Going Once, Going Twice: A World Still Sold on Camelot
Thirty years later, Camelot still outdraws Skorpios.
On Day Two of the auction of the estate of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis--the woman who was married to the world’s most powerful man, and later to one of its richest--the memorabilia of President Kennedy and his times outsold even the huge, glittering gems that Aristotle Onassis showered on his famous wife.
Audiences and bidders in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago gasped and cheered throughout the day Wednesday, the second day of the four-day event that has so far raised $20.8 million.
The day brought hundreds of high prices and two moments of high drama: when an unidentified European museum bought the 18th-century desk that President Kennedy used to sign the 1963 nuclear test ban treaty (for $1,432,500), and when the founders of Weight Watchers bought, on behalf of an unnamed friend, the 40-carat “Lesotho III” marquise diamond that was Onassis’ engagement ring to the woman he married on his private island of Skorpios in 1968.
The ring, the single costliest lot among more than 1,000 in the auction, brought more than four times its top $600,000 estimate, selling for $2.58 million. But the JFK desk sold for $1.4 million, more than 40 times its highest estimate of $30,000, typical of the eager sentiment that buyers have shown for anything related to the assassinated president and his brief, shining moment on the nation’s stage.
Still, diamonds are forever.
On the crying of Lot 453, the last piece of the day, auction-goers cheered as the ferocious bidding for the diamond ring leaped by six-figure increments to hit a million, and cheered again as it crept to its selling price. “This is your last chance to be part of the mystique,” said John Bloch, the auctioneer and head of Sotheby’s jewelry department. “Don’t be shy.”
Earlier in the day, a 47-carat ring of pink kunzite and diamonds, bought by Kennedy for his wife but never given to her (the rumor swept the Beverly Hills showroom that he was killed before he could), brought an astounding $415,000, or 50 times its highest estimate.
After the shock of huge prices wore off--a set of ordinary wicker baskets fetched $9,200, and the catalog’s cheapest item, a reproduction of an etching of Washington, D.C., valued at $20 to $30, brought $2,070, the Sotheby’s of Beverly Hills audience laughed as much as it cheered.
They listened to Sotheby’s in New York via speaker and watched the screen as a photograph of each lot was shown during the bidding. It was rather like Home Shopping Club, if your home is on Park Avenue or Rodeo Drive.
“The Super Bowl of auctions,” said Lita Colis Cohen, the editor of Maine Antiques Digest, who sat quietly in New York as bids cascaded in by phone and from eager collectors in the audience.
Prices rose faster than California gas prices, astonishing many who had been attracted by Sotheby’s fairly modest catalog estimates, which were based on the actual value of the items without considering their provenance, their ownership by Mrs. Onassis.
The pattern was clear from the first item of the day’s second session, when a slightly dented gold minaudiere evening clutch that Mrs. Onassis carried during the White House years went from zero to 60--$60,000, 20 times its top estimate--in a matter of seconds.
“Oblivious consumption,” said a casually dressed man near the back of the Beverly Hills session, shaking his head, and pretending to tear up his bidding paddle, No. 271, in despair.
“That’s New York money,” said the man behind him.
Much of the second half of the day was devoted to jewelry--including great masses of Greek-designed gold, and wedding and engagement gifts from Onassis to his bride, who became known the world over as “Jackie O.” (The shipping magnate once complained that while his wife spent a fortune on jewels and clothes, he seemed never to see her wearing anything but a T-shirt and jeans.)
After Mrs. Onassis died in 1994, her will directed that her children, Caroline and John Jr., and the John F. Kennedy Library in Boston, could choose from her possessions, then sell the rest. Prices include Sotheby’s commission, which is 15% of the first $50,000 and 10% of anything above that.
In a unique arrangement, Sotheby’s agreed that profits from the sale of catalogs (more than 85,000 have been sold at $90 hardcover and $45 paperback) would go to the children, who will donate the money to charity, allowing a tax deduction.
Among the notable sales:
* Mrs. Onassis’ schoolgirl French textbook, which she ornamented with doodles and sketches of fashion, went for $42,550.
* A small red Morocco leather casket that once belonged to Marie Antoinette, which Mrs. Onassis bought at auction in 1981, sold Wednesday for $118,000, far above the estimated value of $25,000 to $35,000. London antique dealer John Maas, who bought it for an unidentified American client, said: “If you wanted the best provenance of two women in the world, it would be Marie Antoinette and Jackie Kennedy.”
* Mrs. Onassis’ engraved Tiffany silver-cased tape measure was bought Tuesday night by Juan Pablo Molyneux, a New York interior designer, for $48,875; its high estimate was $700.
And for $11,500, former San Diego Mayor Maureen O’Connor snared enough salt-and-pepper shakers to serve as Christmas presents for each of her 13 siblings. “I grew up under Camelot, and my family is a big Democratic family in California, and we feel strongly about the Kennedys,” she said.
With today and Friday yet to go in the auction and $20.8 million already in the bank, the auction could eclipse the 1987 record set by the estate of the Duchess of Windsor, whose husband abdicated his throne to marry her. The Windsor jewels and royal memorabilia brought $50 million.
As an elated Diana Brooks, Sotheby’s president, watched the bids soar, she declared: “It’s not work, it’s pleasure.”
“It shows that Americans are obsessed with fame,” said Allison Schloss, who sat in the New York audience, not as a bidder but “as a spectator sport.”
Before Session Four’s bidding began at 3:15 p.m. in Beverly Hills--6:15 p.m. in New York--Sotheby’s Beverly Hills auctioneer, Hugh Hildesley, did everything but call for “the wave” from his audience. “I think we beat Chicago solid [on Tuesday],” he declared. “I want to do it again. Let’s hear it for L.A!”
When the day’s tally was reckoned Wednesday, L.A. had purchased nine of the day’s 95 lots, while Chicago, city of big shoulders but not quite so big wallets, got five.
A Northern California couple walked off with the pair of red tourmaline and amethyst earrings for $30,000 (estimate $1,000). An unidentified buyer snagged a 1900 Faberge hair ornament for $55,000. Neil Simon’s wife, Diane, bested other bidders for a gold-and-jade brooch.
And Stockton’s Joe Faso, oh-so-casual in Jordache pants amid the Beverly Hills splendor, took time off from supervising his chain of Pick ‘n’ Pull auto wrecking yards to buy an engraved Kennedy cigarette lighter for $20,000 on Tuesday. On Wednesday he bought a jade pendant for $10,000 as a 74th birthday gift for his mother, Norma Moyes.
Faso liked the jade (catalog price $200-$300) because it was simple, and he liked Kennedy because “you felt safe with him president. I liked Reagan too. Other than those two. . . . “
Goldman reported from New York and Morrison from Beverly Hills.
