Latest News Articles by Tom Derbyshire
'Britain’s Fabulous Disc Stars' - early Beatles poster ignites bidding battle
30 May 2017A gig poster advertising as the headline act ‘Britain’s Fabulous Disc Stars!’ sold for £28,000 at the Roger Jones (20% buyer’s premium inc VAT) May 23 auction.
Ooh er as whopper collection of saucy seaside postcards comes up at auction
26 May 2017British summer and bank holiday trips to the coast used to be synonymous with bucket and spade, ice cream stolen by seagulls, greasy fish and chips and… rain. But don’t forget another popular aspect of the golden age of seaside breaks: the saucy postcard.
Gramophones and early records could be sound investments
25 May 2017A long time ago, way before music downloads came onto the scene, the latest technology involved phonographs, graphophones and gramophones. Not to mention the phonautograph, of course.
Auction offers original John Player tobacco adverts artwork
24 May 2017Times change. While tobacco has now assumed a Social Evil status up there with North Korea, not so long ago children would be proudly displayed in an advert clutching a bunch of fags with the words ‘Mummy’s favourite’ underneath.
Unusual Royal Flying Corps relics take off at auction
24 May 2017If Royal Flying Corps medals are out of your price range, or you want to collect something a bit different, two recent lots show that honours are not the only option for auction purchases.
Hokusai The Great Wave at auction and on show at the British Museum
23 May 2017It’s already one of the most famous images in the world, and thanks to a British Museum exhibition opening this week ‘The Great Wave’ is set to thrill an even wider audience.
Winston Churchill's thanks for kippers and other memorabilia up at auction
22 May 2017Certain topics or people are so popular with collectors that they virtually become a market in themselves. Take Sir Winston Churchill for instance.
Soviet WW2 air ace medals soar to £120,000 in London sale
22 May 2017Lot 1234 made it count for London auction house Dix Noonan Webb despite lurking towards the back of an extensive two-day sale.
Roman statues used for Jamaican toga parties now in London auction
16 May 2017Fancy holding ‘Ides of March’ toga parties in your luxury Jamaican villa with original Roman statues dotted around the swimming pool for the authentic touch? American couple Douglas and Diene Cooper made that fantasy reality.
Lord Ashcroft buys Merchant Navy George Cross for Imperial War Museum public display
11 May 2017Lord Ashcroft’s superb collection of medals on public display at the Imperial War Museum in London has grown even larger thanks to a George Cross bought at auction.
Put your feet up on furniture with Billy Connolly comedy value
10 May 2017You would expect a comedian like Billy Connolly to buy furniture as colourful and outrageous as he can be. Now you have the opportunity to buy for yourself some of the migraine-inducing items from his Scottish holiday home.
Writing table helps to look for a Muriel Spark of inspiration
10 May 2017Suffering from writer’s block? Maybe the solution is to feel inspired by those who have gone on to success. Working on your next best-seller using Muriel Spark’s table might help.
Austin pedal cars power to thousands at auctions
09 May 2017For classic car collectors, a genuine ‘barn find’ to restore is the holy grail: a cobwebbed, dust-covered vehicle which has lain undisturbed for many, many years and is calling out for a restoration project.
Berenice Abbott New York photos on sale in same city
08 May 2017The largest group of photographs from Berenice Abbott (1898-1991) to come on the market since the Museum of the City of New York deaccessioned its duplicates in 2002 is offered in Heritage Auctions’ photographs sale on May 18-19.
Family medal group at auction shows how torpedoes transformed naval warfare
05 May 2017The First World War signals the start of ‘modern warfare’ for most military historians. It was when factors such as mass mobilisations, conscription, railways, machine guns, aeroplanes and gas attacks really came into force with devastating results.
Muhammad Ali gloves are latest boxing boost for auctioneer Graham Budd
04 May 2017No offence to Neil Diamond, a highly respected singer, but if you are a 12-year-old boy then memorabilia linked to him is not likely to be top of your present list. Fortunately, the other gift was a pair of boxing gloves owned by Muhammad Ali.
Uncovered documents up at auction reveal more about Bristol slave traders
03 May 2017The uncomfortable but inescapable fact that a lot of Britain’s wealth was based on business fuelled by slavery was underlined recently by the case of Colston Hall in Bristol.
Debut medals sale for new Baldwin’s unit
02 May 2017Networking is far more than a good chinwag. As Baldwin’s of St James’s medal specialist Mark Smith explains, it can also be good business.
Car’s the star in extension tale at Suffolk auction
02 May 2017It wasn’t so much a Road to Damascus moment for Edward Crichton but more the road back to Bury St Edmunds, a car journey that provided the Lacy Scott & Knight auctioneer with much-needed think time.