(bright holiday music) - Welcome to a special holiday edition of Mississippi Antique Showcase.

Please join us as we explore unique Christmas antiques and see what we can learn about these yuletide treasures, family heirlooms, and quirky collectibles, and find out what they might be worth.

- Anywhere from $1,500 to $2,500 - Even with the trim paint splashed on it?

- Hello, we are here at Mississippi Antique Showcase.

And here is Yvonne.

Welcome.

- Thank you.

- Thank you so much for coming tonight.

- Thank you.

- And sharing this interesting piece of of antiques with us.

Tell me a little bit about it.

What do you know about it?

- This is a friend of mine's and I told her that I would bring it and see what it was worth.

She was curious.

It was her grandfather's, Mr. William Irving Hirsch from Pelahatchie.

He was a doctor and went on to be chief of staff at Baptist Hospital in Jackson.

- Oh My.

Okay.

- And he had it on his mantle for over 60 years, and then it went down the line and she, as a granddaughter, inherited it.

- Uh, now did he buy it as an older man or a young man, or what do you know?

- Well, younger if he had it for 60 years.

And he paid $3 for it.

So that was back in the day.

- Well, I think you got a deal, don't you?

- Yes, yes, I do.

- Okay.

Well, I want to show you the back of it for a second.

It's a mantle clock, and it is a beautiful wood, and it's it is a mahogany.

I want to show the back of it 'cause you can see just a little bit about it.

Um, it is the Alamo Clock Company and it's a paper thing and some of it has been broken off through the years, but you can, you can read the Alamo Clock Company on there, and I see that we have the key.

- Mm-hmm.

- And so it, obviously, it runs, - It runs.

It needs to stay level for it to run.

And of course it's been moved to get it here, so it's, it's not right now.

- And of course you have the dial or the whole thing is in place and intact, and it's really a really very attractive one.

I like the, the simplicity of it, you know?

- Mm-hmm.

- I think this is a really cool clock, and I think it's really great that it, it works.

- Right.

- That's a real plus because so many of them we find today don't work, you know?

Um, and so I would like to offer this as a fair market value on the clock.

I think the clock should sell somewhere around $375 to $450.

- Okay.

- And so you can tell your friend that she's got a beautiful piece and we appreciate her sharing it with us here today, and we appreciate your being here.

- Yes, sir.

Thank you.

- Thank you.

- Well, hello and welcome to the Mississippi Antique Showcase Holiday Edition.

Thanks so much for coming.

- Thanks for having me.

- You wanna tell us a little bit about what you brought in today?

- I've got a baseball signed by Mickey Mantle, Roger Maris, Casey Ingle, and really the whole New York Yankees team from, I haven't decided where, somewhere in the 1950s or early 1960s that I've had for 40 years.

- And you have an interesting story about how you acquired the baseball.

You wanna tell the viewers?

- From my roommate.

We had a, he got me into a gold scheme and we bought this baseball, I think, for $600 and basically lost my $600 in the gold scheme.

So he gave me the baseball.

- The best of roommates.

- Best of roommates.

- So essentially - Still best friends.

- You, you bought, bought it for $300, right?

- Pretty much, Yeah.

- And we, we were chatting before, but I, I was trying to count because it's always good to at least kind of know how many signatures.

It was any where between, when I was trying to run it around, 21 to 23.

And so that's kind of right Kind of right where you see that.

But we talked about, what I'm noticing is when I look at this baseball is they're actually ink signatures.

- Right.

- And so sometimes they deemed them, oh, one of these is Clubhouse Signature, and that's really, you know, that adds to the value of the baseball.

- Right.

- So I definitely think this is post 1960, so in the 1960s, but as you and I talked about, it's real hard to determine exactly what year when you study these rosters and look at exactly the team composition.

So really very difficult to pin down the date.

But even, even that aside, tell me how much you think it's worth.

- I've been given a number of $11,000, and that was about three years ago.

And that was his best estimate.

This is a guy that's in the, the industry of, you know, baseball cards and such.

- Right.

So he kind of knows at least.

- Threw a number out there.

- He's probably right on.

I would probably say anywhere between $12,000 and $13,000 now that I've examined the ball.

I would've said before, before I saw the ball anywhere from $8,000 to $12,000.

But I definitely think it's over $10,000.

So, yeah.

It's a great part of history.

It's that American just pastime.

- It's the Yankees.

- It's the Yankees.

- Who are some of the Yankees on the ball?

- You got Ralph Howell, uh Casey Stingle, who was, you know, legendary coach for years.

You know, Roger and Mickey Richardson.

I mean, there's a ton of them.

I mean, there's so many, I've forgotten 'em all.

- Well that's a part of, you were talking about earlier, you actually played baseball at Ole Miss.

- Yep.

- Hoddy Toddy, - Hoddy Toddy.

- At least you got a piece of history there, and we really appreciate you bringing it in.

- Thank you guys so much.

- Absolutely.

- I am standing here with my two new friends, Selena and Glen, and we're just so glad to have y'all.

Thank you so much for coming.

- Thank You for having - Oh, this is so exciting.

This is super exciting.

- Great.

Well, it is fun.

And tell me, I'm gonna ask you a couple of things real quickly.

- Okay.

- How did you acquire this incredibly precious piece right here?

- This belonged to my grandmother.

And when I would visit her, I would get to play with it.

It was a special treat.

And when she passed away in about 2002, this was really the one thing of hers that I wanted because it had such fond memories for me growing up.

So it was my grandmother's and she lived in Hattiesburg.

- Well, you know, one thing that I have always said about antiques is that, you know, it's all about memories, right?

It's, it's all about, I can just almost envision you as a young girl using this as a doll piece with a doll.

- Yes.

- Well, what it really is, is a salesman's sample.

- That is amazing.

- Yes, absolutely.

You know, salesman would go around, you know, you, you couldn't order the way we order things now.

You had to have traveling salesmen to go around to different places, and they couldn't take a huge piece of furniture with them.

- Right.

- So they made samples or what we call a salesman sample a miniature form of exactly what the piece would look like.

So this is really incredible because it's, it's in such good condition.

All of the pulls are, the glass pulls are intact.

And of course, you then have the little piece up here, just like the big piece would be, this would be a chest that would've had a a makeup area or a piece on the top.

Normally, these things swiveled and even on the sample you have it that it is, it is doing that.

It's a walnut piece.

And, uh, it has been varnished.

You know, the sides are incredible because look, they're, they're paneled and they're also pegged.

Right there, you can see, you can see the peg marks.

One thing that I love about it, y'all, and you can see it on your side if you can't see it over here, is the front leg is, it's almost a French bracket foot on it, but the, the back leg is the same thing.

And normally you would've just had a straight line, a straight piece of wood down for the back, but as you can see, they match.

And it just gives a really beautiful angle of what the piece would look like when you approached it from the side.

Now to show you something else, even the back is paneled, which is really cool.

I think it's a great, great piece.

Um, and so I, tell me about, did you play with dolls with it?

- So my memory is that it had toys in the drawers, maybe jewelry, you know, play jewelry.

- Now that you've grown up, - Yes?

- And you don't play with dolls anymore, - No, I don't.

- Okay, Good.

Um, this piece could be very serviceable, and I'll tell you why.

I would have a, I mean, if it were mine and I would put it on a chest on top of another chest and use it as a jewelry box.

- And I have, I have used it for that purpose in the past.

Yeah.

Yes.

- Okay.

Well, what I would say on a piece like this, okay.

Because it is in such good condition, and again, I wanted to show just the sides and how lovely they are.

And the other side matches this side, which is of course understood.

You know, this piece, I think you could, you could value this piece anywhere from $450 to maybe another $100 or so.

- Yeah.

- Depends on what market that you're trying to sell it in.

Uh, I'm, I'm giving you a fair market value for it, pretty much because they are rare and, and they're, they're really precious pieces.

So congratulations.

- Thank you.

I had no idea like what it was.

I had no idea that it was something that a salesman would travel with to show other pieces.

- Absolutely.

- How exciting.

- And that, and that it has its own legacy in that story, don't you think?

- I do think.

I wonder where it's been, all the places it's been, - It's no telling.

- When I appraise these things, I'm aware of what these things bring.

It's just because I've sold it before.

I'm asked to do insurance appraisals.

I'm asked to do all kinds of appraisals other than this Showcase.

And the other appraisers too, they, they're actually appraising from experience At the Showcase, the people that come, I find 'em delightful, talking to 'em.

And they have, they have so much fun and they tell you the wildest stories about some of this stuff, and we just sit and talk to 'em and we pick 'em, you know, and we listen to all the stories that they have to tell, down in Natchez especially, you know, they, all these things that they were telling us down there, they'd go back, you know, 150 years back in their family.

And they were telling me all this stuff about this one piece, this silver goblet, you know, and it goes back in the family all those years.

And the lady had it, and then she was going to give it to her great-granddaughter that was just born and with the same name as, as she had.

And so I thought that's, that was always good.

And things that people should bring.

And it should be an old heirloom, you know, they have in the family and all.

And it may be something they did buy somewhere at, uh, at a yard sale.

But it's, it's really good.

And they knew it was good and they bought it and, and get there and find out they paid $200 for it and, or maybe they bought it at an auction, paid $200 for it.

And it's worth $3000 is always a good story.

And it does matter and it matters when we are selling things here.

If they give us the provenance of it, we put it on the on live auctioneers, we put that provenance.

And it also has a lot to do with the value of it.

And it does affect the price.

I always tell people a good story is better than good merchandise anytime, - Bill.

Kay.

You guys are from Brandon, very close.

And you brought us something pretty cool today and I'm excited to see it.

Can you tell me more about it?

- Well this is an old King James Bible that I inherited from a relative and it's an 1802 Bible over 200 years old.

So I thought I might come here and find a little bit more about it.

- Yeah, absolutely.

So when did you get it?

- Well, I've had it for about 10 years.

And I've done very little research on it, so I don't know a lot about it other than the fact that, of what it says in the Bible, that it has maps from the children of Israel and their travels and several lithographs in there too.

- Right.

So, and it says that somewhere along here, doesn't it?

- It does.

- And let's see, I'll see if I can find it right here.

Tables of scripture, weights, measures, and coins.

Um, six maps, 21 for historical engraving.

So there's more than just text in this, this version.

And then we've got something inscribed at the top.

Can you tell us what that is?

- That is Charles Marsh uh, dated April, 1807.

And this was done by a, uh a person who had this printed and he took subscriptions and it has the names of all the people who had subscribed to get a copy of this Bible.

- And so Charles Marsh got his copy in 1807.

- Right, right.

Mm-hmm.

- From this version, what is copyrighted in October 27th, 1802.

But yes, so this is done "Printed for Matthew Carey, #118 Market Street."

So Matthew Carey was a printer.

He was in Philadelphia.

And we were luckily able to find several Bibles that have come up for sale.

And obviously he did a lot of them.

Now, you know, the Bibles were one of those things that they just printed a mass amount of because almost every home had one, you know, if not every home.

Um, and so they're much more printers than say, you know, a book of that time.

Or something like that.

Um, and they're also very saleable, you know, 'cause everybody wanted one, so they were easy to sell.

And they're printed and let's, let's go back to the front here.

This is pretty, beautiful, you know, so it's in good shape.

We've got the leather here, and then the bindings in very good shape.

A lot of times with these old leather bindings, opening and closing, using them all the time, they just disintegrate, you know, it happens today with leather books.

And then if you kept it somewhere where it was damp or just not climate-controlled, not a climate-controlled room, then it was just not as good condition as say some of the other ones.

But overall, the condition here is pretty excellent.

Um, and, you know, I'm gonna go back to this kind of first page here and then we're gonna flip through some of these, and this is some of the extra stuff that we just referenced.

I'm not gonna open it I on camera 'cause it's in such good shape.

So again, we can see here, you know, very little yellowing to the pages.

Um, it's just in pretty, I mean, almost as good as they come.

Imagine when you're 200 years old, if you look this good, you know, then you're doing something right.

- Yeah.

- But obviously this is stored very well.

It's kept real well.

Do you guys have any idea of the value?

Have you looked into at all?

- No earthly idea.

- Any guesses?

- I've not even tried to research value on it or anything.

- I'd say $1,500.

- $1.500?

Okay.

Well that's close.

There are some with more intricate bindings and stuff like that and that are set in wood that can bring that.

For this specific printer, in these versions here, you're looking at an auction estimate of roughly about $200 to $400.

Um, they bring a hammer price of about $150.

You add in the premium you're at like $225 or higher, $300.

You can expect a retail value of about $500.

- Mm-hmm.

- I would like to thank you guys so much for bringing this down.

- Sure.

- And it was great to see, and you gotta keep it in good shape now so it can last another a hundred years.

Right?

- Yeah.

- We are lucky to be joined today by the infamous Felder Rushing, or as many of you know him as The Gestalt Gardener.

He's in a different element today.

So Felder, thanks for coming in.

- My pleasure.

- Tell us about what you brought today.

- Well, I heard it was a holiday thing.

So the first thing I brought was some of my antique Avon men's perfume bottles, but they're not worth anything.

But I just brought 'em because of the holiday.

But I brought this chair that was given to me by my great aunt who got it at an antique store in New Orleans.

And she took flying lessons from Charles Lindbergh.

You know, she was quirky and she saw something quirky in me.

And when she passed away, she willed this to me when I was a teenager.

The reason it's all beat up is it's gone to college with me.

- So you've used this for quite some time.

- Yeah.

I mean, look how beat up it is.

I've been sitting in this thing for over half a century.

- But that's part of the beauty of antiques is not only, you know, enjoying 'em for what they look like, the aesthetic value, but also being able to use them and get some usability.

So it's okay to have some imperfections.

Cory, why don't you tell me a little bit more about the, the chair.

- Sure.

So we reference this as an oriental accent chair.

And the great thing about it is you said it's used, but that just creates the aesthetic even more.

Um, you notice here it is got vivid dragons on the back and the arms and even the cabrio legs.

And generally these, as we may have discussed before, were somewhere in the 1880s all the way going up to the 1910s.

A lot of these chairs, though, this distinguishes them is the more vivid paint.

So you've got, even though you've used it, the seat for example a lot of that is a, a, a worn off in some of these.

And most of these chairs are just pure black, even on the balls in the dragon's mouth and even the dragon's eyes in particular, you have ivory also on the back here, that's a little bit easier one to see.

You have ivory in there and usually those accents are not present in the other chairs.

Yeah.

So you got something going for you, - Or they weren't made in the chair.

They were just wood.

- That's right.

Exactly.

- Oh, by the way, the green paint, that's trim paint from when I spalshed redoing my house.

So that's not authentic.

- That's your touch to the chair.

- I "Feldered" all it up.

- I figured that was not original.

So as we always say, we have a firm grip of the obvious now for our viewers.

So we appreciate that.

- Yeah.

I mean, I think you saw, as we discussed prior to going on air this type of Asian influence and it's likely Japanese uh, came in once they opened up the trade.

- Yeah, yeah.

- And they turned the phrase Japanism and it had a wide effect around the European countries and Paris.

And so this is a prime example of what the rest of the world, once they lifted their good essentially embargo and now we all get to enjoy this furniture.

And so it's, it's a really beautiful piece.

Do you have any idea what it's worth or maybe what your relative paid for it?

- You know, over the years, I've, you know, I've looked at it on all sorts of antique places and all like that.

And I've seen anywhere from, depending on the condition, anywhere from $500 to $3,000.

But a lot of those are a lot more intricate, even higher, but mm-hmm.

This one usually I see somewhere between $1,000 and $3000.

- Well, Corey will kind of give what he thinks.

Sometimes we disagree.

I mean, I know twins never do that.

But I, I think this chair probably being 19th century, it's very highly carved.

It's still in overall good shape with some of these accents.

I think you may be surprised, but Cory, tell him what you think.

- I think it has an auction, an estimate anywhere from $1,500 to $2,500.

So it's probably, it's following that mark.

You've done your research.

- Even with the trim paint splashed on it?

- Even with the trim paint splashed on it.

it just adds to that aesthetic.

And if the, if you told 'em who the provenance was and who's had it so long, well then the value may be even higher with higher with your name alone.

- But as you know, this is priceless to me.

It's priceless to me.

- So you don't even need to worry about the price.

No, I'm just glad to share it with other folks.

Thank y'all so much.

- Well, thank you for bringing it down event.

- And uh, care for a little cologne?

It's holiday.

- We do have to go out later.

- Those scents are a little musky for me.

But anyway.

- Thank y'all.

Thank you.

- Appreciate it.

- Joni.

- Yes?

- It wouldn't be a Christmas special without a tree, would it?

- I guess not.

- And so what did you bring us today?

- It's an old tinsile tree.

I like to junk on the weekends sometimes.

And so I found an ad.

This guy had one and I went out to his property and he had about, I would say five 18-wheeler trailers out there just full of junk and he knew exactly where it was.

- So I brought it home.

- What'd you pay for it?

- About 50 bucks.

- 50 bucks.

Okay.

So tell me what it's made of, Can you tell me anything about it?

- It's made of aluminum.

I know that they used to sell 'em in department stores for about $15.

They came with the color wheel, which you plug in and as the wheel turns, it lights your tree up.

It's very nostalgic to me because I grew up with one, you know, at my grandmother's house.

- Yeah, absolutely.

Do you use this one?

- I do.

- Does the color wheel work?

- It does.

- It's fantastic.

Well, when I originally saw this, I had never seen one before, so I started doing some research and I looked it up and they surprisingly bring a good bit of money, you know, these days.

Yeah, sometimes.

So retail value on these trees, I see 'em as high as $1,250, $1,300.

- Wow.

- Um, to buy this piecemeal with this piece here and to buy this just the tree without the ornaments, you'd probably be looking at $400 or $500.

- Cool!

- I think you did great.

Did he have any more in those trailers?

- No, not that I know of.

- You weren't gonna go dig through 'em for more trees?

- No, no.

- Well, this is pretty awesome.

And again, it wouldn't be a Christmas special wothout just an awesome tree.

- Well, thanks.

- I hope you enjoy it this Christmas.

- I will.

- Hello.

We are the twin appraisers and we are so excited to be here for MPB's holiday edition of Antique Showcase.

For this segment or a newer segment that we have, the Showcase and Tell, my brother Cory and I have brought in some sentimental vintage Christmas carolers that we use for decoration, and we're looking forward to telling you about them.

Mainly they're sentimental because our grandfather owned a downtown store, a department store for men and boys, in which he displayed these carolers every Christmas.

So we grew up seeing those for Christmas time at the department store.

Cory, why don't you tell 'em a little bit about the carolers and inform the audience a little bit?

- Sure.

Well, as you mentioned, we grew up with them, but they're probably mid 1960s vintage.

They're actually a blow-mold styrofoam or what we call a vacu-cell styrofoam.

And they're not just, we didn't just see these at our own department store.

They're actually pretty common or were back in the time at Hudson's and a few other larger department stores.

So people may be familiar with seeing some of these carolers throughout the years.

I'm glad we've kept onto these because as you can tell, sometimes the styrofoam gets a little worn and, and you can see the paint chipping and obviously depending on how it was displayed, these are actually molded.

So they're actually made in two pieces.

And you can see right here on the line, that's where you can see where they're molded together.

Now these are little worn, too.

It looks like we've had some glue repairs on 'em throughout the years, but that's why they're special to us.

We don't mind those.

Now our mother likes to display them still at Christmas time, so we still get to enjoy these pieces.

- Yeah, she puts 'em at the bottom of the staircase and that's how we decorate Christmas, still to this day, - I'm pretty sure, but it's just cute when you see things like a little treble clef here or the accordion with the middle caroler.

And that's why these are special is because they're not gonna be terrific pieces and they're not gonna be something that you want to display, let's say all the time during Christmas.

But we like them and that's the most important thing that matters.

- So knowing all of that information, why don't you tell the audience a little bit what you think it's worth?

- After my research, it looks like the most recent sale of these exact same carolers and a similar same condition, someone's willing to pay $300 for them.

So if I had to guess, I would believe the estimate value would be somewhere between $300 and $350 based on the market today.

- Hey, that's a lot more than I thought they would be.

- I know.

So we're both surprised.

- Well, at least we continue, can continue to enjoy these for a lot more Christmases ahead.

- I hope.

- Join us next time on Mississippi Antique Showcase and see if you have a hidden treasure in your closet!