[Runscott]

I once sold a tintype of a baseball player on eBay. The player didn't have a bat, glove or anything else related to baseball, other than the uniform. A year after the sale I discovered what team he played for (his uniform was unique) through an odd accidental circumstance. I contacted the buyer and asked him if he would be interested in selling it. If he had said "no", I planned to give him the new information, but he said "no" with a rude emphasis, so I kept the information to myself, and have done so for fifteen years.

A year or so ago a super-rare item came up at auction. It was an item that was right in my collecting wheel-house - pretty much a 'holy grail'. It was mis-described by a major auction house and I was sure I could get it at a great deal, brag about it for a while, then put it in a safe deposit box. Again, an odd circumstance gave me information about the item that it was very, very unlikely that anyone else would have. Possible, but highly improbable. This was due to the weird esoteric research that I do for my baseball history articles.

Well, another bidder had other ideas. All night we bid - going down to the 30 minute wire each time. We bid the item up to north of $12k (the AH had it predicted at $2K, which would have been right if their description were accurate). Sometime early in the morning I gave up; still, I was dying to talk about the item the morning after the auction, but I felt like it would show up again at auction someday, possibly again misdescribed, and I would have another shot at it. Hasn't happened - in fact; no one ever mentioned the item in any discussion forums. So I've kept my mouth shut, still hoping.

Any other stories like the above?