeeper of this secret, because I mean it's
still a great piece of art. I mean, the artwork
will exist at Langley, so that's great, but the secret,
you know, having that pass key is valuable.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
That's interesting. By the way, the purchaser.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
Will not own the sculpture, just the secret.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
The government will continue to open that sculpture that's outside
the CIA building in the back where no one sees it.
I understand that so many people were writing in with
guesses about what it was. He started to charge fifty
bucks for a personal reply to say, no, is that
something you read? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (04:14):
Yeah, he I don't think he was pretty adamant about that,
but I know he instituted it because people would just
write him every day. I mean, can you imagine every
day come in to your email and then there's like,
you know, seventy five people that have you gotten it wrong?
And you got to like, how many do I have
to go through this? And you know, and do I
have to answer them? I mean every day, and there's people,
there's people that spend their decades trying to crack this.
(04:34):
I mean, he's told me he's got you know, there's
people who's sole focus every day is to try to
crack K four the fourth.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Panel, Cryptose four Cryptos four. Man, I wonder is the
so I also heard that once you understand cryptos four,
the fourth panel, then the other three get tied in
and will present some sort of more unified message. The
other three will make more sense and be more meaningful
once the fourth one is revealed or is understood.
Speaker 3 (05:04):
Yeah, that might be the case. I don't know, you know,
I'm representing the artists. I don't know what his message
is or his intentive.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
It's probably something like Soulin's Green his People kind of thing.
Speaker 3 (05:17):
Yeah, I mean, it's probably pretty well thought out and poetic,
because the other three are pretty cool.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
Oh there's another one deciphering old movie. There was maybe
an other limits you can't remember what it was, but
aliens came down and they were offering people, you know,
a chance to go up to the They gave him
this book and said, figure out this book and you'll
understand why we're taking you back to our planet. And
the people are climbing on. They really want to go
(05:44):
to the superior place where these superior beings are. And
as some of the people were going up the ramp
to get on the spaceship to go off to this
other planet, somebody figured it out.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
What was called. The name of the book was to
serve Man.
Speaker 2 (05:58):
Serve Man. Go.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
It's a cook book. Don't get on the don't get
on the spaceship. It's cookbook.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
Just serve man.
Speaker 3 (06:05):
So exactly, so you never know what the message is
man and so so that's fry.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
Now, Uh, what's the procedure. How does the auction go
for something like this.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
Well, it's going to be a live auction. It's going
to be in Boston. It's on November twentieth at six pm,
and you know there'll be an auction caller, you know,
asking for bids. The estimates around three hundred thousand to
five hundred thousand. We'll see if we get there or
go well past that, we'll see. Uh, and uh, you
know what you'll get is the is the past key
and several other pieces of e femera related to the
(06:37):
making of the sculpture. Participating is pretty easy. You you
go to the website at our auction dot com. You
fill out a form and then we vet you because
when you have an object like this, we got to
make sure you know you are who you say you
are and you have the funds to pay for something
like this, so that that's pretty seamless process these days.
And then on the day the auction just come in bid,
(06:59):
you hold up your panel number and you get the secret.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Another question about the procedure of how to use the key,
and that is you have to go to you will
have to go to the fourth panel K four and
hold this thing up to read it. Will that be
cordoned off so no one else can see when when
the he or she purchases and wants to know the answer.
Speaker 3 (07:22):
I don't know if you have to go all the
way to that type of thing. I think once you
have that pass key, and could you also get his
notes and everything he broke down so you'll be able
to decipher.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
It from without going to the site.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
You won't have to go to the side because if he.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Did, there would be people from the rooftops with binoculars,
and it would be quite interesting.
Speaker 3 (07:40):
I don't think you can even get a security pass
to get in there.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
And so at a live auction like this, how many
people do you expect come show up?
Speaker 3 (07:49):
Well, you never know. Sometimes all it takes is two
people to have a big sale. This is a single item,
So I wouldn't be surprised if there was you know,
ten to twenty people at the sale. We'll see what happens. Yeah,
and the sale is here in Boston. Yes, you're here
in Boston.
Speaker 2 (08:05):
That's pretty cool. And I guess I have about a
minute to ask a couple more questions about the procedure.
Do the people have to put down a deposit at
all to get involved with this?
Speaker 3 (08:19):
Typically, if we feel it's necessary, we would ask for
a depositive. But most of the people they're well known
to us. I mean, the people that register for these
types of sales, they're they're known entities, you know. And
so you're you're you're you're dealing with someone who you
know has the public profile and footprint, that you know
exactly who they are, and that they have.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
The funds, and what if and I asked you this
before we started. What if the person gets in over
the head and can't afford it. What happens? Then they
bid way up and they realize, oh my, I didn't
realize I had that mansion payment coming up. I can't
afford it. What happens?
Speaker 3 (08:56):
Then that typically doesn't happen, and they pay. You know,
it's a contract and they've entered into a legal agreement.
So when they put their paddle up and win and
then they say, oh h then you know it gets
worked out. It gets worked out legally. Well, they pay,
they'll pay their you know, they pay.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
And they will pay. They will.
Speaker 4 (09:15):
They signed a contract, they have to pay, right, they're
legally obligated to. It's yeah, so so doesn't the second place?
Things rarely happen. They rarely happen, and you do everything
you can to make sure that they don't, right, Because
I mean, if you win something like this, it's like,
don't you want this? I mean, of course you wanted this.
I know you've been a little bit more than you
thought you had to.
Speaker 3 (09:35):
But you now own K four that the decryption that
k Ford that is a pretty special thing. And I
don't think someone's going to walk away from a bid
like that, it doesn't happen. Most of the things we
sell are so remarkable and it's fantastic, rare and rare,
rare and remarkable. Bobby Livingston from our auction. This, this
is the type of thing that someone is going to
(09:56):
happily wire the money within twenty four hours.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
And being a person that's never been to an auction
like this, what are the pedals like they? I think
of ping pong paddals, but they're probably not like that.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
Well, they're rounded. The ones we use are little squares,
and yet you have their bitter number on the square
itself and they hold them up and so the auctioneer
can see, oh that's that's bitter two of four bitter.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
Two four okay, And about how much time does the
auctioneer allow between you know, bids before they say okay,
going once, going twice? Sol too.
Speaker 3 (10:28):
I think something like this one lot like this might
take five to six minutes to complete. I mean, you know,
when you're sitting you know, hopefully you're sitting at you know,
three hundred thousand dollars and you're trying to get three
hundred and twenty five thousand and three and twenty five
thousand and you wait, right, and you wait, and you
let the tension go, and then you go again, I
still need and you.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
Keep and you say, and you try to sell it. Right,
who wants this fantastic secret, one of a kind items. Right,
you'll be famous, You'll be in all the newspapers. Right.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
And a lot of people like to wait to the
last secon. I mean, I don't know, you know why.
But there's our people that are bidders whose strategy is
to try to wait it out and come in at
the last minute. So it's it's an art to it.
Not everybody can do that. I can't. I can't be an.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
Honest So and I'm sure this happens. Wait wait, wait, wait,
and then somebody after five minutes says it okay. And
then somebody else immediately, like in one second later, pops
it up and as if to say, dude, you're never
going to win. I'm gonna do I'm gonna do this
all night. You might as well get.
Speaker 3 (11:29):
Out now that happens. I've seen it happen.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
Oh, we'll continue with Bobby Livingston from our auctions In
a moment on WBZ, It's.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
Nike Side with Dan ray On Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Right, So Jake for Dan tonight, and we're talking auctions
of rare and valuable and strange things, particularly now we're
talking about cryptos. I'm not gonna run through everything that
cryptos is. I'll give you the short version. Basically, it's
the secret to what a code means, and it's a
code that is in a sculpture out outside the CIA building.
(12:06):
There were four panels. Three of them have been deciphered.
Now the key to the fourth is being auctioned off.
Why are our auctions? And Bobby Livingston from said our
is here to talk about a little bit. And we've
gone through everything on this particular item except who what
type of person would buy a secret? You know, you
(12:27):
can't eat it, you can't, you can't. I guess you
could sell it. But is this something that they might
expect would be an investment?
Speaker 3 (12:35):
Will let secret go up in value? I don't know,
you know who's going to buy it? I really think
in this world of technology and cryptology and you know,
bitcoin and all the things that cryptology represents to a
whole generation of entrepreneurs and people that made a lot
of money in cryptology, I think that's the type of
(12:56):
person that would want to own this. Someone who's you know,
comes from a world of hacking back in the the eighties, Yeah,
or something.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
Somebody in the Cold War era that you know into
spy stuff, like myself. Yeah, if I were Bezouts, I
might buy it myself.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
Someone like you could, you know, who wants to be
the protector of the encryption. So you cannot read what's written.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
I know something you don't know. It did cost me,
but I know it, right? Is it? Is it secret?
Is it a secret? Who is in the in the running?
Do you sign a non disclosure agreement so that you
can't say who's bidding?
Speaker 3 (13:33):
That's right? Uh, we keep our bidders anonymous. That's why
we give them paddle numbers, so they don't have to
use their name. They use their number.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
No, No bob Elon.
Speaker 3 (13:42):
No kings Kingston, Kingston.
Speaker 2 (13:45):
Okay. And now we get into some other types of
things that you have sold there, yea, and yeah, I
I I'm not sure if if you're at home that
Bobby can really do an appraisaler or anything. He does
know the kinds of things that sell, but he can't
(14:05):
do an actual appraisal because he can't see it right.
So I have a list of things here, and not
all of them are hard objects that you can touch, feel, taste.
There is, in fact, the first seat aboard Blue Origins
New Shepherd is called Yeah, New Shepherd was the rocket
that was ride number one, that's right.
Speaker 3 (14:27):
For the first ride. Blue Origin wanted to establish what
they should charge to take a space flight of twelve
minutes up to the Carmen line, and so Jeff Bezos,
his brother, and Wally Funk, one of the first female
astronaut candidates from the sixties, were given seats, and the
fourth seat was put up for auction twenty twenty one,
(14:48):
and so we sold it here in Boston for twenty
eight million.
Speaker 2 (14:54):
How did that go? How long was the auction? Was
it longer than normal? Shorter than normal?
Speaker 3 (14:58):
It was longer than No on YouTube, you can find
it on the Blue Origin site. Still, it's an amazing moment.
In fact, the auctioneer was brilliant because it got stuck,
like at twenty six million, and he just goes, I'm
a twenty six I need twenty There's probably three minutes
I'm asking for twenty seven and twenty seven million comes
in and then right away, Like you said, the guy
who's gonna win it just a twenty eight.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
So these people have unlimited money. It could have been
one hundred. They wouldn't care, is that correct?
Speaker 3 (15:26):
That's right. The gentleman. Typically I wouldn't tell you who
won it, but he identified himself in the press. It
was a gentleman named Justin Sun and he owns a
cryptocurrency company. And he's also the gentleman that won. You know,
in that yellow banana with the tape on it, the
sold for about four million dollars piece of artwork. Anyway,
he bought that too, So he just went After four years,
(15:50):
Justin Sun just went on the Blue Origin mission. He
didn't get to go on the number one. He went
on like the twentieth, but he finally got to go
after ording through some things so that he could he
could go into space.
Speaker 2 (16:03):
But any idea what it's like on the Blue Origin
Since you've dealt with it, then, did this person tell
you about it or when you were trying to sell it,
did you were you describing what the ride is like?
How high do you go, how fast do you go?
What does it feel like? Are you witless? Twelve minutes
is not.
Speaker 3 (16:18):
Long, I know, but you do pass the Carmon line
into weightlessness for a couple of minutes and float and
so you can you float around in the spacecraft. You
can see out into the nothingness of our universe, you know,
once you get through the atmosphere, you can see forever.
And then you come back down. I mean, but you're launched,
you know, on a giant you know, twenty thousand miles
an hour or however it is. You're strapped and there's
(16:40):
no pilot, there's no captive.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
There no pilot, no, so there's all automated, all.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
Automated, and then you come parachuting down into the desert
of Texas. So it's quite exciting. Did you talk to
the buyer after I did? And, like I said, I
just heard from him recently. And how excited do you
that he finally got to go?
Speaker 2 (17:01):
Was it? Did he say he was scared? That's my
big question.
Speaker 3 (17:04):
I don't ask those kinds. I mean, it was, it's
an exhilarating experience.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
I don't. Don't you want to know if he was scared?
Speaker 3 (17:09):
No, I don't know.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
I would want to know.
Speaker 3 (17:10):
I mean, it's there are terms of conditions.
Speaker 2 (17:13):
I don't don't preventing if he was scared, don't give
me that.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
I don't know that.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
I know better than that. So that's something. And of
course I don't know. Can you even take pictures? What's
the rule on taking a photo?
Speaker 1 (17:26):
Well?
Speaker 3 (17:26):
Everything? Uh, you know, I don't know if I don't remember,
if there's rules, I mean, everything being videotapes anyway, you
know you're in there being videotape. I think you could. Yeah,
people took selfies. Yeah, for sure, you could take pictures.
Speaker 2 (17:36):
You know.
Speaker 3 (17:36):
You unbuckle your seatbelt and you float around while you
can float around, and then you get back in your
and they go through training for they spend three days
training to go on that.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
I suppose you have to take an exhaustive physical examination.
Speaker 3 (17:46):
I don't think so. I don't think so. Bill Shatter
was like a ride at the fair. You know, are
you this tall?
Speaker 2 (17:54):
Right? Get on?
Speaker 3 (17:55):
If you have this much money, you can come.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
So William Shanner did it.
Speaker 3 (17:58):
Yeah, the next fight, Schattner went and he was ninety
ninety and he wept when he came home. You know,
I mean it's uh, you know, when you when you
go up in space and look back at the Earth
you know, it's that they have. They call it the
overview effect, where you you know, you understand we're just
this little blue ball in the middle of nothingness.
Speaker 2 (18:13):
You know, would you go for free?
Speaker 3 (18:15):
No?
Speaker 2 (18:17):
I wouldn't either. No, I don't even want to bungee jump.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
No.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
All right, what else there are? There are a lot
of things as a musical instrument, many many musical instruments,
I'm sure, but there's one in particular that's that's fairly interesting.
Speaker 3 (18:31):
Tell us about that one, well, I the most expensive
guitar we we we've sold was Johnny Ramon's most right
ventures to guitar. We sold it for nine hundred and
thirty seven thousand dollars back in twenty twenty one. This
is we always called it the our pal Chris Lamby
calls it Thor's Hammer, but we called the Johnny Appleseed
(18:53):
guitar because this is the guitar that Johnny Ramon played
all over the world, all over the country. And you know,
they would come into town and play and that come
back the next year and there would be punk bands
playing inspired by the Ramones. So this this is the
he used it for decades, you know, and tens of
thousands of shows. This particular guitar was.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
Is that a secret? Who bought that?
Speaker 3 (19:12):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (19:13):
It is okay? Interesting? Why one is that? So that
it it will all be stolen? So they won't you know?
Is it for security reasons?
Speaker 3 (19:23):
All these things factor into whether a person wants to
reveal what they have. But this is a very special guitar,
and so when you see it, it's like a museum piece.
And so when the person pulls it out, that's their
prerogative to keep it secret. Who's you know, they keep
it secret. And then when you come over and hang out,
you get to see it, you know, and that's a
great it's a great thing, you know, So I don't
(19:45):
blame them from not telling it.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
So you know, that should probably be in a museum, right,
which brings me to something you told me. The Smithsonian
is not real pally with you folks, because they, as
you sell stuff they want in their museum.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
Most of the time we have things that Smithsonian has
dozens of, and you know, they really don't watch us.
But occasionally we get something that you know, would have
been nice to have in the National collection, but they
don't want to buy it. And the person that has it,
or the family that retained it isn't going to donate it.
I mean, it's it's it's very valuable. I mean a
(20:21):
lot of people do donate things the Sithsonian, and you know,
you saw the raids that lost dark You know what happens.
They donate it and then it goes in that back
room and stays there, you know. So it's better that
things get in you know, from our view, it's better
that collectors get these things that aren't going to be
on display and take care of them and curate them
and show them to their friends.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
Has anyone tried don't name any names, but has it
come to pass that someone tried to bring you a
stolen article and auction it off and you you vetted
the article and said, whoa sir, it seems that this
is sir or ma'am. Looks like this is a stolen article.
We can't handle it.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
Yeah, I mean that happens. That happens, and you know,
understanding provenance and chain of custody and what's plausible to
be out in the public hands, it is something we
have to deal with. And we've worked with law enforcement
many times to get things returned, you know, to not
only to the Smithsonian. We've worked with National Archives, We've
(21:21):
worked with We've worked with the Kennedy Library. Many organizations
in our auction work hand in hand to make sure
things that aren't supposed to be in the marketplace are
returned to their rightful owners.
Speaker 2 (21:34):
We need to break but I have afterwards. I want
to know about how important the providence is to the
price and how you how you go about finding out
that and how you vet that as well. Coming up
on WBZ.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
It's Night Side with Dan Ray on wb Boston's news Radio,
we're digging into the very interesting world of high end auctions.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
Now we're going to start to take a look at
some of the things that have been sold by our
auction and the executive vice president of Bobby Livingston.
Speaker 3 (22:06):
Here.
Speaker 2 (22:07):
We talked about a couple of things, but there's a
list of really interesting things.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
Now.
Speaker 3 (22:11):
You sell a lot of.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
Watches, incredibly interesting watches that go for huge dollars. Talk
about some watches.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
Sure, we're known for working with the astronauts, NASA, astronauts,
moonwalkers and their their families and so we've sold we
sold a pall of fourteen rolex that went for two
million Neil Armstrong's Omega Commender of Omega wa for two million,
and then we sold probably my favorite watch, which was
a pall of fifteen Commander Dave Scott's Bulvar watch that
(22:43):
he used on his third moonwalk saluted the flag. There's
great pictures of him wearing this watch.
Speaker 2 (22:48):
Talk about provenance, yeah, yeah, all right, And I mentioned provenance.
What is that?
Speaker 3 (22:56):
Well, provenance is basically ownership, change of custody, where to
come from? How did it get into the auction house.
In the case of this Dave Scott watch got right
from him, right, And so you know, the astronaut himself
had the watch he wore on the moon. It belonged
to him. We sold it from that's great promonace. But
something like we had two tickets to Ford's Theater the
night Lincoln was assassinated, right, and uh, you have to
(23:18):
kind of track those back. Where did where did those
Where did those come from?
Speaker 2 (23:21):
You know?
Speaker 3 (23:21):
And and they came out of the Malcolm Forbes collection
in the nineteen eighties and bought by our client and
then Soldso you kind of trace back.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
When it comes to the Scott watch, do you still
have to take it to the boys at the lab,
the people at the lab to make sure it's legit.
Do you still have to somehow figure out it's the
right one or do you just trust him?
Speaker 3 (23:43):
Well, in this case number one, there's photographs of it
on the moon. So no, there was only one made.
Oh okay, it was that's different. This was what they
call prototypes. There was only one of the watches made.
In fact, Bulva was angry because Omega, a Swiss watch company,
got the contract for the NASA Watch program, so this
(24:06):
one was a backup and his Omega broke. The bezel
face of the watch popped off, popped off, and so
he needed a watch because when you're out on the Moon,
you lose contact with Houston. There's no computers, you know,
or you know, and you only have so much oxygen.
You gotta have a watch. This is a very important.
Speaker 2 (24:25):
I can't help wonder on the side of being on
the Moon affects how the watch works.
Speaker 3 (24:28):
Well, it was this the angle of the sun apparently
is what they figured out why the bezel failed because
of the heat where Dave landed uh that particular spot
and the and the sun affected the bezel apparently, but
provenounces is really important. The other cool thing is it
came with a watch band and you can see the
serial number on the watch band that's on the watch
(24:50):
on the moon.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
It's like perfect.
Speaker 3 (24:52):
So it kind of and then there was there was
a lot of documentation about the boulevard once it got back,
so it was that's a pretty easy authentication in that case.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
And it occurs to me, since you got so much
of his watch, to ask you if astronauts will take
all kinds of little stuff up there as much as
the weight will carry to sell when they get home,
do they take like a little I don't popsicle, little
some items, beanie babies or what light things that they
can sell when they get home.
Speaker 3 (25:27):
Badly, they were allowed to take things to the moon,
souvenirs for themselves, their families and for their friends, and
they did. They were allowed, with a certain amount of
space and material and weight to bring things. So they
brought religious trinkets, they brought pieces of jewelry, they would
you know, they brought dollar bills and that type of
(25:47):
things that they either kept, retained and gave to their children.
Like another watch we sold the one for ed Mitchell
we sold for two million. He used that in space
and he brought that back and gave it to his daughter,
and we sold it to his daughter, sold it for
his So they were allowed and uh and knowingly brought
things into space. And that's another great thing with provenance
(26:09):
is that all that stuff was checked in and out
of the spacecraft, you know, so so you knew it
was there, and you can you can you can verify
it that way.
Speaker 2 (26:19):
So it's all legit. Are there any other things non personal,
like pieces of equipment from the capsules that get sold?
Speaker 3 (26:25):
Sure? Dave also and other astronauts because they were pilots
and they landed on the Moon with these joysticks, you know,
they were they were supposed to they leave part of
the spacecraft on the lunar surface, right, they go back
up and then they eject another spacecraft off. So they
had landed on the Moon and they're like, I'm not
leaving my joystick here, you know. And then and so
they that's going to be worth millions, and that wasn't
(26:46):
worth millions. It's emotionally connected to the greatest moment of
their life. Can you imagine landing. Come on, Brad, you
land on the moon, you know, and you're.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
Gonna got his helmet. He's got plenty of the Smithsonians.
Speaker 3 (26:55):
No, No, the Smithsonian took his suit and his helmet.
So so they gave him his name tag. But that
was about it.
Speaker 2 (27:01):
You're telling me you think they weren't dollar signing at all.
They were probably just worried about getting home alive. But
that said, you know, if they do make it, it's
chi ching.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
I don't know if they were saying chiching. I think
they were saying souvenirs.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
You know.
Speaker 3 (27:15):
I think there's a long history of explorers taking things
to the North Pole and back, you know, and say,
you know, bringing things with you on these emissions. It
was a generational thing. It was a traditional thing. Lindbergh
did it, Admiral Byrd did it, Perry did it. So
this is, this is this was quite an American thing
to do. And I don't think they were thinking dollar
(27:35):
signs then. But you also have to know they wouldn't
give them insurance policies. So what the astronauts would do
before the launches is they would sign these postal covers
for their families, and so in case they died in space,
their families would have something to sell. Because the astronauts
could not be good in life insurance policies.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
That's going to tell you something about the risk. If
you cannot at any price buy insurance, no amount of
money will buy insurance for you.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
And you're a government worker, so you're not getting like
they're not paying you a lot of money to do this.
You know, you're in the military, you know, so your
pay grade isn't enough to support your family should you perish,
so you know, I think these guys were all civil
servants and weren't thinking monetarily until decades later.
Speaker 2 (28:23):
One thing about those early missions is to remember is
that they were done nobody knew what was going to happen,
and they were done so experimentally with rubber bands and
popsicle sticks, and will this work? It was? It was
not a sure thing at all. Will we get back?
I wonder what the odds really were, if, like if
(28:43):
there were Vegas odds, or maybe the scientists, maybe the
Space program themselves, calculated the odds. I wonder what they were.
Not great, I bet worse than fifty to fifty. Don't
you think.
Speaker 3 (28:54):
It's incredible to think about They went with hardly a computer,
you know what I mean? They had just just the
Iden's computer for the rockets. Everything else was manual star charts,
you know, all mechanicals creat so the odds of success.
When I talked to UH Chris Kraft, the head of them,
now so that the whole point of Apollo eleven was
just to get there alive, get out, get put the flag,
(29:17):
grab some rocks and get home. And it was only
two hours, you know, and they didn't know, they didn't
know if they were going to live or die. And
I don't know what the odds today, you know, there
probably was. You should probably look it up it. I'm
sure there was some kind of betting angle, you know,
Bradley or you could have could have bet.
Speaker 2 (29:32):
And I also can't help thinking what it must have
been like to be the guy waiting around, orbiting and
waiting for them. You know, you went all that way
and you didn't get to go to the moon. I wonder,
I wonder how that got decided. Any idea on that note,
You know they were an auctioneer. Let's get some more
auction things. The UH Bob Dylan, I'm a DJ a
(29:53):
lot of folks and music fans, and you have dealt
with a lot of music stuff there's something Bob Dylan
that went for large dollars.
Speaker 3 (30:02):
What was that, Well, I think when Bob Dylan was seventeen,
he fell in love with a girl from Minnesota who
moved away, and he wrote to her several times, like
twice a day, three times. You remember when the mail
would come in the morning and the afternoon. No, I
don't either, but they did it. Apparently the man would
(30:23):
come twice a day, so he would send letters twice
a day to this girl. She kept them and they're
wonderful letters where Bob Dylan talks about his band, the
type of music you know he's playing, Who's going to
go see? And so it was quite an archive, never
been seen in a time period. So it sold for
almost seven hundred thousand dollars and it was purchased. They
(30:43):
was purchased by a bookstore in Porto, Portugal, the most
beautiful bookstore in the world. I've been to that bookstore
and the great staircase.
Speaker 2 (30:49):
Yeah. The David Bieber, your friend, colleague, your friend anyway,
was in as a guest and brought many artifacts. He's
a person who is a collector and not a seller.
He's got so much stuff. Probably some of it with
a whole lot. You've brought in some handwritten things from
ric Ocassick of the cars. I'm sure he has a
lot of that stuff. Let's do we have Let's break
(31:11):
and we'll get to we'll talk about Steve Jobs, Apple
computer and if anybody has a question, we welcome your
input here. If you want to know how it works,
or you've had like a bulb, go off for an idea,
for a question, let us know. Six one, seven, two, five, four,
ten thirty on WBZ.
Speaker 1 (31:29):
You're on Night Side with Dan Ray on WBZ, Boston's
news radio.
Speaker 2 (31:35):
That is correct, my friends. We're with Bobby Livingstone of
our auctions, talking about some of the really wild, high
end things that they have sold and also the process
that takes place to do that, a lot of the
ins and outs. One thing that's interesting, well, Bobby's life
is he deals with people who want to be unknown
(31:57):
selling things to other people who also want to be unknown,
and even they can it's my understanding, you can even
use crypto, so there's no paper trail. That's why they
like crypto, that there's no way to trace who bought it,
who sold it.
Speaker 3 (32:11):
That's what Yes, absolutely, one of the one of the reasons. Also,
you know, some of them go up a lot a
lot in price a good investment too.
Speaker 2 (32:17):
So I can tell by your personality that it must
be a lot of fun for you over there. If
if it were not, you probably wouldn't work there. So
is it fun? And what's fun about what you do?
Speaker 3 (32:28):
Well? You have to learn something new every day because
we sell things from Einstein to Johnny Ramon to things
that went to outer space, that Apple computers. You know,
I don't know anything about physics, you know, it gets
something from Albert Einstein. I I really I can't really,
you know, do much with it, the actual mathematical formulas.
But when we you know, we had a we had
a letter written to another colleague of his, another physicist
(32:53):
that had emigrated from Germany and the United States, and
he was a critic of Einstein's. His name was Silberstein.
And the family contact us is that we have these
letters that Einstein wrote my grandfather and one, you know,
one of them he uses E equals MC squared. And
I was like, well, you know, because he's always uses
the theory relativity, theory relativity, but in a sentence he
(33:13):
typically wouldn't say use equals mc squared. But in this,
in this one he did. He was arguing with Silberstein
and Szilberstein was criticized and he said, listen, this is
it's in German. This is Bobby Livingston's version of what
Einstein says. He says, Silberstein just used equals EMC squared.
Any anybody should know that, you know, than German right,
(33:34):
rather than written out right, instead of saying theory relativity,
actually wrote out the formula in a sentence, which is
not typical for him. Anyway, the family decided to sell
it and they needed, you know, they were they were
looking for maybe twenty or thirty thousand, and we sold
it for a million dollars for them, and went for
a million dollars the letter. It was so rare that
(33:55):
Einstein would use equals empc squared in a sentence. And
there's only three other examples that we know of, and
they were all on Einstein's papers where he's using that.
And so we changed, we changed our lives. And so
when you do that, when you when you work, when
you work someplace like our auction, like I do it,
and all my colleagues do you know, it's pretty fulfilliated
(34:16):
rewarding when the scoreboard goes bang a million dollars.
Speaker 2 (34:19):
Interesting as well. So is there anything that you let
me rephrase, if you could sell anything at our our
auction what would it be? And I know you must
lay when you can't sleep at night staring at the
ceiling thinking, boy, I wish we could sell that thing.
What would be the ultimate thing? Even though you may
(34:40):
have no hope of getting it? If you could choose
anything to run through your auction house, what would you do?
What would you choose?
Speaker 3 (34:46):
So this, you know, I don't I don't think this
is that this will ever happen because the ownership of
it would be contested. But one of the things that
I've always wanted to find would be Jackie's pink pillbox
hat that she wore in Dallas, because by the time
she went into Parkland Hospital with the President, the hat
(35:09):
was gone, so when she got back out there was
no more hat. Where's that hat? I'd like to find that.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
Are there any rooms a speculation or well?
Speaker 3 (35:16):
We sold a rose that she carried into that was
when the president was assassinated. Missus Kennedy had a bouquet
of flowers on her lap, so one of those flowers
fell out on the ground and a law enforcement officer
took it, took the flower, So I don't know what
would have happened to the hat.
Speaker 2 (35:35):
So there's not a lot of folks that would have
had access to that hat. You could probably see at
the point where it was gone and she the last
time she had it on, and you'd be able to
pretty much track down who had access.
Speaker 3 (35:50):
Well, there isn't There wasn't a lot of television cameras
there when I mean, there was no footage of we sold,
we just sold. The only footage after the Zabruta film
of with agent Clint Hill on the car and Missus
Kennedy holding the president heading to Parkland. She saw that.
But but but once they got to Parkland Hospital, there
(36:11):
was no cameras there waiting for the right you know,
and so in those days it was all sixteen millimeter cameras.
So there there isn't a way really to track out
who would have had access to it. You know, there's
those great interviews badly as you know, of people shocked
outside the Parkland hospital.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
So Ted I was just about to go to Ted
in Texas and he disappeared, call me back real quickly,
ted because.
Speaker 3 (36:33):
If you know where that is, I'll squeeze from Tex.
Speaker 2 (36:34):
Squeeze you in there. And also could have fallen off.
It's a convertible that could have flown out of the car,
I guess. And finally, are there a couple more musical
artifacts that you've sold. I'm interested in that kind of thing,
lyrics do anything. I think.
Speaker 3 (36:54):
One of the cool things we sold was Jimi Hendrix's
arrest card from when he crossed the were into Canada
from Detroit in nineteen sixty eight and he was arrested.
They found some dope in his guitar case. Are apparently
you know, he was acquitted, but anyway, they fingerprinted him.
So we had a fingerprint card signed by Jimmy Hendrix
(37:15):
with the fingers that played the Star spangled banner, you
know that the gruz in his fingers. It was one
of the coolest.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
You can see you can see his his fingers with
the calluses. Yeah, yeah, that was great.
Speaker 3 (37:26):
It was so fantastic. That was one of the That
was one of my favorite Jimmy Hendrix things. And we
sold lots of great beautle items.
Speaker 2 (37:33):
You can't just go and observe these auctions.
Speaker 3 (37:35):
Correct, twenty three out of twenty four are Internet only.
But we have a big live auction September twentieth.
Speaker 2 (37:43):
Can people just go and watch?
Speaker 3 (37:44):
Yeah? Well they yeah, they come in. Yeah, we're at
the Royal Sinesta and Cambridge. When's that September twentieth.
Speaker 2 (37:49):
What's getting sold? A bunch of things? We had many lots.
Speaker 3 (37:52):
We have one hundred lot auction, Remarkable Rarities auction. We
have things from Thomas Jefferson.
Speaker 2 (37:58):
Does anything ever sell that a normal human could afford? No?
Short answer, well you know they're define normal human.
Speaker 3 (38:08):
Yeah, you know, we like to have remarkable results. But no,
you can buy things in our auction starting bit of
two hundred dollars.
Speaker 2 (38:14):
Really yeah, Okay, there's one more item, Steve Jobs Apple
one computer we have like a minute to talk about.
That sold for a whopping amount. How much was that?
Speaker 3 (38:24):
I think that you're talking about the prototype that was
found in his garage, cracked in half. Sold for almost
seven hundred thousand dollars. But that was really cool because
that came right out of when they're where they were
building the prototype. This is a prototype of the first
Apple one. So this is what we think was actually
used in the Byte shop to get the first order
of Apple computers.
Speaker 2 (38:45):
Do you ever say, wow, I can't believe somebody bought
that for that much. What are you thinking? Man? Well,
you don't say it obviously, but do you think that.
Speaker 3 (38:57):
It happens so often now that you're like blown away,
like wow, how'd that happen? And then you find out
these people that buy these things that have disposal income,
like you said, they want it and they're not going
to stop until they get it because they want to
be the guy when you come over their house for dinner.
They want to I want to show you this.
Speaker 2 (39:16):
Perfect man, what a great hour. I'm so glad you
came in, and I'm so glad you came in person.
It wouldn't have been the same on the phone. Now
I've met you and this is great. Now I know you.
Bobby Livingston, executive vice president our auction Thank you so much,
and I have a safe trip home. Thank you bad
All right, It's WBZ News Radio ten thirty
It's nice size with Dan Ray, I'm going you Beasy
Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Bradley J for Dan. How much would you pay for
a secret? How much would you pay for the ownership
rights to a secret? Would you pay millions for that?
Would you go to an auction and bid on the
right to know a secret which if you told wouldn't
be a secret anymore and it would be worthless? Well,
this is this is actually going down, and it's going
(00:27):
to happen with the our our auction house, and we
have Bobby Kingston here with us to talk about that
and so much more and that rarefied world of really
expensive stuff at auctions. This is gonna be great, my friends.
And if you have any questions, please, you know, jump
ahead of me, call in at six one, seven, two, five, four,
(00:48):
ten thirty and ask the question before I do. You're
gonna have fun. This is Friday Night. We'll call it
Friday Night Lights because there are light topics. I just
made that up on the spot. Our guess is Bobby
Kingston from our auctions.
Speaker 3 (01:02):
How you doing, Bobby good? But it's it's Bobby Livingston.
But I say you can make I say Bobby Kingston
that's good. I like it. I'll go with it.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
I actually had Kingston written down, Okay, living Ston very good,
and I apologize. So there's a thing. It's your job
now to explain what's going on with cryptos. What is
it and and what's going on?
Speaker 3 (01:26):
Well, Cryptos is our installation. It's cryptos with a K
that the United States government hired our client, Jim Samborn,
to put an installation in Langley, top secret CIA headquarters.
And there's a sculpture there that the public can't see.
And it's inspired by cryptology and code breakers, because of course,
the CIA prided itself on being able to listen in
(01:50):
on their adversaries and break codes.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
As I understand that there are four panels, each with
its own code. Three of them, I guess it was
a challenge to break the code, and three of them
were broken by various entities, but the fourth remained a secret.
And now the sculptor is going to sell the solution
to that code. Is that correct?
Speaker 3 (02:13):
Well almost, it's the it's like the password. It's like,
in order to read what it says, there's a passcode
that decrypts it. So you're going to get the pass
god and be able to read the fourth panel of
this sculpture.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Yes, I read that. There's as a copper piece with
that you put up over the existing letters and then
you're able to read it. It's kind of like one of
those Raiders of the Lost archetype of situation for sure.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
And and you know, being able to be a code breaker,
you know, it's tough work and it's it's been you know,
secrets have been kept for millennium and so this one
has not been cracked. Everybody's been trying to crack this
particular code and it has never been done. Now he's
eighty years old and he's kept this locked up in
a safe. The answered that you know how the past
(03:02):
key to read this, and it's time for him to
sell it. He's ready to move on because people are
there's so many people write them every day like I've
got the I've got it, I've got it, and he's like, no,
you know, no, you don't, and so you know, he's
gonna go ahead. And because there's so many people focused
on cracking this code to keep it going instead of
just revealing it, he wants to auction it and get
(03:22):
it in the hands of someone that will be the
keeper of that code for the next generation.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
It is the sculptor's hope that the purchaser of the
secret will keep it a secret.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
Well, I would think if you're going to pay the
kind of money it's going to be, you're gonna want
to keep the secret and be the person that that
is the gatekeeper of this secret, because I mean it's
still a great piece of art. I mean, the artwork
will exist at Langley, so that's great, but the secret,
you know, having that pass key is valuable.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
That's interesting. By the way, the purchaser.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
Will not own the sculpture, just the secret.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
The government will continue to open that sculpture that's outside
the CIA building in the back where no one sees it.
I understand that so many people were writing in with
guesses about what it was. He started to charge fifty
bucks for a personal reply to say, no, is that
something you read? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (04:14):
Yeah, he I don't think he was pretty adamant about that,
but I know he instituted it because people would just
write him every day. I mean, can you imagine every
day come in to your email and then there's like,
you know, seventy five people that have you gotten it wrong?
And you got to like, how many do I have
to go through this? And you know, and do I
have to answer them? I mean every day, and there's people,
there's people that spend their decades trying to crack this.
(04:34):
I mean, he's told me he's got you know, there's
people who's sole focus every day is to try to
crack K four the fourth.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Panel, Cryptose four Cryptos four. Man, I wonder is the
so I also heard that once you understand cryptos four,
the fourth panel, then the other three get tied in
and will present some sort of more unified message. The
other three will make more sense and be more meaningful
once the fourth one is revealed or is understood.
Speaker 3 (05:04):
Yeah, that might be the case. I don't know, you know,
I'm representing the artists. I don't know what his message
is or his intentive.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
It's probably something like Soulin's Green his People kind of thing.
Speaker 3 (05:17):
Yeah, I mean, it's probably pretty well thought out and poetic,
because the other three are pretty cool.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
Oh there's another one deciphering old movie. There was maybe
an other limits you can't remember what it was, but
aliens came down and they were offering people, you know,
a chance to go up to the They gave him
this book and said, figure out this book and you'll
understand why we're taking you back to our planet. And
the people are climbing on. They really want to go
(05:44):
to the superior place where these superior beings are. And
as some of the people were going up the ramp
to get on the spaceship to go off to this
other planet, somebody figured it out.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
What was called. The name of the book was to
serve Man.
Speaker 2 (05:58):
Serve Man. Go.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
It's a cook book. Don't get on the don't get
on the spaceship. It's cookbook.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
Just serve man.
Speaker 3 (06:05):
So exactly, so you never know what the message is
man and so so that's fry.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
Now, Uh, what's the procedure. How does the auction go
for something like this.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
Well, it's going to be a live auction. It's going
to be in Boston. It's on November twentieth at six pm,
and you know there'll be an auction caller, you know,
asking for bids. The estimates around three hundred thousand to
five hundred thousand. We'll see if we get there or
go well past that, we'll see. Uh, and uh, you
know what you'll get is the is the past key
and several other pieces of e femera related to the
(06:37):
making of the sculpture. Participating is pretty easy. You you
go to the website at our auction dot com. You
fill out a form and then we vet you because
when you have an object like this, we got to
make sure you know you are who you say you
are and you have the funds to pay for something
like this, so that that's pretty seamless process these days.
And then on the day the auction just come in bid,
(06:59):
you hold up your panel number and you get the secret.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Another question about the procedure of how to use the key,
and that is you have to go to you will
have to go to the fourth panel K four and
hold this thing up to read it. Will that be
cordoned off so no one else can see when when
the he or she purchases and wants to know the answer.
Speaker 3 (07:22):
I don't know if you have to go all the
way to that type of thing. I think once you
have that pass key, and could you also get his
notes and everything he broke down so you'll be able
to decipher.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
It from without going to the site.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
You won't have to go to the side because if he.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Did, there would be people from the rooftops with binoculars,
and it would be quite interesting.
Speaker 3 (07:40):
I don't think you can even get a security pass
to get in there.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
And so at a live auction like this, how many
people do you expect come show up?
Speaker 3 (07:49):
Well, you never know. Sometimes all it takes is two
people to have a big sale. This is a single item,
So I wouldn't be surprised if there was you know,
ten to twenty people at the sale. We'll see what happens. Yeah,
and the sale is here in Boston. Yes, you're here
in Boston.
Speaker 2 (08:05):
That's pretty cool. And I guess I have about a
minute to ask a couple more questions about the procedure.
Do the people have to put down a deposit at
all to get involved with this?
Speaker 3 (08:19):
Typically, if we feel it's necessary, we would ask for
a depositive. But most of the people they're well known
to us. I mean, the people that register for these
types of sales, they're they're known entities, you know. And
so you're you're you're you're dealing with someone who you
know has the public profile and footprint, that you know
exactly who they are, and that they have.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
The funds, and what if and I asked you this
before we started. What if the person gets in over
the head and can't afford it. What happens? Then they
bid way up and they realize, oh my, I didn't
realize I had that mansion payment coming up. I can't
afford it. What happens?
Speaker 3 (08:56):
Then that typically doesn't happen, and they pay. You know,
it's a contract and they've entered into a legal agreement.
So when they put their paddle up and win and
then they say, oh h then you know it gets
worked out. It gets worked out legally. Well, they pay,
they'll pay their you know, they pay.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
And they will pay. They will.
Speaker 4 (09:15):
They signed a contract, they have to pay, right, they're
legally obligated to. It's yeah, so so doesn't the second place?
Things rarely happen. They rarely happen, and you do everything
you can to make sure that they don't, right, Because
I mean, if you win something like this, it's like,
don't you want this? I mean, of course you wanted this.
I know you've been a little bit more than you
thought you had to.
Speaker 3 (09:35):
But you now own K four that the decryption that
k Ford that is a pretty special thing. And I
don't think someone's going to walk away from a bid
like that, it doesn't happen. Most of the things we
sell are so remarkable and it's fantastic, rare and rare,
rare and remarkable. Bobby Livingston from our auction. This, this
is the type of thing that someone is going to
(09:56):
happily wire the money within twenty four hours.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
And being a person that's never been to an auction
like this, what are the pedals like they? I think
of ping pong paddals, but they're probably not like that.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
Well, they're rounded. The ones we use are little squares,
and yet you have their bitter number on the square
itself and they hold them up and so the auctioneer
can see, oh that's that's bitter two of four bitter.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
Two four okay, And about how much time does the
auctioneer allow between you know, bids before they say okay,
going once, going twice? Sol too.
Speaker 3 (10:28):
I think something like this one lot like this might
take five to six minutes to complete. I mean, you know,
when you're sitting you know, hopefully you're sitting at you know,
three hundred thousand dollars and you're trying to get three
hundred and twenty five thousand and three and twenty five
thousand and you wait, right, and you wait, and you
let the tension go, and then you go again, I
still need and you.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
Keep and you say, and you try to sell it. Right,
who wants this fantastic secret, one of a kind items. Right,
you'll be famous, You'll be in all the newspapers. Right.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
And a lot of people like to wait to the
last secon. I mean, I don't know, you know why.
But there's our people that are bidders whose strategy is
to try to wait it out and come in at
the last minute. So it's it's an art to it.
Not everybody can do that. I can't. I can't be an.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
Honest So and I'm sure this happens. Wait wait, wait, wait,
and then somebody after five minutes says it okay. And
then somebody else immediately, like in one second later, pops
it up and as if to say, dude, you're never
going to win. I'm gonna do I'm gonna do this
all night. You might as well get.
Speaker 3 (11:29):
Out now that happens. I've seen it happen.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
Oh, we'll continue with Bobby Livingston from our auctions In
a moment on WBZ, It's.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
Nike Side with Dan ray On Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Right, So Jake for Dan tonight, and we're talking auctions
of rare and valuable and strange things, particularly now we're
talking about cryptos. I'm not gonna run through everything that
cryptos is. I'll give you the short version. Basically, it's
the secret to what a code means, and it's a
code that is in a sculpture out outside the CIA building.
(12:06):
There were four panels. Three of them have been deciphered.
Now the key to the fourth is being auctioned off.
Why are our auctions? And Bobby Livingston from said our
is here to talk about a little bit. And we've
gone through everything on this particular item except who what
type of person would buy a secret? You know, you
(12:27):
can't eat it, you can't, you can't. I guess you
could sell it. But is this something that they might
expect would be an investment?
Speaker 3 (12:35):
Will let secret go up in value? I don't know,
you know who's going to buy it? I really think
in this world of technology and cryptology and you know,
bitcoin and all the things that cryptology represents to a
whole generation of entrepreneurs and people that made a lot
of money in cryptology, I think that's the type of
(12:56):
person that would want to own this. Someone who's you know,
comes from a world of hacking back in the the eighties, Yeah,
or something.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
Somebody in the Cold War era that you know into
spy stuff, like myself. Yeah, if I were Bezouts, I
might buy it myself.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
Someone like you could, you know, who wants to be
the protector of the encryption. So you cannot read what's written.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
I know something you don't know. It did cost me,
but I know it, right? Is it? Is it secret?
Is it a secret? Who is in the in the running?
Do you sign a non disclosure agreement so that you
can't say who's bidding?
Speaker 3 (13:33):
That's right? Uh, we keep our bidders anonymous. That's why
we give them paddle numbers, so they don't have to
use their name. They use their number.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
No, No bob Elon.
Speaker 3 (13:42):
No kings Kingston, Kingston.
Speaker 2 (13:45):
Okay. And now we get into some other types of
things that you have sold there, yea, and yeah, I
I I'm not sure if if you're at home that
Bobby can really do an appraisaler or anything. He does
know the kinds of things that sell, but he can't
(14:05):
do an actual appraisal because he can't see it right.
So I have a list of things here, and not
all of them are hard objects that you can touch, feel, taste.
There is, in fact, the first seat aboard Blue Origins
New Shepherd is called Yeah, New Shepherd was the rocket
that was ride number one, that's right.
Speaker 3 (14:27):
For the first ride. Blue Origin wanted to establish what
they should charge to take a space flight of twelve
minutes up to the Carmen line, and so Jeff Bezos,
his brother, and Wally Funk, one of the first female
astronaut candidates from the sixties, were given seats, and the
fourth seat was put up for auction twenty twenty one,
(14:48):
and so we sold it here in Boston for twenty
eight million.
Speaker 2 (14:54):
How did that go? How long was the auction? Was
it longer than normal? Shorter than normal?
Speaker 3 (14:58):
It was longer than No on YouTube, you can find
it on the Blue Origin site. Still, it's an amazing moment.
In fact, the auctioneer was brilliant because it got stuck,
like at twenty six million, and he just goes, I'm
a twenty six I need twenty There's probably three minutes
I'm asking for twenty seven and twenty seven million comes
in and then right away, Like you said, the guy
who's gonna win it just a twenty eight.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
So these people have unlimited money. It could have been
one hundred. They wouldn't care, is that correct?
Speaker 3 (15:26):
That's right. The gentleman. Typically I wouldn't tell you who
won it, but he identified himself in the press. It
was a gentleman named Justin Sun and he owns a
cryptocurrency company. And he's also the gentleman that won. You know,
in that yellow banana with the tape on it, the
sold for about four million dollars piece of artwork. Anyway,
he bought that too, So he just went After four years,
(15:50):
Justin Sun just went on the Blue Origin mission. He
didn't get to go on the number one. He went
on like the twentieth, but he finally got to go
after ording through some things so that he could he
could go into space.
Speaker 2 (16:03):
But any idea what it's like on the Blue Origin
Since you've dealt with it, then, did this person tell
you about it or when you were trying to sell it,
did you were you describing what the ride is like?
How high do you go, how fast do you go?
What does it feel like? Are you witless? Twelve minutes
is not.
Speaker 3 (16:18):
Long, I know, but you do pass the Carmon line
into weightlessness for a couple of minutes and float and
so you can you float around in the spacecraft. You
can see out into the nothingness of our universe, you know,
once you get through the atmosphere, you can see forever.
And then you come back down. I mean, but you're launched,
you know, on a giant you know, twenty thousand miles
an hour or however it is. You're strapped and there's
(16:40):
no pilot, there's no captive.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
There no pilot, no, so there's all automated, all.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
Automated, and then you come parachuting down into the desert
of Texas. So it's quite exciting. Did you talk to
the buyer after I did? And, like I said, I
just heard from him recently. And how excited do you
that he finally got to go?
Speaker 2 (17:01):
Was it? Did he say he was scared? That's my
big question.
Speaker 3 (17:04):
I don't ask those kinds. I mean, it was, it's
an exhilarating experience.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
I don't. Don't you want to know if he was scared?
Speaker 3 (17:09):
No, I don't know.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
I would want to know.
Speaker 3 (17:10):
I mean, it's there are terms of conditions.
Speaker 2 (17:13):
I don't don't preventing if he was scared, don't give
me that.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
I don't know that.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
I know better than that. So that's something. And of
course I don't know. Can you even take pictures? What's
the rule on taking a photo?
Speaker 1 (17:26):
Well?
Speaker 3 (17:26):
Everything? Uh, you know, I don't know if I don't remember,
if there's rules, I mean, everything being videotapes anyway, you
know you're in there being videotape. I think you could. Yeah,
people took selfies. Yeah, for sure, you could take pictures.
Speaker 2 (17:36):
You know.
Speaker 3 (17:36):
You unbuckle your seatbelt and you float around while you
can float around, and then you get back in your
and they go through training for they spend three days
training to go on that.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
I suppose you have to take an exhaustive physical examination.
Speaker 3 (17:46):
I don't think so. I don't think so. Bill Shatter
was like a ride at the fair. You know, are
you this tall?
Speaker 2 (17:54):
Right? Get on?
Speaker 3 (17:55):
If you have this much money, you can come.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
So William Shanner did it.
Speaker 3 (17:58):
Yeah, the next fight, Schattner went and he was ninety
ninety and he wept when he came home. You know,
I mean it's uh, you know, when you when you
go up in space and look back at the Earth
you know, it's that they have. They call it the
overview effect, where you you know, you understand we're just
this little blue ball in the middle of nothingness.
Speaker 2 (18:13):
You know, would you go for free?
Speaker 3 (18:15):
No?
Speaker 2 (18:17):
I wouldn't either. No, I don't even want to bungee jump.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
No.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
All right, what else there are? There are a lot
of things as a musical instrument, many many musical instruments,
I'm sure, but there's one in particular that's that's fairly interesting.
Speaker 3 (18:31):
Tell us about that one, well, I the most expensive
guitar we we we've sold was Johnny Ramon's most right
ventures to guitar. We sold it for nine hundred and
thirty seven thousand dollars back in twenty twenty one. This
is we always called it the our pal Chris Lamby
calls it Thor's Hammer, but we called the Johnny Appleseed
(18:53):
guitar because this is the guitar that Johnny Ramon played
all over the world, all over the country. And you know,
they would come into town and play and that come
back the next year and there would be punk bands
playing inspired by the Ramones. So this this is the
he used it for decades, you know, and tens of
thousands of shows. This particular guitar was.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
Is that a secret? Who bought that?
Speaker 3 (19:12):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (19:13):
It is okay? Interesting? Why one is that? So that
it it will all be stolen? So they won't you know?
Is it for security reasons?
Speaker 3 (19:23):
All these things factor into whether a person wants to
reveal what they have. But this is a very special guitar,
and so when you see it, it's like a museum piece.
And so when the person pulls it out, that's their
prerogative to keep it secret. Who's you know, they keep
it secret. And then when you come over and hang out,
you get to see it, you know, and that's a
great it's a great thing, you know, So I don't
(19:45):
blame them from not telling it.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
So you know, that should probably be in a museum, right,
which brings me to something you told me. The Smithsonian
is not real pally with you folks, because they, as
you sell stuff they want in their museum.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
Most of the time we have things that Smithsonian has
dozens of, and you know, they really don't watch us.
But occasionally we get something that you know, would have
been nice to have in the National collection, but they
don't want to buy it. And the person that has it,
or the family that retained it isn't going to donate it.
I mean, it's it's it's very valuable. I mean a
(20:21):
lot of people do donate things the Sithsonian, and you know,
you saw the raids that lost dark You know what happens.
They donate it and then it goes in that back
room and stays there, you know. So it's better that
things get in you know, from our view, it's better
that collectors get these things that aren't going to be
on display and take care of them and curate them
and show them to their friends.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
Has anyone tried don't name any names, but has it
come to pass that someone tried to bring you a
stolen article and auction it off and you you vetted
the article and said, whoa sir, it seems that this
is sir or ma'am. Looks like this is a stolen article.
We can't handle it.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
Yeah, I mean that happens. That happens, and you know,
understanding provenance and chain of custody and what's plausible to
be out in the public hands, it is something we
have to deal with. And we've worked with law enforcement
many times to get things returned, you know, to not
only to the Smithsonian. We've worked with National Archives, We've
(21:21):
worked with We've worked with the Kennedy Library. Many organizations
in our auction work hand in hand to make sure
things that aren't supposed to be in the marketplace are
returned to their rightful owners.
Speaker 2 (21:34):
We need to break but I have afterwards. I want
to know about how important the providence is to the
price and how you how you go about finding out
that and how you vet that as well. Coming up
on WBZ.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
It's Night Side with Dan Ray on wb Boston's news Radio,
we're digging into the very interesting world of high end auctions.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
Now we're going to start to take a look at
some of the things that have been sold by our
auction and the executive vice president of Bobby Livingston.
Speaker 3 (22:06):
Here.
Speaker 2 (22:07):
We talked about a couple of things, but there's a
list of really interesting things.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
Now.
Speaker 3 (22:11):
You sell a lot of.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
Watches, incredibly interesting watches that go for huge dollars. Talk
about some watches.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
Sure, we're known for working with the astronauts, NASA, astronauts,
moonwalkers and their their families and so we've sold we
sold a pall of fourteen rolex that went for two
million Neil Armstrong's Omega Commender of Omega wa for two million,
and then we sold probably my favorite watch, which was
a pall of fifteen Commander Dave Scott's Bulvar watch that
(22:43):
he used on his third moonwalk saluted the flag. There's
great pictures of him wearing this watch.
Speaker 2 (22:48):
Talk about provenance, yeah, yeah, all right, And I mentioned provenance.
What is that?
Speaker 3 (22:56):
Well, provenance is basically ownership, change of custody, where to
come from? How did it get into the auction house.
In the case of this Dave Scott watch got right
from him, right, And so you know, the astronaut himself
had the watch he wore on the moon. It belonged
to him. We sold it from that's great promonace. But
something like we had two tickets to Ford's Theater the
night Lincoln was assassinated, right, and uh, you have to
(23:18):
kind of track those back. Where did where did those
Where did those come from?
Speaker 2 (23:21):
You know?
Speaker 3 (23:21):
And and they came out of the Malcolm Forbes collection
in the nineteen eighties and bought by our client and
then Soldso you kind of trace back.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
When it comes to the Scott watch, do you still
have to take it to the boys at the lab,
the people at the lab to make sure it's legit.
Do you still have to somehow figure out it's the
right one or do you just trust him?
Speaker 3 (23:43):
Well, in this case number one, there's photographs of it
on the moon. So no, there was only one made.
Oh okay, it was that's different. This was what they
call prototypes. There was only one of the watches made.
In fact, Bulva was angry because Omega, a Swiss watch company,
got the contract for the NASA Watch program, so this
(24:06):
one was a backup and his Omega broke. The bezel
face of the watch popped off, popped off, and so
he needed a watch because when you're out on the Moon,
you lose contact with Houston. There's no computers, you know,
or you know, and you only have so much oxygen.
You gotta have a watch. This is a very important.
Speaker 2 (24:25):
I can't help wonder on the side of being on
the Moon affects how the watch works.
Speaker 3 (24:28):
Well, it was this the angle of the sun apparently
is what they figured out why the bezel failed because
of the heat where Dave landed uh that particular spot
and the and the sun affected the bezel apparently, but
provenounces is really important. The other cool thing is it
came with a watch band and you can see the
serial number on the watch band that's on the watch
(24:50):
on the moon.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
It's like perfect.
Speaker 3 (24:52):
So it kind of and then there was there was
a lot of documentation about the boulevard once it got back,
so it was that's a pretty easy authentication in that case.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
And it occurs to me, since you got so much
of his watch, to ask you if astronauts will take
all kinds of little stuff up there as much as
the weight will carry to sell when they get home,
do they take like a little I don't popsicle, little
some items, beanie babies or what light things that they
can sell when they get home.
Speaker 3 (25:27):
Badly, they were allowed to take things to the moon,
souvenirs for themselves, their families and for their friends, and
they did. They were allowed, with a certain amount of
space and material and weight to bring things. So they
brought religious trinkets, they brought pieces of jewelry, they would
you know, they brought dollar bills and that type of
(25:47):
things that they either kept, retained and gave to their children.
Like another watch we sold the one for ed Mitchell
we sold for two million. He used that in space
and he brought that back and gave it to his daughter,
and we sold it to his daughter, sold it for
his So they were allowed and uh and knowingly brought
things into space. And that's another great thing with provenance
(26:09):
is that all that stuff was checked in and out
of the spacecraft, you know, so so you knew it
was there, and you can you can you can verify
it that way.
Speaker 2 (26:19):
So it's all legit. Are there any other things non personal,
like pieces of equipment from the capsules that get sold?
Speaker 3 (26:25):
Sure? Dave also and other astronauts because they were pilots
and they landed on the Moon with these joysticks, you know,
they were they were supposed to they leave part of
the spacecraft on the lunar surface, right, they go back
up and then they eject another spacecraft off. So they
had landed on the Moon and they're like, I'm not
leaving my joystick here, you know. And then and so
they that's going to be worth millions, and that wasn't
(26:46):
worth millions. It's emotionally connected to the greatest moment of
their life. Can you imagine landing. Come on, Brad, you
land on the moon, you know, and you're.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
Gonna got his helmet. He's got plenty of the Smithsonians.
Speaker 3 (26:55):
No, No, the Smithsonian took his suit and his helmet.
So so they gave him his name tag. But that
was about it.
Speaker 2 (27:01):
You're telling me you think they weren't dollar signing at all.
They were probably just worried about getting home alive. But
that said, you know, if they do make it, it's
chi ching.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
I don't know if they were saying chiching. I think
they were saying souvenirs.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
You know.
Speaker 3 (27:15):
I think there's a long history of explorers taking things
to the North Pole and back, you know, and say,
you know, bringing things with you on these emissions. It
was a generational thing. It was a traditional thing. Lindbergh
did it, Admiral Byrd did it, Perry did it. So
this is, this is this was quite an American thing
to do. And I don't think they were thinking dollar
(27:35):
signs then. But you also have to know they wouldn't
give them insurance policies. So what the astronauts would do
before the launches is they would sign these postal covers
for their families, and so in case they died in space,
their families would have something to sell. Because the astronauts
could not be good in life insurance policies.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
That's going to tell you something about the risk. If
you cannot at any price buy insurance, no amount of
money will buy insurance for you.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
And you're a government worker, so you're not getting like
they're not paying you a lot of money to do this.
You know, you're in the military, you know, so your
pay grade isn't enough to support your family should you perish,
so you know, I think these guys were all civil
servants and weren't thinking monetarily until decades later.
Speaker 2 (28:23):
One thing about those early missions is to remember is
that they were done nobody knew what was going to happen,
and they were done so experimentally with rubber bands and
popsicle sticks, and will this work? It was? It was
not a sure thing at all. Will we get back?
I wonder what the odds really were, if, like if
(28:43):
there were Vegas odds, or maybe the scientists, maybe the
Space program themselves, calculated the odds. I wonder what they were.
Not great, I bet worse than fifty to fifty. Don't
you think.
Speaker 3 (28:54):
It's incredible to think about They went with hardly a computer,
you know what I mean? They had just just the
Iden's computer for the rockets. Everything else was manual star charts,
you know, all mechanicals creat so the odds of success.
When I talked to UH Chris Kraft, the head of them,
now so that the whole point of Apollo eleven was
just to get there alive, get out, get put the flag,
(29:17):
grab some rocks and get home. And it was only
two hours, you know, and they didn't know, they didn't
know if they were going to live or die. And
I don't know what the odds today, you know, there
probably was. You should probably look it up it. I'm
sure there was some kind of betting angle, you know,
Bradley or you could have could have bet.
Speaker 2 (29:32):
And I also can't help thinking what it must have
been like to be the guy waiting around, orbiting and
waiting for them. You know, you went all that way
and you didn't get to go to the moon. I wonder,
I wonder how that got decided. Any idea on that note,
You know they were an auctioneer. Let's get some more
auction things. The UH Bob Dylan, I'm a DJ a
(29:53):
lot of folks and music fans, and you have dealt
with a lot of music stuff there's something Bob Dylan
that went for large dollars.
Speaker 3 (30:02):
What was that, Well, I think when Bob Dylan was seventeen,
he fell in love with a girl from Minnesota who
moved away, and he wrote to her several times, like
twice a day, three times. You remember when the mail
would come in the morning and the afternoon. No, I
don't either, but they did it. Apparently the man would
(30:23):
come twice a day, so he would send letters twice
a day to this girl. She kept them and they're
wonderful letters where Bob Dylan talks about his band, the
type of music you know he's playing, Who's going to
go see? And so it was quite an archive, never
been seen in a time period. So it sold for
almost seven hundred thousand dollars and it was purchased. They
(30:43):
was purchased by a bookstore in Porto, Portugal, the most
beautiful bookstore in the world. I've been to that bookstore
and the great staircase.
Speaker 2 (30:49):
Yeah. The David Bieber, your friend, colleague, your friend anyway,
was in as a guest and brought many artifacts. He's
a person who is a collector and not a seller.
He's got so much stuff. Probably some of it with
a whole lot. You've brought in some handwritten things from
ric Ocassick of the cars. I'm sure he has a
lot of that stuff. Let's do we have Let's break
(31:11):
and we'll get to we'll talk about Steve Jobs, Apple
computer and if anybody has a question, we welcome your
input here. If you want to know how it works,
or you've had like a bulb, go off for an idea,
for a question, let us know. Six one, seven, two, five, four,
ten thirty on WBZ.
Speaker 1 (31:29):
You're on Night Side with Dan Ray on WBZ, Boston's
news radio.
Speaker 2 (31:35):
That is correct, my friends. We're with Bobby Livingstone of
our auctions, talking about some of the really wild, high
end things that they have sold and also the process
that takes place to do that, a lot of the
ins and outs. One thing that's interesting, well, Bobby's life
is he deals with people who want to be unknown
(31:57):
selling things to other people who also want to be unknown,
and even they can it's my understanding, you can even
use crypto, so there's no paper trail. That's why they
like crypto, that there's no way to trace who bought it,
who sold it.
Speaker 3 (32:11):
That's what Yes, absolutely, one of the one of the reasons. Also,
you know, some of them go up a lot a
lot in price a good investment too.
Speaker 2 (32:17):
So I can tell by your personality that it must
be a lot of fun for you over there. If
if it were not, you probably wouldn't work there. So
is it fun? And what's fun about what you do?
Speaker 3 (32:28):
Well? You have to learn something new every day because
we sell things from Einstein to Johnny Ramon to things
that went to outer space, that Apple computers. You know,
I don't know anything about physics, you know, it gets
something from Albert Einstein. I I really I can't really,
you know, do much with it, the actual mathematical formulas.
But when we you know, we had a we had
a letter written to another colleague of his, another physicist
(32:53):
that had emigrated from Germany and the United States, and
he was a critic of Einstein's. His name was Silberstein.
And the family contact us is that we have these
letters that Einstein wrote my grandfather and one, you know,
one of them he uses E equals MC squared. And
I was like, well, you know, because he's always uses
the theory relativity, theory relativity, but in a sentence he
(33:13):
typically wouldn't say use equals mc squared. But in this,
in this one he did. He was arguing with Silberstein
and Szilberstein was criticized and he said, listen, this is
it's in German. This is Bobby Livingston's version of what
Einstein says. He says, Silberstein just used equals EMC squared.
Any anybody should know that, you know, than German right,
(33:34):
rather than written out right, instead of saying theory relativity,
actually wrote out the formula in a sentence, which is
not typical for him. Anyway, the family decided to sell
it and they needed, you know, they were they were
looking for maybe twenty or thirty thousand, and we sold
it for a million dollars for them, and went for
a million dollars the letter. It was so rare that
(33:55):
Einstein would use equals empc squared in a sentence. And
there's only three other examples that we know of, and
they were all on Einstein's papers where he's using that.
And so we changed, we changed our lives. And so
when you do that, when you when you work, when
you work someplace like our auction, like I do it,
and all my colleagues do you know, it's pretty fulfilliated
(34:16):
rewarding when the scoreboard goes bang a million dollars.
Speaker 2 (34:19):
Interesting as well. So is there anything that you let
me rephrase, if you could sell anything at our our
auction what would it be? And I know you must
lay when you can't sleep at night staring at the
ceiling thinking, boy, I wish we could sell that thing.
What would be the ultimate thing? Even though you may
(34:40):
have no hope of getting it? If you could choose
anything to run through your auction house, what would you do?
What would you choose?
Speaker 3 (34:46):
So this, you know, I don't I don't think this
is that this will ever happen because the ownership of
it would be contested. But one of the things that
I've always wanted to find would be Jackie's pink pillbox
hat that she wore in Dallas, because by the time
she went into Parkland Hospital with the President, the hat
(35:09):
was gone, so when she got back out there was
no more hat. Where's that hat? I'd like to find that.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
Are there any rooms a speculation or well?
Speaker 3 (35:16):
We sold a rose that she carried into that was
when the president was assassinated. Missus Kennedy had a bouquet
of flowers on her lap, so one of those flowers
fell out on the ground and a law enforcement officer
took it, took the flower, So I don't know what
would have happened to the hat.
Speaker 2 (35:35):
So there's not a lot of folks that would have
had access to that hat. You could probably see at
the point where it was gone and she the last
time she had it on, and you'd be able to
pretty much track down who had access.
Speaker 3 (35:50):
Well, there isn't There wasn't a lot of television cameras
there when I mean, there was no footage of we sold,
we just sold. The only footage after the Zabruta film
of with agent Clint Hill on the car and Missus
Kennedy holding the president heading to Parkland. She saw that.
But but but once they got to Parkland Hospital, there
(36:11):
was no cameras there waiting for the right you know,
and so in those days it was all sixteen millimeter cameras.
So there there isn't a way really to track out
who would have had access to it. You know, there's
those great interviews badly as you know, of people shocked
outside the Parkland hospital.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
So Ted I was just about to go to Ted
in Texas and he disappeared, call me back real quickly,
ted because.
Speaker 3 (36:33):
If you know where that is, I'll squeeze from Tex.
Speaker 2 (36:34):
Squeeze you in there. And also could have fallen off.
It's a convertible that could have flown out of the car,
I guess. And finally, are there a couple more musical
artifacts that you've sold. I'm interested in that kind of thing,
lyrics do anything. I think.
Speaker 3 (36:54):
One of the cool things we sold was Jimi Hendrix's
arrest card from when he crossed the were into Canada
from Detroit in nineteen sixty eight and he was arrested.
They found some dope in his guitar case. Are apparently
you know, he was acquitted, but anyway, they fingerprinted him.
So we had a fingerprint card signed by Jimmy Hendrix
(37:15):
with the fingers that played the Star spangled banner, you
know that the gruz in his fingers. It was one
of the coolest.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
You can see you can see his his fingers with
the calluses. Yeah, yeah, that was great.
Speaker 3 (37:26):
It was so fantastic. That was one of the That
was one of my favorite Jimmy Hendrix things. And we
sold lots of great beautle items.
Speaker 2 (37:33):
You can't just go and observe these auctions.
Speaker 3 (37:35):
Correct, twenty three out of twenty four are Internet only.
But we have a big live auction September twentieth.
Speaker 2 (37:43):
Can people just go and watch?
Speaker 3 (37:44):
Yeah? Well they yeah, they come in. Yeah, we're at
the Royal Sinesta and Cambridge. When's that September twentieth.
Speaker 2 (37:49):
What's getting sold? A bunch of things? We had many lots.
Speaker 3 (37:52):
We have one hundred lot auction, Remarkable Rarities auction. We
have things from Thomas Jefferson.
Speaker 2 (37:58):
Does anything ever sell that a normal human could afford? No?
Short answer, well you know they're define normal human.
Speaker 3 (38:08):
Yeah, you know, we like to have remarkable results. But no,
you can buy things in our auction starting bit of
two hundred dollars.
Speaker 2 (38:14):
Really yeah, Okay, there's one more item, Steve Jobs Apple
one computer we have like a minute to talk about.
That sold for a whopping amount. How much was that?
Speaker 3 (38:24):
I think that you're talking about the prototype that was
found in his garage, cracked in half. Sold for almost
seven hundred thousand dollars. But that was really cool because
that came right out of when they're where they were
building the prototype. This is a prototype of the first
Apple one. So this is what we think was actually
used in the Byte shop to get the first order
of Apple computers.
Speaker 2 (38:45):
Do you ever say, wow, I can't believe somebody bought
that for that much. What are you thinking? Man? Well,
you don't say it obviously, but do you think that.
Speaker 3 (38:57):
It happens so often now that you're like blown away,
like wow, how'd that happen? And then you find out
these people that buy these things that have disposal income,
like you said, they want it and they're not going
to stop until they get it because they want to
be the guy when you come over their house for dinner.
They want to I want to show you this.
Speaker 2 (39:16):
Perfect man, what a great hour. I'm so glad you
came in, and I'm so glad you came in person.
It wouldn't have been the same on the phone. Now
I've met you and this is great. Now I know you.
Bobby Livingston, executive vice president our auction Thank you so much,
and I have a safe trip home. Thank you bad
All right, It's WBZ News Radio ten thirty
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