Latest / Armstrong & Getty One More Thing / We Have Polk's Grocery List...
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: Well, we have a grocery list signed by President Polk
- 0:03Speaker 1: for thirty dollars. If you're interested, it's.
- 0:06Speaker 2: One more thing. Oh boy, that's funny.
- 0:14Speaker 1: Yeah, there's some auctions about to go on later in
- 0:19Speaker 1: June for some unbelievable Lincoln related memorabilia for many millions
- 0:26Speaker 1: of dollars.
- 0:26Speaker 2: We have spirow Arew's dry cleaning ticket.
- 0:30Speaker 1: You have any interest in that? No initial d tip amount.
- 0:35Speaker 1: You see the S and the A. Yeah, so rare
- 0:40Speaker 1: copies of both the Emancipation Proclamation and the Thirteenth Amendment
- 0:45Speaker 1: are going to be auctioned off in Softab's upcoming books
- 0:48Speaker 1: and manuscripscripts sale in New York City.
- 0:51Speaker 2: How many times I've been in these stores. They're usually
- 0:54Speaker 2: in Vegas, one of your froncy casinos or where they
- 0:58Speaker 2: sell memorabilia, whether it's sports, memorabilian music, or you know,
- 1:02Speaker 2: politics or whatever, and they have a really it's usually
- 1:05Speaker 2: a cool picture and a really fancy frame, and then
- 1:08Speaker 2: what you're paying for is the little signature on something,
- 1:10Speaker 2: a letter or whatever. But I've come close to buying
- 1:13Speaker 2: them many times. If I never had, I never have,
- 1:15Speaker 2: mostly because I don't have the slightest idea if the price.
- 1:17Speaker 1: Is raised more not well, they almost caught me once
- 1:20Speaker 1: or twice. Two authorities believe alcohol was involved, but they didn't.
- 1:24Speaker 1: And and it's usually for the same reason. I end
- 1:28Speaker 1: up thinking, all right, what would I do with this?
- 1:33Speaker 2: Who would I show it?
- 1:34Speaker 1: To?
- 1:34Speaker 2: Stick it under your pillow, sleep with your head on
- 1:36Speaker 2: it every night?
- 1:38Speaker 1: Well? And how much you know, like after a year,
- 1:40Speaker 1: how much joy would it bring me to have?
- 1:43Speaker 2: Or is it just an investment? I wouldn't do it.
- 1:45Speaker 2: I would I never looked at it as an investment.
- 1:47Speaker 2: It's always the coolness of it. But right right, how
- 1:50Speaker 2: would it continue to be cool if I had? Okay,
- 1:52Speaker 2: I got a signed copy of the Gettysburg address by
- 1:54Speaker 2: Abrad Lincoln. That's a good one that I would get.
- 1:57Speaker 2: Would I enjoy looking at that every day, hanging on
- 1:59Speaker 2: my well forever? Or at some point is the phone
- 2:03Speaker 2: worn off? I don't know. My friends and.
- 2:05Speaker 1: Acquaintances are history freaks enough that that would be really cool.
- 2:09Speaker 1: But then, because I try not to be the slave
- 2:13Speaker 1: to my more base urges, I find myself thinking, okay,
- 2:20Speaker 1: so I'd be getting it to make myself look cool,
- 2:25Speaker 1: And is that really a healthy use of time money
- 2:29Speaker 1: and you know that's a good one. I'm not sure,
- 2:32Speaker 1: and so I always end up in the same place.
- 2:34Speaker 1: Although I will tell you so.
- 2:35Speaker 2: Much an extent with some stuff, it's just one degree
- 2:39Speaker 2: removed from just showing somebody your bank statement. Is that
- 2:42Speaker 2: much money I have in my account? I mean, because
- 2:44Speaker 2: the point is this was expensive and I haven't Yeah,
- 2:48Speaker 2: well yeah, partly, Yeah, you're not wrong. I've mentioned several
- 2:55Speaker 2: times that the one thing I've lusted after for years
- 2:58Speaker 2: and have really gone back and worth on spending the
- 3:01Speaker 2: money for is a first edition of Dickens A Christmas Carol.
- 3:08Speaker 2: And because they're available and they're not so prohibitively expensive
- 3:12Speaker 2: as to be insane, it's not like buying a copy
- 3:14Speaker 2: of would you say the Gettysburg Address would be. But
- 3:18Speaker 2: my my beloved daughter Delaney, when she was in England,
- 3:21Speaker 2: she went to the Dickens Museum and got me a
- 3:23Speaker 2: reproduction of the first edition of A Christmas Carol with
- 3:27Speaker 2: all the original art and stuff like that was absolutely
- 3:29Speaker 2: lovely gift and very cool. When I read A Christmas
- 3:32Speaker 2: Carol this Christmas time, as I do every single year,
- 3:35Speaker 2: I will be reading it from that edition, which I'm
- 3:37Speaker 2: excited about. But anyway, so you've got rare copies of
- 3:41Speaker 2: both the CHRISTI right, So is that is that the
- 3:44Speaker 2: one where.
- 3:45Speaker 1: The writing the fucking title.
- 3:47Speaker 2: Yes, that's the one where the burglars break into the
- 3:49Speaker 2: house and the kids parents had gone on vacation.
- 3:51Speaker 1: Yes, that is exactly. And they said the kid sets
- 3:54Speaker 1: up various booby traps. And I've never actually read to
- 3:57Speaker 1: the end, but yeah, that's my understanding of it.
- 4:01Speaker 2: Sorry, too funny not to go along with.
- 4:05Speaker 1: So anyway, you got the the EP and the thirteenth
- 4:10Speaker 1: Amendment on sale in June twenty six. The eighteen sixty
- 4:15Speaker 1: three Probably Proclamation, was originally signed by Lincoln, issued during
- 4:18Speaker 1: the Civil War, declared all enslaved people in Confederate States
- 4:22Speaker 1: would be free. The copy, which was signed a year later,
- 4:25Speaker 1: is estimating to sell for at least three million dollars.
- 4:28Speaker 1: The handwritten Amendment he signed on vellum in eighteen sixty five,
- 4:34Speaker 1: ending slavery nationwide, is expected to sell for at least
- 4:36Speaker 1: eight million dollars price that would triple its auction record,
- 4:43Speaker 1: and the two single sheet papers represent the price priciest
- 4:46Speaker 1: examples of each document to enter the marketplace and should
- 4:50Speaker 1: serve as a major test of collectors' appetites for historic
- 4:53Speaker 1: American artifacts, and they actually get into the market for
- 4:56Speaker 1: this sort of thing, which I found pretty interesting. The
- 5:00Speaker 1: overall art market is in a slump, but this category
- 5:06Speaker 1: has enjoyed an influx of gen X and millennial bidders
- 5:09Speaker 1: ever since. A copy of the Constitution sold a billionaire
- 5:12Speaker 1: Ken Griffin for forty three point two million dollars in
- 5:16Speaker 1: twenty twenty one. Griffin famously outbit a consortium of cryptocurrency
- 5:21Speaker 1: investors to win it.
- 5:23Speaker 2: I have no idea how many original copies of the
- 5:26Speaker 2: Constitution there are. Are there six or sixty, Probably closer
- 5:30Speaker 2: to six than sixty because you had to handle the hold.
- 5:33Speaker 1: They were originally like thirty two. Assume if these numbers
- 5:37Speaker 1: are wrong, and they're far fewer left.
- 5:38Speaker 3: Now Katie, there are only thirteen known surviving original copies.
- 5:44Speaker 2: Okay, good, Yeah.
- 5:45Speaker 1: So aficionados are also getting more enthusiastic as we approach
- 5:50Speaker 1: our two hundred and fiftieth anniversary. But Lincoln is super
- 5:54Speaker 1: super hot within the pantheon of historic signatures. Demand has
- 5:57Speaker 1: fallen off in the past decade for President Thomas Jefferson
- 6:01Speaker 1: and Robert E. Lee, for instance, and remained steady for
- 6:04Speaker 1: George Washington and Ben Franklin. Something from doctor Franklin would
- 6:09Speaker 1: be very very cool.
- 6:11Speaker 2: Yeah, you can't be a guy who's got to sign
- 6:13Speaker 2: Robert a lease something hanging on your wall anymore.
- 6:17Speaker 1: Well, not north of Kentucky anyway. Lincoln has proved to
- 6:21Speaker 1: be the most coveted name in the American rare documents arena.
- 6:24Speaker 2: Lincoln Reign Supreme.
- 6:25Speaker 1: Said this authority from Sothabes. The record so far for
- 6:31Speaker 1: any Lincoln related document is a three point eight million
- 6:34Speaker 1: dollar copy of the Emancipation Proclamation sold to an anonymous
- 6:37Speaker 1: guy in twenty ten. That, oh man, it stood out
- 6:42Speaker 1: in part because it also belonged to Robert F. Kennedy Senior,
- 6:46Speaker 1: who bought it in early nineteen sixty four for ninety
- 6:48Speaker 1: five hundred bucks when he was Attorney General. Oh wow,
- 6:52Speaker 1: now three point eight million.
- 6:54Speaker 2: Don't you have a guitar pick from somebody famous or something?
- 6:57Speaker 2: Keith Richards Keith Richards guitar pack.
- 7:00Speaker 1: Yeah. I also have Jimmy Page's cigarette, but which I
- 7:04Speaker 1: actually grabbed off the front of the stage.
- 7:06Speaker 2: And where do you keep these artifacts? They're in your
- 7:10Speaker 2: pocket right now?
- 7:11Speaker 1: This pocket well, right, they're in a little box in
- 7:13Speaker 1: my music room in my house.
- 7:14Speaker 2: How often do you show them to people? This gets
- 7:15Speaker 2: to our earlier discussion. How often do you open them up?
- 7:18Speaker 2: And look at him? Look at that guitar pick. I'll
- 7:19Speaker 2: be damned, it's this opener.
- 7:22Speaker 1: I think I've shown the guitar pick once or twice
- 7:25Speaker 1: the guitar players in the I forgot I had the
- 7:28Speaker 1: Jimmy Page cigarette button until we just talked about it now.
- 7:31Speaker 1: So it's been twenty years since I've shown it to anybody.
- 7:34Speaker 2: Okay, so you're not getting that much enjoyment out of it.
- 7:36Speaker 1: I'm really not. Of course, Let's keep in mind what
- 7:39Speaker 1: I paid for both of them, nothing and nothing true.
- 7:43Speaker 1: Uh so interesting. Well, here's some more interesting stuff. The
- 7:46Speaker 1: upcoming version of the proclamation has a storied history of
- 7:52Speaker 1: its own. This copy. Lincoln was already embroiled in the
- 7:55Speaker 1: Civil War when he signed the original freeing enslaved People
- 7:59Speaker 1: on jan one, eighteen sixty three. Great quote from Lincoln
- 8:02Speaker 1: at the time quote, I never in my life felt
- 8:05Speaker 1: more certain that I was doing right than I do
- 8:07Speaker 1: in signing this paper. Lincoln and Secretary of State William
- 8:11Speaker 1: Seword later carved up and mortally wounded by the assassin
- 8:17Speaker 1: team that killed Lincoln later signed an additional forty eight
- 8:21Speaker 1: folio broadsides that were sold for ten dollars apiece to
- 8:26Speaker 1: raise funds for the US Sanitary Commission, a private release
- 8:30Speaker 1: relief agency that helped wounded Union soldiers in their families.
- 8:33Speaker 1: So they signed forty eight more of them and sold
- 8:36Speaker 1: them for ten bucks apiece. Lincoln's original handwritten, written manuscript
- 8:41Speaker 1: of the proclamation was lost in the eighteen seventy one
- 8:44Speaker 1: Chicago fire. Oh wow, so the printed copies have become very,
- 8:48Speaker 1: very coveted. Only twenty seven are known to survive. Eighteen
- 8:51Speaker 1: to witch are now tucked away in institutions, and nine
- 8:54Speaker 1: are on the loose. They're privately owned and occasionally come
- 8:56Speaker 1: up for sale.
- 8:57Speaker 2: If you're really famous, so many of your things could
- 8:59Speaker 2: be something that they could be documented. I'm surprised that.
- 9:03Speaker 2: I mean, everything Lincoln had or touched it could be
- 9:06Speaker 2: worth quite a bit of money. His socks, his pants,
- 9:11Speaker 2: his hat, Yeah, his chair is just everything.
- 9:15Speaker 1: Well and famously, back in the day, people would write
- 9:17Speaker 1: letters to Lincoln or Washington or whomever and ask for
- 9:21Speaker 1: a lock of their hair, and they would and they
- 9:25Speaker 1: would accommodate people. If they wrote a nice letter, they
- 9:28Speaker 1: would send them a lock of their hair. It was
- 9:30Speaker 1: really common, and so once in a great while you'll
- 9:33Speaker 1: see what is allegedly Lincoln's hair come up procus. I
- 9:38Speaker 1: remember I was talking about that a few years ago
- 9:40Speaker 1: that I really wanted to buy some Lincoln's.
- 9:42Speaker 2: Hair, Oh, Jeeth, And what would you like? Taped it
- 9:46Speaker 2: to your head and warning around.
- 9:49Speaker 1: Or showing it to friends together with Jimmy Page's cigarette,
- 9:52Speaker 1: but both of which would have to be DNA tested
- 9:56Speaker 1: for authenticity. Although I'm telling you I saw Jimmy smoke
- 9:59Speaker 1: the thing, throw down the cigarette butts, and I just
- 10:01Speaker 1: grab one.
- 10:02Speaker 2: Yeah, the provenance in all of these things is difficult.
- 10:06Speaker 2: Although that means word it came from actually and being
- 10:10Speaker 2: able to document it.
- 10:11Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 10:12Speaker 2: But if but if you believe it it's true, right,
- 10:15Speaker 2: doesn't even make any difference.
- 10:18Speaker 1: Yeah, it's funny. I get all hot to trot thinking
- 10:20Speaker 1: about this stuff, like something really cool from Ben Franklin.
- 10:25Speaker 1: Then I always come back to where we started this discussion.
- 10:28Speaker 1: All right, what would I do with it? You know what?
- 10:31Speaker 1: It's partly an expression of my admiration and love for
- 10:35Speaker 1: Abraham Lincoln, for instance, I would do that. But then okay, then,
- 10:41Speaker 1: but what good does it do me unless I tell people,
- 10:44Speaker 1: and then it's a showing off thing. I don't know.
- 10:46Speaker 1: I'm conflicted. I'm very conflicted.
- 10:48Speaker 2: I would wear Lincoln socks every day if I had them.
- 10:51Speaker 1: I don't think they're probably in wearing shape at this point.
- 10:57Speaker 1: I remember they sold square of the bloody pillow case, right,
- 11:03Speaker 1: if I remember correctly. At one point.
- 11:05Speaker 2: There was some info about that. I was just at
- 11:07Speaker 2: Ford's Theater not that long ago, all right, with my kids,
- 11:10Speaker 2: and there was some info in there. Actually the house
- 11:12Speaker 2: across the street, which I don't think i'd ever been
- 11:14Speaker 2: in before, the house across the street where he actually died.
- 11:17Speaker 1: Yeah, it was. It's Katie. It is a very small room.
- 11:22Speaker 1: It's like under the level of the street. What do
- 11:25Speaker 1: you call that with like there's a skylighting window, as
- 11:27Speaker 1: I recall, But it was very dismal and small and
- 11:32Speaker 1: terrible and just kind of adds to the feeling of
- 11:36Speaker 1: what a miserable waste assassination of Lincoln was.
- 11:40Speaker 2: Wow. Well, and the weird stuff on that thing like that,
- 11:43Speaker 2: you know, a murder like a week later, it's pretty
- 11:47Speaker 2: weird and disgusting to be in the room where somebody
- 11:49Speaker 2: was killed or died. But you wait long enough and
- 11:51Speaker 2: it's you know, everybody's just chattering and taking pictures and talking.
- 11:55Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, has there been I'm sure there have been
- 11:59Speaker 1: multiple great books written about the amount of human suffering
- 12:04Speaker 1: that was caused by the assassination of Lincoln because he
- 12:09Speaker 1: couldn't oversee the early days of reconstruction established his policies.
- 12:14Speaker 2: Yeah, I would read that while I was wearing Lincoln socks.
- 12:16Speaker 2: That's what I would do if I had them.
- 12:18Speaker 1: You know, is there John Wilkes Booth memorabilia. No, you
- 12:24Speaker 1: can get probably not.
- 12:25Speaker 2: That wouldn't be cool.
- 12:27Speaker 1: I would pee on it every day or something, some
- 12:29Speaker 1: expression of hatred.
- 12:30Speaker 2: That's how I that would be normal.
- 12:32Speaker 1: Pe on it. I'd tape on Lincoln's air onto my
- 12:39Speaker 1: head and take my vengeance every day.
- 12:44Speaker 2: You can get Lincoln air for me, can't No, John
- 12:47Speaker 2: Wilkes Booth, you can get his hair. Really, what's I
- 12:49Speaker 2: go for?
- 12:51Speaker 1: Uh?
- 12:52Speaker 3: Thirty one thousand dollars and his wanted poster is also
- 12:57Speaker 3: going for twenty three thousand dollars.
- 13:02Speaker 2: They must be able to They must have a really
- 13:04Speaker 2: good way to authenticate that hair for it to go
- 13:09Speaker 2: for that much money.
- 13:11Speaker 1: Yeah, the poster for twenty three kut put in a
- 13:15Speaker 1: bid for me.
- 13:16Speaker 2: You're considering it, I'm gonna buy.
- 13:18Speaker 1: Then I'll pay it back. Don'try. I'm good, okay, all right,
- 13:20Speaker 1: cool front me what it?
- 13:22Speaker 2: Just still pay it anytime. If you come up short,
- 13:25Speaker 2: you'll sell off your cigarette button. Right. Well, I guess
- 13:30Speaker 2: that's it.