New Orleans, Hour 3

MARK WALBERG: "Antiques Roadshow" is showing off America's prized possessions in New Orleans.

MAN: She would actually teach doll making.

We had eyeballs in all kinds of drawers and all the body parts laying all over the place.

Oh, my gosh, you're kidding.

♪ ♪ WALBERG: "Antiques Roadshow" knew a dose of the New Orleans Pharmacy Museum was just what the doctor ordered.

Set up like an early 19th-century apothecary, the shelves and cases are packed with everything an ailing patron of the past may have been prescribed for comfort and healing.

From pills and powders to liniments and leeches.

There are even some treatments in the exhibit that were used by practitioners of voodoo.

Back at our event, Roadshow fans need no drug or miracle elixir to feel good about their treasures.

Check out this timekeeper, with a special feature.

WOMAN: Well, it was a gift from my father.

My father grew up in Greenwich, Connecticut.

It was given to him from a neighbor.

His neighbor was a civil engineer, and his neighbor also ran a radio repair shop in his basement, and my dad helped him repair radios.

And he actually told me that this man inspired him to go on to M.I.T., and...

So it's really special.

We know it's a pocket watch, it's 18-karat gold.

It was made by Smith & Son in London.

Okay.

And they were famous watchmakers.

They made watches for the British royalty, they made them for the Admiralty, for the navy.

They were very famous for making chronometers and very accurate timepieces.

They also made watches for the king of Spain.

Oh, okay.

Because it's called the king of Spain watch by my family.

Oh, is that right?

Right, it's written somewhere on it, I think on the inside.

Okay, well, we'll open it up and look at it.

Let's study the face of the watch first.

You have an hour hand, of course, like all watches.

And a minute hand, and a constant running second hand.

But do you know what that little dial is, and that hand is, up there?

I'm not sure, I think it said, "Wind," on it.

It says, "Up-Down."

Wind?

Yeah.

Okay.

That's all I know.

It's called a power reserve indicator or a winding indicator.

And basically it would tell you how much time the watch had left before it would stop ticking so you would know when to wind the watch.

Oh, "Wind."

And I'm just going to give it a quick turn.

As we... ...turn the watch to wind it, watch that hand move.

Do you see it's moving?

Oh, look at that.

Okay.

And so, that winding indicator would turn, and you would know when you wound the watch all the way up.

You'd also know when you'd have to wind the watch again.

It's a very heavy case, 18-karat solid gold.

The case was made by Frederick Thoms, who was a famous English case maker.

Now, the watch has an enamel-porcelain dial, which has a very faint hairline crack, and that was about the only flaw that I could see in it.

But other than that, the watch has a very special feature that I want to show you.

Okay.

When we open up the back of the watch, you'll see here that-- there's the escapement of the watch.

Now, this has a very special type of escapement known as a tourbillion.

And the whole escapement makes one revolution every 60 seconds.

Tourbillions were invented by Breguet, who was really the most famous watchmaker in France.

He was 50 years ahead of everybody else.

Breguet didn't make this actual tourbillion, but this was his invention.

And what it was made for was to counteract the effects of gravity on the watch.

When a watch lays flat, gravity is pulling on it and can affect the timekeeping of it.

And if you turn the watch over, now gravity's pulling on it in another way.

So it was thought that if the escapement was constantly revolving, gravity would never be pulling on it in one particular direction.

And, therefore, it would be of the utmost accuracy.

These escapements are really incredibly rare.

Really?

Now you mentioned the king of Spain watch.

And it's upside-down, but it says, "Maker to the Admiralty," and it's signed by the maker here, Smith & Son, London.

It also says, "His Majesty, the King of Spain," with the royal warrants.

And one other interesting feature on these watches is that it actually spun all the way around here.

Your watch is hallmarked and I dated them.

The case was manufactured in 1904.

I think this case could be as heavy as three ounces of 18-karat gold, which at present gold prices today would put the gold value at over $2,000 and close to $3,000.

Oh, wow, okay.

The power reserve indicator adds a little bit to the value of it.

So a watch like this with a power reserve indicator-- nice, heavy, big English watch, with a normal escapement, would retail for around $4,000 to $5,000.

Wow.

This watch, in the present market, would retail between $40,000 to $50,000.

Oh, my gosh, you're kidding.

No.

Wow, I had no idea.

(laughs) I better be careful with it.

This tourbillion escapement is still rare today.

And it's made for very collectible watches.

Let's take an example of, like, a Patek Philippe wristwatch.

A strapped, Patek Philippe, 18-karat gold, retail price, let's say is around $20,000.

Wow.

That same watch with a tourbillion escapement would retail by Patek Philippe between $200,000 and $250,000.

Oh, wow.

So it's something really wonderful to have and very special.

That's amazing.

Well, I knew it was a special watch, but I didn't know how special.

MAN: I'm a direct descendant of them.

They've been in my family forever.

APPRAISER: When your mother died, you inherited these, was that correct?

Yes, I did.

They were always packed away in boxes.

They've never been displayed.

Wow.

Well, that may explain the great condition that they're in.

They are two remarkable miniature portraits.

They're painted on a little panel of mahogany, and they're painted with oil paints.

Quite frankly, I was astonished to see them today.

These portraits we know were painted about 1840, probably in Georgetown, Kentucky, by an artist named E.S.

Goddard.

We know that because on the back, the owners... signed both of these portraits.

And this is very unusual in itself.

Here we have Henry James Osborne.

And he was born in 1820.

It says, "Taken by E. S. Goddard in 1840."

And we know Osborne was born, and it took me a while to figure out where this was, and that's Coosawhatchie, South Carolina.

Coosawhatchie, I've never heard that before.

So Coosawhatchie is a small town that barely exists today in the coastal plain of South Carolina.

And then here we have Susan Garritt Osborne, born in 1824, and again taken by Goddard in 1841.

And she was born in Georgetown, Kentucky.

So we can speculate that this couple are man and wife, and that the paintings were probably made in Georgetown.

When you look at these paintings, you think they should be really big, larger portraits.

The detail in the background, with the landscape and the sun.

And then the drape, and the glorious morning or late-afternoon sky here and this drape, is just remarkable for these.

They're missing their original frames, and you never saw them with the frames.

Never.

They've never been displayed as long as I've been alive.

I'm sort of stumbling here, because they're just so remarkable.

They're very rare, to see this scale of portrait.

And for Kentucky, they're even rarer.

So I showed them to my fellow colleagues at the folk art table, and we all agreed that a good minimum auction estimate would be $8,000 to $10,000 for the pair.

What?

(laughing): Wow.

Great.

Oh, man.

And I think that there may be some upside on the $10,000 side, because what I can tell you is that regional collectors still like the things that were made in their region.

And there are some very passionate Kentucky collectors.

If I were you, I would probably insure them for $15,000 or $20,000.

Wow.

I've got this print from my mom, and also a brooch.

She bought it at a garage sale, a dollar apiece.

That's fantastic!

And did she buy them here in New Orleans?

Yes, she did.

APPRAISER: Something like this would be in the neighborhood of about $75 to $125.

Yeah, she always called it Tiffany-- I knew it wasn't.

This opal ring is pretty cool.

It's a very watery opal, but with a freeform feeling going in the ring.

It's easy, $400 to $600.

All right?

Okay.

Ka-ching.

All right, but the diamond's about three-quarters of a carat.

It's a European cut.

It's set in black onyx.

It's typical for the period around 1930.

It might be $2,500.

Pretty nice.

Okay, and then you got this piece.

Yes.

If you had to go buy this, it would probably be an easy $500.

Nice, thank you.

Because it is, in fact, gold.

Okay.

Pretty cool.

MAN: This poster came from the New Orleans Pop Festival.

I was on my way down to the festival.

We stopped at a store to get our ice and a few drinks.

It happened to be in the window.

I decided I'd go in and ask about the poster, and the guy said I could have it.

It was held here in New Orleans, at the old Speedway, right?

That's right.

1969, and two weeks after Woodstock.

Great acts there.

We've got The Birds, we've got Canned Heat.

We've got Chicago Transit Authority.

We've got the Grateful Dead there.

And even down here, you have the Night Tripper, Dr. John.

That's right.

How old were you when you went to this festival?

19.

Wow.

I see Janis is on here.

Tell me your impression of Janis.

Almost all these bands were dominated by men, and when she took the stage, it was all about her.

It sounded a lot like she was singing to everybody individually.

Very powerful.

It's actually a super-rare poster.

And I love the imagery on it, with the zeppelins going by with the peace symbols on it.

I did find another one that sold, and it sold for $1,500 at auction.

Well, there's no problem with that.

MAN: I don't know too much about her, but my mom did make and collect porcelain dolls.

And this is one of many that she has of the, I guess, the real antique porcelain dolls that she had.

She would actually teach doll making.

My dad would pour the molds.

We had a kiln in the backyard and eyeballs in all kinds of drawers and all the body parts laying all over the place.

It wasn't really something I was into, you know, being a boy.

A little bit like Frankenstein's studio?

Yeah, it was pretty wild-looking, sometimes, so...

The only thing I can remember was a Bru or something.

I don't even know if this is a Bru, I have no idea, so...

This doll was made by Leon Casimir Bru in 1880.

Ooh, that's pretty old.

So she's definitely antique, and she was made in France.

Okay, it's a French doll, then.

And we call her a circle-dot Bru.

If we look at the back of her, we'll see there is a little circle on the back of her neck.

And he made the finest dolls, and he was very proud of his dolls.

And they were award-winning dolls at the exposition.

And what's really wonderful about your doll is, she has glass paperweight eyes.

If you look at them, they curve out in the front, they bulge.

So it's a more realistic, human feature.

She has beautifully painted eyelashes and mauve eyeshadow.

And she has this sweet little mouth that's just barely open, with a little light space between.

Very labor-intensive doll to make.

Beautifully done, with plump, rosy cheeks.

She's made of bisque, and she has a beautiful bisque shoulder plate.

The socket head goes into the bisque shoulder plate.

And then the shoulder plate is on top of a kid body.

She's got bisque hands.

And your doll has her original mohair wig, which is often gone.

And that's an animal fiber.

And then she has been beautifully re-dressed.

Very period, but was not original to her.

And then she has on antique shoes, but they're not the original shoes.

Okay.

On today's market, she would retail for around $12,000 to $14,000.

Wow, that's a little bit more than I thought she was worth.

So, yeah, that's nice to know.

(chuckles): That's pretty neat.

So, wow, I didn't think they were worth that much, but that's good.

WOMAN: Well, it originally belonged to my parents.

They are both deceased now, and so it is now in my custody.

They called it the brass urn, the bronze urn, depending on the day.

So I don't know whether it's brass or bronze, but it is the urn, so... Where was it in your parents' house?

It was in the foyer on an alabaster plant stand.

So they must have thought something of it.

Yes.

Oh, yes, they loved it.

It's quite an interesting piece.

It has its antecedents in the first millennium BC.

Wow.

In China, where bronzes like this were cast for notable officials, used as wine vessels.

Perfect.

And they always had these serpentine handles.

Now, this piece was made between 1780 and about 1810, basically an homage to this earlier form.

Because in China, the Qianlong emperor, who ruled between 1735 and 1796, was really, really interested in archaic things, particularly bronze shapes.

On top of the bronze itself, these gold splashes that you see on the surface?

Yes.

They call it fire gilding.

It's a process of putting mercury and gold together, and then heating it to a very high temperature where the mercury evaporates, and it leaves these spots on the vessel, which are really a sign of lavish wealth.

The emperor really liked having these things in his house.

This is cast with six Chinese characters that look different, but are all the same character.

And it's the character for long life, called "shou."

And so, you have long life in six forms, in six iterations, on the surface of this vessel.

And then on the underside... ...you have a four-character mark, which basically says that this was made for the Jade Hall, a location in the Imperial City-- in the imperial palace.

Okay.

In the Gugong.

And many, many pieces were made for this.

There's a huge interest in these gold-splashed bronzes.

They usually come in small forms like censers.

But to have a large, and very impressive form like this-- you're looking at auction between $30,000 and $50,000.

Oh, my God.

Well, thank you very much.

This is something that will stay in the family for a long time.

Well, I love that it was a wine vessel, because we love wine.

Long life and wine?

Perfect.

WOMAN: I have from the City of New Orleans Cotton Exchange, it's a map that was given to people when they entered.

Printed on cotton.

Oh, it's printed on cotton?

Mm-hmm.

Unfortunately, Arts and Crafts has kind of declined, value-wise.

And it's our children's fault.

They don't buy this stuff anymore.

I would say, in today's market, this piece is probably worth $200 to $300.

Good, I'm pleased.

APPRAISER: A great design with the dead rabbits on it, is kind of neat.

Which tends to kind of grotesque now-- you would never buy something for your kitchen now that had dead rabbits on it.

In this condition, probably only worth $5 or $10, $20.

In perfect condition, maybe $75 to $100.

Great-looking, though.

WOMAN: Thank you so much, I appreciate it.

WOMAN: This was a piece that has been in my house for over 30 years.

I have a suitcase of a friend of mine, and I tried to get it back to him several times, and he just told me to keep it.

And since then, he passed away.

And my daughter looked in the suitcase, and she found all these pieces.

And this was one of the pieces that we did find.

So do you wear it?

No, I thought it was always too big to wear.

Once I found it, I said, "That's too big to wear."

First of all, it's sterling silver, and it's by an extremely well-known company that's Italian.

Their name is Buccellati.

Now, Buccellati started in 1919, and they were known for fabulous gold pieces, lots of stones, intricate workmanship.

What you have here is the satyr mask pendant.

Okay.

It dates from about 1940s, 1950s.

An auction value is between $800 and $1,000.

Oh, that's a lot.

That makes, that's a lot.

Well, I've had them about ten years.

I bought them in an antiques store, and they were all rolled up into one wad.

This is the first time I've seen them all out at once.

I've always been a hiker, love the outdoors, so by the time I got to Mammoth Cave, that was the third one-- "I'm buying them."

(chuckles) So I rolled them back up, and they've been in the tube for ten years.

And how much did you pay for them?

They were at $30 apiece, $180 for all of them.

Right on.

As is fairly obvious, they are ads for Del Monte canned foods.

And what may not be so obvious to the people watching right now, is that these are actually double-sided images.

Paper that's connected at the top and that was meant for in-store display to drape over a wire or a pole, much like we have it set up now.

And on one side of each is a travel destination in one of America's national parks.

And on the other side is the sort of iconic Del Monte can inside a compass, I think to show that it covered the globe, basically.

And of course one key word to exemplify how good the product was.

During the 1960s and '70s, Del Monte turned to illustrators to help illustrate their posters, as opposed to graphic designers.

And they employed different kinds of illustrators, some who did caricature-like images, some who did cartoon-like images.

These date to the early 1970s.

Oh, really.

Now, these images were designed by an illustrator named Jack Dumas.

He signed each one on the image side of each poster.

And Dumas was an illustrator who did magazine ads, he helped do some promotion for the 1960 Squaw Valley Olympics.

And in this case, obviously, the style is very realistic.

So you have Devil's Tower in Wyoming, you have the Mammoth Cave in Kentucky, you have Niagara Falls in New York.

On the backside of the other three, we have Acadia National Park, we have Half Dome at Yosemite, and we have Old Faithful in Yellowstone.

They're meant to be bold enough to be viewed from a distance.

If you're in the store, you were supposed to see this display and you were supposed to think, "Oh..." They look like real photographs.

"Del Monte peaches, good enough for Half Dome, good enough for me."

So you paid $30 each.

At auction, each one of these posters would sell for about $200 to $250.

Oh, right on.

For a combined total between $1,200 and $1,500.

Very good.

WOMAN: The jewelry was my grandmother's.

She gave it to my father, and before my father died, he gave me a piece every few years.

So I've had it for a long time now.

How did your grandmom acquire the jewelry?

She was a couturier here in New Orleans.

She owned a business.

She did gowns for Mardi Gras, she did debutante gowns, she also did wedding gowns and trousseaux.

And during the Depression, I'm sure it was First and Second World War, when the wealthy people here lost a lot of their finances, she would trade them some of their possessions, because they still, even though they had no money, they wanted their daughters to make the debuts or be in Mardi Gras balls.

So this is where she got the jewelry from, and she had quite a lot of it.

My dad used much of it to support her as she got older, and he kept pieces for me.

And these are the pieces he gave me.

And do you wear any of them?

I sure do.

Well, good.

Well, let me tell you a little about them.

So, first is the ring.

It's a cushion-cut diamond in the center.

By measurement-- because we can't actually take it out and weigh it-- it appears to be somewhere around four carats.

It's set longways in the ring, which is a little bit unusual.

But the stone was cut probably in the 1860s or 1870s.

The stone would have been in something else previous to this ring.

The ring is very classic and typical of the beautiful filigree platinum work done in the 1920s.

It's ornamented with single-cut diamonds all the way around.

Now, the center stone has never been repolished or recut, so it's in its original form.

And there're some small marks and bruises on it.

It has a little bit of body color, as a lot of the stones from the 19th century did.

Next is the bar pin.

Right.

And the bar pin is typical of the 1920s, the Roaring '20s.

It's made out of platinum, it's completely handmade.

The center stone is approximately three carats, and that's what you would call a modern European cut.

So it's much closer to what a new stone today would be-- it's round, and it's symmetric.

And then you've got another four carat or so of smaller diamonds of different sizes, and the setting work is called bead-set.

And all the little openings are all pierced work.

Unfortunately today, pins are probably not the most popular.

Sometimes they'll repurpose them into necklaces and things.

The next item you have is a beautiful platinum watch, made by Bulova.

The bracelet's platinum, and the head is platinum, and it's probably from, say, the 1930s.

It's completely ornamented with diamonds, also.

So all the pieces appear to be made in the United States.

A lot of times, on platinum pieces, you'll see little French hallmarks and things.

These are all unmarked and are just typical of the really nice jewelry that was made up and down, mainly, the East Coast during that 1920s-1930s, time period.

The center ring, because of the quality of the stone, probably would, at a retail setting today, be somewhere in the $25,000 to $27,000 price range.

Wow.

The watch-- unfortunately most women that like watches like this either inherit one for free or already have one.

Like me.

And a lot of younger women don't like manual-wind watches that aren't water-resistant.

But this would probably, because it's platinum and so pretty, be in the $2,500 to $3,000 price range.

And the pin, because it's got a nice three-carat stone in the center, would probably today, at a retail setting, be in around the $16,000 to $18,000 price range.

Wow.

So it's a great group of jewelry, and it's so interesting that it was all traded in barter for clothes in the '20s, '30s, and '40s.

Right-- well, thank you.

This is a sofa that belonged to my grandmother.

Her second husband bought it for her at auction in Natchitoches, Louisiana.

It came out of the "Steel Magnolias" house-- the movie was filmed there.

And she's had it at least 20 years.

You mentioned that it was out of the "Steel Magnolias" house.

What does that mean to you?

The house where Julia Roberts' character lived.

Lived, yeah.

Yes, that's where it was filmed, in that house.

So it belonged to the owners of that house, and they put it up for auction.

Do you know whether this piece actually appeared in that movie?

It was not-- we re-watched it a few days ago.

What do you know about the piece of furniture, specifically?

I researched the label on the bottom, I think it said, "Vander Ley Brothers."

I learned that they closed their doors in 1951, so I'm assuming it's at least that old.

And I learned they did reproduction furniture, and they did all the furniture for "Gone with the Wind."

Correct.

We actually do have a label.

I'm just going to tip this forward a little bit so we can see the label just on the underside.

So we know that this is the Natchez model.

Vander Ley Brothers was indeed a furniture company based in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

They did make furniture for Warner Brothers and are most famous for making furniture for "Gone with the Wind."

In fact, they made a piece incredibly similar to this, which appeared in "Gone with the Wind."

You said they disappeared in 1951.

They were absorbed in 1951 by another, larger company.

In 1923 is when they were founded.

Okay.

But of course, if they're making furniture in the "Gone with the Wind" style, this dates more to the late 1930s, early 1940s.

So that reasonably is where we can date this piece.

Okay.

We'd refer to it as a Victorian Rococo Revival-style double-back settee, which is sort of a mouthful.

So this settee is made of carved mahogany and sort of a velvet-type upholstery.

This is a Rococo Revival revival piece of furniture.

The Rococo Revival was initially sort of Victorian.

This is done in the Belter style of Rococo Revival furniture, which would have been about 1860 or 1870.

So this is really a reproduction of a reproduction.

The market for it isn't great.

Okay.

A piece of furniture like this, if it would come to market, might bring $50 or $100, based on the style itself.

Okay.

What might drive the price a little bit higher is a really passionate group of collectors called Windies.

Windies.

Who collect all things "Gone with the Wind."

Oh, okay.

Because Clark Gable sat in a sofa that looks very like this, in Aunt Pittypat's parlor, might bring $300 or $400 in a current auction.

Okay, great.

This is pyrography.

Oh, I've never heard of that.

What is that?

They take a hot pen, and it puts the design in it.

It's a cool little box, probably worth a couple of hundred dollars.

Okay, that's interesting.

$200 to $300.

That's really interesting.

APPRAISER: The market for this stuff has dropped considerably.

There was a time when a vase like this would sell for $1,200 or $1,500.

And now you're looking at probably maybe $200 or $300.

But it's a beautiful piece of work.

Yeah, it's gorgeous, yeah.

APPRAISER: It's a very desirable regional subject, it's in untouched condition.

So collectors would be interested in a, sort of a WPA-era painting like this at an auction level of about $1,000 to $1,500.

This style of works has experienced a resurgence on the market.

MAN: I brought my great-grandfather's silhouette from when he graduated at West Point.

And this is a cane that was made for him by his men after he was wounded in the Battle of the Wilderness.

Let's start with the cane.

Right here, we've got his name, "Major General George W. Getty," for George Washington Getty.

"Cedar Creek, October 19, 1864."

On the side, we have this little badge here, that's the VI Army Corps badge.

Ah, okay.

George Washington Getty graduates West Point in 1840.

We've got his image here.

He was from Georgetown, Washington, DC.

Here's the artist, dated 1840.

Wonderful silhouette in uniform.

Career military officer, fights through the Mexican War, into the American Civil War.

And at the Wilderness, he's wounded.

But at the Battle of Cedar Creek, General James Ricketts, his corps commander, is wounded.

And George Washington Getty takes command.

So he ends up acting as corps commander for the battle at Cedar Creek.

So this was presented to him because of him taking command of the corps at the Battle of Cedar Creek.

I see.

I would say at auction, for the group, I would put it in the $2,000 to $3,000 range.

Really?

Wow.

WOMAN: My sister was a artist-- or is an artist, actually, still, but at the time, she was living up in northern California.

And she became friends with another artist named David Gilhooly and his wife, Camille.

And he used to come over for dinner, and instead of bringing a bottle of wine or a cheese tray or something, he would bring one of his little pieces of art that he had made.

And I was visiting one time and I thought they were kind of fun.

So she gave me a couple of them.

"So here, I brought you dessert."

Dessert, that's right.

"I brought you "a chocolate-covered frog on top of a cupcake, or a chocolate-covered beaver."

It's so clever.

David Gilhooly is such an interesting character.

He passed away about four years ago.

And he was part of the original California Funk movement.

And he was, in the 1960s, at U.C.

Davis, the assistant to the very, very famous Robert Arneson.

And Robert Arneson was a sculptor and a potter, and along with some others, decided to kind of rebel against what was believed to be the fine art, which was by then very nonrepresentational.

So things that were so abstract for so long and so well-regarded, and so posh, they wanted none of that.

They wanted to go back to figural sculpting, but not just figural sculpting, goofy figural sculpting.

And then, once it was goofy, it became very sophisticated again.

Gilhooly would do things like a lot of food, for example.

And he would adapt food and make it kind of crazy and give it these really bright glazes.

And then he went onto frogs, which always reminds me of "Monty Python," he's got all these little "crunchy frogs!"

And so like this, he would cover them in chocolate sometimes, and other times only with really bright glazes.

So even though these really look like chocolate, they are indeed glazed ceramic.

This Funk movement is this reaction against what has been established.

It's also political, it's also a little bit angry.

So with these frogs or other animals, Gilhooly made a lot of statements.

I would like to show how they're signed, here.

It's a very easy signature to read, it's just scratched in.

And these two are signed the same, and they're dated 1977.

I would think that at auction these would probably have a pre-auction estimate each of about $1,000 to $1,500.

(chuckles) For a chocolate frog, okay.

I think my sister's going to want them back.

This flag comes from Atlanta, downtown headquarters.

It flew there, I know, in the early '70s.

I think they got rid of it around the '80s.

How did you acquire it?

My father worked there doing construction, and they demo'd this room that was, I guess it was a maintenance room.

It had a-- lots of shelves and doors, and it had some lockers.

And he loaded up all the stuff, and about ten years later, I wanted to get a locker for my daughter.

When I pried it open, this was sitting in there.

Wow.

Kind of like buried treasure.

I was, like, "Yeah, it's Coca-Cola flag."

I didn't have a pole big enough to fly it, so I folded it up and shoved it in my closet.

It's been there ever since.

It's great-scale, and you wouldn't have had a flag this big for any other purpose besides a headquarters or a manufacturing plant.

It's not the kind of flag you'd see at the grocery store or your drugstore.

Right.

So look at the quality of it.

It's two-piece construction, we can see here.

And then this is actually sewn, individually sewn and cut out.

We got image on both sides.

And it's just a beautiful flag.

Coke is one of the most iconic American brands, also it's probably one of the most longest-collected brands.

You see collectors back from the early days having early Coke signs, just because it's just a great image.

Now, there are a lot of ways to tell the date based on how the logo changed over the years.

Okay.

And this particular configuration, with the "Enjoy" above, tells us it's post-1969 and of use till the present day.

Size can be tricky for collectors sometimes, because too big can be too big.

This could take up the whole wall.

Condition's overall pretty good for a flag that was flown, even if it has a few little blemishes that can probably be fixed.

So you found it in a locker-- what a great find.

I know, it would have been sitting in there still, probably.

All that said, at auction I would conservatively estimate this at $1,500 to $2,000.

All right.

$1,000 or $2,000, that's good.

It's a beauty.

Thank you, I appreciate it.

MAN: These "Moby-Dicks" originally belonged to my grandfather.

Was given to my mother, and my mother has passed away and since gave them onto me as the oldest surviving son.

They've been in my house now for about 12 years.

So this is the famous Rockwell Kent illustrated edition of "Moby-Dick," published by the Lakeside Press.

How did your grandfather get them?

My grandfather sold the books for Lakeside Press.

He originally started with R.R.

Donnelley, who's the overall publisher, and then worked for Lakeside Press.

And he was good friends with a guy named William Kittridge, who was the supervising producer of this book.

He met the illustrator Rockwell Kent.

The original first edition of "Moby-Dick" was first published in 1851.

It actually came out a month earlier in a two-volume set under the title, "The Whale."

But what we have here today is the first Rockwell Kent illustrated edition of "Moby-Dick," the most famously illustrated edition of "Moby-Dick" of all time, and it was issued in 1930.

And the title page here, but if we can turn the page back to the front flyleaf-- we have an inscription.

That is to my grandfather, William Bowes.

So it's to your grandfather, but it's signed by the illustrator, Rockwell Kent.

By the illustrator, yes.

It's a limited edition that was done in 1,000 copies, but the limited edition wasn't called for to be signed.

So to have Rockwell Kent, the famous woodcut illustrator, sign it, is an extra bonus.

And also, it's a three-volume set-- we've got all three volumes on display here.

But also, here in the center, we have this machine-made aluminum, I believe, slipcase that fits all three books.

And could you tell me about this Rockwell Kent-designed wrapping paper here?

Yes, this is the actual wrapping paper that this aluminum case came in.

Somehow, it was never used for a birthday present or anything else, and it's survived all the way down.

This wrapping paper, I've never seen before, and I have to assume that most people just discarded it and threw it away.

And this whole set, your grandfather took very good care of them, because they're in immaculate condition.

They still have their original glassine dust wrappers on each of the three volumes.

And the aluminum slipcase is in pristine condition, as in the wrapping paper.

It's a bonus to have this set inscribed by the famous illustrator, Rockwell Kent.

This is one of the high points in a masterpiece of machine-age design.

Let me just turn it back to the title page for a moment.

On this side, we have the title page proper, but notice the ghost image that's imprinted onto the other page.

It's the only flaw in the books, really.

And without tissue guards being issued in the books in the first place, there's almost no way to stop that.

The three-volume set, in the original glassines, with the aluminum slipcase and the virtually unheard-of wrapping paper, I think this set at retail would bring between $12,000 to $15,000.

Oh, oh-- good, excellent.

(chuckling) Good-- I can go out for dinner tonight.

(laughing) APPRAISER: So this is late-19th century German earthenware from Munich.

The color's applied by hand.

So it's more interesting than most.

When you start getting into the 20th century, they're really commercial.

APPRAISER: This was the pre-modern way of printing.

It took great skill in manipulating the colors, but also in making sure that the blocks aligned perfectly.

These are all second-tier, third-tier art.

It's perfectly skilled, beautiful work, but mostly things that are going to be valued in the $20 to $50 range.

APPRAISER: Certainly this was a subject that he liked and painted over and over again.

He often painted the 24-by-36 size, so this is kind of his smaller size that he would paint.

And a painting this size and this subject at auction would be about $400 to $600.

Wow, thank you.

MAN: I got this as a kid, as a present from my grandparents.

I thought that I was going to be a budding musician.

I was taking lessons at the time.

And so they were kind enough to give me a present like this, so I enjoyed it.

The guitar's a beauty.

Either you were very careful with it, or you didn't practice very much.

(chuckles): Some of each.

The 335 is an iconic model for Gibson.

It was a guitar that was started in 1958 and is still made up to this day.

There's features about it-- the thinline, hollow body, the archtop construction.

And the biggest thing about it is, it was the first guitar with humbucker pickups in it, in the thinline body.

This one is a '68, I believe.

It has what they call a trapeze tailpiece instead of what they call a stop tailpiece.

This is as nice an example as you will find.

It's just spotless.

I think a retail value of this guitar would be somewhere around $7,500 to $8,000.

Wow.

WOMAN: It was one of my grandfather's objects that he had.

He was a serious collector of all types of art.

And it was at their house in Chicago for as long as I can remember.

APPRAISER: Okay, and have you ever had it appraised before?

I took it one place once, and got a little bit of information about it, but not very much.

Do you recall how much it was valued for at the time?

I believe between 20 and 25.

Okay, so what we have here is a sculpture by Frederick William MacMonnies.

And it is the "Bacchant and Faun."

And it's a 15-and-a-half-inch model of this sculpture.

The original full-size model was exhibited in 1894 at the Paris Salon.

And then after the Paris Salon, it was gifted to a friend of MacMonnies' called Charles McKim, who was an architect in Boston, who in turn donated to the Boston Public Library.

Wow.

And in 1896 it went on display, at the time with great acclaim.

I believe it was in November of 1896.

But shortly after it went on display, the Women's Christian Temperance Union had great issue with it because of her perceived drunken indecency.

And after a short period of display, it was taken down.

Really?

So the gift was withdrawn, and it was donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where it sits today.

Because of all of this uproar in 1896, MacMonnies was able to recast many smaller editions.

It became extremely popular.

MacMonnies from 1896 onwards for about the next ten years cast these in two sizes: in a 32-inch, and just over a 15-inch model.

We have the signature right here, which is "F. MacMonnies," and then the date of 1896.

And then you have the bronze foundry mark as well.

And it was cast in Paris.

You had talked about the value, and now when you say "$20, $25," is that thousand?

Mm-hmm.

Okay.

Now, whether or not that was correct, I have no idea.

When I was researching it and looking for comparable sales results, I found that the price that you had been given was the price for the bigger model.

I see.

We were able to find examples in the 15-and-a-half-inch model.

When they come up for auction, the auction estimates are $3,000 to $5,000.

That doesn't bother me.

I had no intentions of taking her out of the family.

I was just curious to learn more about her.

WOMAN: These are postcards of the Mississippi River flood of 1912.

And I don't know much about the actual flood other than family stories that have been passed down.

Mainly know about that postcard because there's a picture of my great-grandfather's mercantile store.

Okay.

And I was told by family members that he kept the store open 24 hours a day during the flood so that the workers would have a place to sleep and eat.

We were told that he used the countertops for bunkbeds and that he took flooring up and made more bunkbeds in the back, so the people would have places to sleep while they were working.

So your great-grandfather was a big part of the rescue efforts and the assistance following the flood.

Yes.

What stories have come down in the family about the actual flood?

I was told that when it broke, it didn't just immediately flood everything, because it was such a flat area of land, and that it took a long time for the waters to completely cover everything.

So most of the people had time to gather their belongings and their family members and livestock and send them other places.

So, this is the flood, of course, part of the great Mississippi flood.

Right.

Right, this is in Torras, Louisiana.

Yes, yes.

And that was May 1, 1912, was when the levee broke in the front of town.

So, these are real photo postcards.

These are a divided back, and we can see on the back where these were intended to be for correspondence and to be mailed.

Yes.

It appears these were all unused.

These were real photo postcards, and that term relates to the fact that these were an actual photographic image printed on the postcard stock.

Do you know who took the images?

I have no idea.

A professional photographer would typically have their name, either the lower left or lower right, as part of the image.

But, with the real photo postcards, truthfully most of them we see are what we call amateur photography.

But what's great about these is it's highly likely that most of these images have never been seen before.

They were most likely printed in small batches.

and so there's actually only one image here that I saw of it anywhere.

Oh.

really?

Printed.

So, that's what's fascinating.

That's why real photo postcards are so highly collected, and that's why they're so important to historians, too.

Because these, taken right after the flood, showing the rescue efforts, showing the assistance, even showing the government steamer that came into town, is really a fabulous chronicle of some historical images that probably, as I've said, have never been seen before.

You have a total of 31 here.

So, tell me about the captions on the bottom.

All I know is that some family member-- and I'm assuming my great-grandmother or my grandmother, wrote those captions on the bottom.

Because they were familiar with the area.

And people often ask if that hurts or helps the value.

In this case, because these images are about history, it helps tremendously.

Because it gives an account, it gives a caption basically to every image.

Typically, when we find the natural disaster postcards like this, I might see one or two, rarely will I see 31 from the same event.

So, as far as values go-- I have my favorite here, which is the depot.

That one we would expect to sell for $150 to $200 at auction.

Oh, wow.

Moving along to the steamer, that's another one that I would easily expect to sell for $150 to $200 alone at auction.

Whoa.

The value in total for the archive is for between $2,000 to $3,000 at auction.

Oh my goodness.

Well, thank you.

I really didn't think they would have much monetary value other than historically.

WOMAN: Well, I brought a portrait, a study, done by Jamie Wyeth of Andy Warhol.

It was done in 1976 for a show at the Coe Kerr Gallery in New York City.

And you went to the exhibition, to the opening?

I was there, I was there.

And what else did you bring?

Photographs of Andy Warhol, Jamie Wyeth, and the final portraits that they did of each other.

And how many studies were in the exhibition, do you remember?

The study like this, this is number 12-- maybe there were 15?

They were, just, charming little studies that Jamie Wyeth had done.

Right.

And how much did you pay for this?

This was in 1976.

Yeah, I think it was around $5,000.

So, tell me about your friendship with Jamie and Andy.

Well, I became friends with Jamie Wyeth through Fred Woolworth, who was the owner of the Coe Kerr Gallery.

Right.

And Andy Warhol became a friend of mine... actually, we first met when he came to New Orleans and had a show.

And I brought a can of consommé soup and asked if he would sign it.

Oh, good.

And he did.

And he got such a kick out of that, we became friends.

These portraits came about-- it was a very interesting friendship between Warhol and Jamie Wyeth.

And you kind of think of them as complete opposites, but in fact they had quite a nice friendship, and a lot of respect for each other and each other's work.

And they decided they wanted to paint each other's portraits, and then this exhibition came about, which took place in New York and it traveled then to other venues.

The exhibition was in 1976.

They began doing the portraits of each other in 1975.

When Warhol painted Jamie, he made him quite glamorous.

He made him, as he said, "very movie star-ish."

And Jamie's comment about the portrait was that it was really a little bit too glamorous for him, and this was maybe because Warhol had put lipstick on him, and eyeshadow, and it wasn't quite what he maybe would have preferred.

And Warhol was always pretty careful about what kind of images he allowed.

So this was kind of a surprise when people saw it because he was so hyper-realistic, and it showed blemishes on his face, and his hair or wig looked kind of messy.

And so it was a kind of a new way for him to look that people weren't really used to.

So, Jamie had a few interesting comments about painting the oil portrait, which is on the right.

He said that he had to use a ton of white paint because Warhol's skin was so pale.

And he did also depict the blemishes in his skin.

And Warhol could tell that as Jamie was painting him, that he was going to do something like this because he was using the "pimple-colored paint."

Whoa.

(chuckling) Warhol loved Archie, he was very important to him, and he would take him everywhere, even to Studio 54.

So of course he's included Archie here.

This is mixed media.

We have watercolor in the black, but then the white is a gouache or temper paint, which is an opaque, water-based paint.

And you can see it's really built up.

And it's such a great image.

I think if this were offered today, the retail price for this painting, the portrait of Warhol, might be around $75,000.

Wow.

Wow.

This accompanying material which you also brought in is very interesting, but it really doesn't have any market value.

Well, that's wonderful.

WALBERG: You're watching "Antiques Roadshow" WALBERG: And now, it's time for the Roadshow Feedback Booth.

I brought an egg that my father-in-law got when he was christened in 1904.

And I was quite sure it was going to be my golden egg, but it turned out to be a rotten egg.

This very, very valuable rock was appraised at zero, and it's something that my husband picked up in Afghanistan in exchange for a vehicle.

Honey, you should have kept the car.

(laughing) My wife has a print, we found out, from an Austrian artist, limited edition, five to 100.

We found out it's worth about 100 percent what we paid for it.

300.

300 percent.

(laughing) She corrects me all the time.

It was part of my grandmother's estate, and it's something that I got, and my cousin always thought I got something that was really valuable.

So, Barb, if you're watching, if you cut me a check for $250, it's yours.

Anything this can do, this can do better.

My grandfather's top-of-the-line Bolex movie camera is now a $400 paperweight.

We drove down here together to find out how much our crap is worth.

(gasps) I can't say "crap" on PBS!

Crap!

Okay, try again, start over.

Stop, stop this.

What are you doing?

Okay, I'm sorry, I won't say that again, all right.

(playing "When the Saints Go Marching In") Who dat!

WALBERG: I'm Mark Walberg, thanks for watching.

See you next time on "Antiques Roadshow."