E.G. & W. Blunt Company Celestial Globe, ca. 1864
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GUEST:
This is a celestial globe that my parents got from an estate sale in Washington, DC, in about 1952. And after my father passed away, I inherited it.
APPRAISER:
Okay, now, where is the other globe that goes with this?
GUEST:
Well, this was the only one.
APPRAISER:
Okay.
GUEST:
That they had at the house at the time. And I understand they generally come in twos.
APPRAISER:
The terrestrial's what we're looking for, which is the world globe.
GUEST:
Right, right.
APPRAISER:
And do you know who the maker is on this?
GUEST:
I believe it's Blunt Company.
APPRAISER:
Yes, it's sold by E. and G.W. Blunt in New York.
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
And we see this right up in front here. Blunt was a very important territorial mapmaker and globe maker of America in the 19th century. It's very interesting. It says, "Corrections made to 1864." But if we go further around the month charter ring, which is the signs of the Zodiac, we'll see that this was entered in the act of Congress in 1852 by Charles Copley. These globes usually have lots of damage to them. They've been scraped, they've been peeled, they've been dropped over the years. They have a lot of repair. They've been inpainted. And as you can see, we have just a little bit of skinning on this piece. But my favorite part of this here is, we have this wonderful casting on here, which follows up from the charter ring and goes down. We don't see many nice globes here in America. First of all, we were not a wealthy nation that the English were. And so, this came from a very wealthy home at one time. And do you have any idea of its value?
GUEST:
I have no idea at all. I believe my father paid $50 for it.
APPRAISER:
Oh, wonderful.
GUEST:
At the time. He was an astronomer and a physicist, and actually, this was a working globe for him.
APPRAISER:
Well, we believe that this could be, fair-market auction value, between $6,000 to $8,000. If you had the world map...
GUEST:
(chuckles) The other globe.
APPRAISER:
The other globe...
GUEST:
Right.
APPRAISER:
I think we could go somewhere between $15,000 to $20,000, especially if it was in this condition here.
GUEST:
Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER:
We enjoyed you bringing this in today.
GUEST:
Well, thank you very much. I really appreciate getting that information about it.
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