Memorabilia in Auctions WEAK

[benjulmag]

Originally Posted by Shoeless Moe

Are those 2 collectors still alive?

Just curious why they have had these items in their auctions 3-4 times a year for the past 5 years or so. Seems almost never-ending.

Why not have a big one? and what is their tie to Hakes......almost seems like 50-70% of their auctions are from those collections rest of the stuff is filler.

Richard Merkin passed some years ago. For those who do not know him, he was a respected avant garde artist, so reknown in fact that he appears on the cover of the Beatles Sgt. Pepper album. There are several collectors/dealers I know who bought his baseball paintings, regarding them not only as significant works of art but also as prudent investments. As has been noted, his collecting interest was Negro league baseball, and he possessed arguably the most significant collection in that field. Richard was a very warm person, intensely loyal to his friends. Among his close friends was Ted Hake, founder of Hakes Auctions.

As to why Hakes has been selling his items slowly over the years, I do not know except to comment that if the Merkin estate did not have need for the funds upfront, given the size of the collection compared to the size of the market, selling it in one or two shots would have probably presented the market with more material than it could absorb, thus preventing the estate from maximizing the amount it could potentially receive.

[Shoeless Moe]

very good info thank you.

[Hankphenom]

Originally Posted by benjulmag

Richard Merkin passed some years ago. For those who do not know him, he was a respected avant garde artist, so reknown in fact that he appears on the cover of the Beatles Sgt. Pepper album. There are several collectors/dealers I know who bought his baseball paintings, regarding them not only as significant works of art but also as prudent investments. As has been noted, his collecting interest was Negro league baseball, and he possessed arguably the most significant collection in that field. Richard was a very warm person, intensely loyal to his friends. Among his close friends was Ted Hake, founder of Hakes Auctions.

Larry Ritter of "The Glory of Their Times" fame was also close to Merkin, and told me he loved to rib him about Richard's beautiful rent-control apartment in which he housed his collection and his art studio and for which he was paying peanuts. Merkin finally lost that apartment, and I think he might have started selling off his collection at that point.