Larry King’s legacy extends beyond the suspenders, Frank Sinatra letters up for auction
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- Four years after his death, Larry King’s personal items, including Frank Sinatra letters, suspenders, and Dodgers memorabilia, are being auctioned by Julien’s Auctions.
- The lot includes a typewriter, which could be the one I saw in what he called his “ego room” when I visited his Beverly Hills home.
- King was deeply concerned about what would happen after he died. Now we know what will happen to at least some of his treasured belongings.
It sometimes happens that when a celebrity dies, some of their stuff — whatever their survivors have not been left or absconded with — might be auctioned off. Objects that famous people have touched are, of course, magic.
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Such a moment has come for Larry King, inquiring reporter, man of TV, radio, print and the internet. A mere four years since he died, age 87, “The Larry King Collection” will be offered to bidders by Julien’s Auctions, which bills itself as “The Auction House to the Stars” on Tuesday. This news struck a chord with me; not only was I a fan, but in 2016, in the course of writing a feature on him, I had actually visited King’s trophy room in his Beverly Hills home, decorated with plaques and statuettes and photographs with the famous. He called it “my ego room. When I’m feeling low I come here.”
It’s too much to say we had a connection, but sometimes you develop a proprietary feeling toward people you write about. I loved his wayward, almost naive approach to conversation — “I ask dumb,” he said — which could produce interesting results that might elude better prepared interviewers. And he couldn’t stop himself from revealing himself in the course of an interview.
King was much concerned with his eventual nonexistence; he would often ask older guests what they thought happened after death, and finding himself unable to believe in an afterlife, sometimes said he’d like to be frozen until the day that whatever killed him could be undone. (He was also surprised to find himself still alive: “I can’t believe I’m 82. When I was a kid, no one was 80. You retired at 65, you died at 67.”) And now it has come to this: His awards and citations, his shirts and suspenders, his shoes and sweaters being sold to the highest bidder.
Julien’s also has a Whitney Houston-themed auction scheduled for Monday and, in September, an event built around skateboarder Tony Hawk’s history-making “900” at the 1999 X Games; the deck is expected to fetch between $500,000 and $700,000. At a recent auction of “The David Lynch Collection,” the director’s espresso machine sold for $45,500, his director’s chair for $95,000, and an incense holder he made himself in 1974 for $52,000. As part of a “Music Icons” auction, an empty beer bottle associated with Elvis Presley sold for $780. It came with a letter of authenticity from the daughter of Presley’s “personal physician,” the infamous George “Dr. Nick” Nichopoulos: “This Coors beer bottle was one that Elvis Presley drank about half the beer out of it and then set it down. It was after a show in the early ’70s backstage at the Las Vegas Hilton Hotel. I the daughter of Dr. Nichopoulos picked it up, finished it.” Elsewhere, a lock of his hair went for $11,700, the better to scrape for DNA.
The dueling litigation is the latest in a string of legal battles that Priscilla and the Presley heirs have been involved in since Elvis died nearly 50 years ago, leaving a financial legacy as messy and fraught as the King’s life.
I wouldn’t expect the King auction to fetch similarly high prices, but you can’t measure a man by what people are willing to pay for his suspenders. As anyone familiar with King would expect, there are items associated with his main man Frank Sinatra (letters, collectible plate, cardboard standee) and the Dodgers, whom he loved both in Brooklyn and L.A. But you might also bid on an invitation from Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne to a 2002 party reaffirming their wedding vows; Al Hirschfeld’s much-reproduced King caricature; and a 1930s Underwood Standard Typewriter No. 5 (“works, needs a new ribbon”), which I am certain is the same one that sat on a coffee table in the trophy room, a gift from then-wife Shawn Southwick (No. 7). “I miss the typewriter,” King told me. “I miss the rotary phone. I still look for phone booths.”
There are cuff links, charge cards, a menorah designed by Salvador Dali, keys to various cities, nesting dolls representing figures from the O.J. Simpson trial — King moved west to cover it, and stayed — and a slew of sports memorabilia: jerseys, bobbleheads, signed bats and baseballs, including one from Pete Rose, inscribed, “I’m sorry I bet on baseball.”
I have my own bit of Larry King memorabilia. After that feature ran, he sent me a note, printed in neat letters, thanking me for “coming by and spending some time with me. How about lunch some time soon?” To my everlasting regret, I didn’t take him up on the invitation. But I still have that card, and it’s not for sale.
