Holabird Western Americana Collections will Hold A Timed Online-Only Auction This Weekend, May 11-12

Actual information

Reno, NV, USA, May 7, 2024 -- Capitalizing on the recent success of their timed online auctions – in which rare but lesser expensive items in a multitude of collecting categories come up for bid with a starting price of just ten dollars on every lot in the sale – Holabird Western Americana Collections, LLC will hold such an event on May 11th and 12th, beginning at 8 am Pacific time both auction days. 

The two-day auction will be hosted exclusively on iCollector.com, Holabird’s preferred online bidding platform. Categories will include Western Americana, bottles, ephemera, art, jewelry, mining, numismatics, philatelic and dealer specials. “Get ready for two exciting days packed with an array of remarkable items awaiting new homes,” said company president Fred Holabird. 

Day 1, on May 11th, boasts 785 lots in categories that include art, jewelry, souvenir plates, china, flatware, houseware and décor, advertising, electronic devices, medical and professional equipment, antiques, wood boxes, salvaged items, grocery display, kitchen, pantry, bottles, saloon, gaming, tobacciana, cowboy and Old West, hunting, fishing, sports and photography. 

Other Day 1 categories will feature toys, model railroading, entertainment, Hollywood, theater, music, World’s Fair and Expos, maps, travel, automotive, school yearbooks, diplomas, degrees, education, books, postcards, philatelic, Express and Wells Fargo, general ephemera by locale, NASA and space, Boy Scouts and fraternal organizations, political, militaria and weaponry. 

A Day 1 highlight lot promises to be a Wells Fargo & Co. Express wax seal hand stamp from 1885, brass with a wood handle, about 4 inches long and accompanied by an antique wrought iron carousel-style stamp holder commonly used in post offices of the time (est. $400-$1,000). 

Bottles will be led by a purple embossed Goldfield Bottling Company bottle. G.B.C. operated from 1904-1915, selling to saloons, stores and the public. The bottle should bring $400-$600. Also, a turn-of-the-century collection of medical devices, weighing about 25 pounds and featuring hemostats, a glass syringe and other items, has a pre-sale estimate of $500-$2,000. 

Stone lots will include two specimens from the China Chunlin Collection: a large pink calcite crystal mass, 12 inches by 16 inches on a 10-inch base (est. $400-$900); and a visually arresting sculpture made from the polished roots of a Chinese boxwood tree that had grown around a rock, with a carved eagle (or falcon), measuring 17 inches by 15 inches by 26 inches (est. $400-$600). 

Day 1 art will include a group of two original Far Eastern pieces plus a print, all three beautiful and each one 19 inches by 22 inches, formerly the property of Bell Northrop, an art professor at Columbia University who was a victim of McCarthyism (est. $400-$2,000); and a lovely 1946 framed watercolor of a house in Altadena, Calif., painted by Martin Mondras (est. $300-$500). 

Up for bid will be a playbill broadside advertising the play The Heir at Law, written by George Coleman the Younger in 1797 and performed at the Selwyn Theatre in Boston on Feb. 11, 1869 (est. $500-$800); and a group of 33 mostly pre-1912 real photograph postcards of Eau Claire, Wisconsin, depicting street scenes, landmark buildings, roads, bridges, etc. (est. $50-$2,050). 

A cobalt colored Dazey metal butter churn with working gear drive churn and two wooden lids, 20 ½ inches tall with a cast iron base, made in St. Louis, Missouri, should finish at $300-$500. Also, a lot of about 67 pieces of Blue Willow china, mostly in good condition and most of the pieces showing the Wood & Sons maker’s mark on the bottom, has an estimate of $300-$400. 

Day 2, on Sunday, May 12th, the timed auction will officially conclude with 752 lots of Native Americana, mining collectibles, stocks and bonds, railroadiana and numismatics (coins). 

About 75 correspondences in a binder related to Garnet Gold Mining Company in Montana (circa 1909-1917), including letterheads, receivership and legal proceedings as the company failed, will be sold as one lot (est. $500-$1,500). Also, a softcover copy of the Nevada County Mining Review, published by the Daily Morning Union (Grass Valley, Calif.) in 1905, showing profiles of businesses and residents of Nevada City and Grass Valley as well as photos of various mine operations in the county, with plenty of black and white photos, should rise to $200-$300. 

A circa 1890s map of Champion Mines, a consolidation of two adjoining gold mines in Nevada City, California subsequent to the California Gold Rush, on linen backing, 20 ½ inches by 55 inches, has an estimate of $500-$1,000. Also, a brass ticket stamp die from the Cambridge, Illinois station on the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railway, should gavel for $250-$500. 

Native Americana will feature an elbow type peace pipe bowl made of soapstone, 4 inches by 3 inches, gray in color and shaped in an “L” (est. $400-$600); and an early vintage Caddo pot with a traditional etched hashmark design and a flared lip, from the Arkansas/Texas areas and dating back to approximately 800-1200 A.D. and measuring 5 inches by 5 ½ inches (est. $400-$800). 

Antique and vintage stocks and bonds are hugely popular with collectors. A few examples are as follows: 

- A group of 17 bank stocks, circa 1850-1973, including ones for the 1850 Ostego County Bank (N.Y); the National Bank of Methuen; 1859 Bank of America; Bank of Buchanan County, Mo.; 1892 Atlanta National Bank; American State Bank; etc. (est. $300-$500).

- A Duluth, Huron and Denver Railroad Company bond for $1,000, 6 percent bond, signed by the company president and with a steam train at the station vignette (est. $230-$400).

- Three different 1880s railroad stocks, all with the signature of Collis P. Huntington, one of the “Big Four” founders of the Central Pacific Railroad (one lot, est. $250-$500).

Day 2 stones will feature two nice display specimens of cream-colored scalenohedral (a.k.a. dogtooth) calcite, the outer margins of which have been stained deep reddish brown by the presence of an iron mineral, probably hematite (est. $500-$750); and a collection of four quartz crystals specimens from the Chunlin China collection, the crystals individual (est. $350-$600). 

This is a timed auction, so there will be no live auctioneer or audio/video feed. Folks can bid now, up to the day each session closes. On all three auction days, they will be able to log in to a virtual console and bid live, per normal. Each lot will open with an automatic timer that’s reset with each live bid. Once the bidding stops and the timer runs out, then the next lot is presented. 

Internet bidding will be provided exclusively by iCollector.com. Telephone and absentee bids will also be accepted. Color catalogs are available by calling 1-844-492-2766, or 775-851-1859. 

Anyone owning a collection that might fit into a Holabird Western Americana Collections auction is encouraged to get in touch. The firm travels throughout the U.S., to see and pick up collections. The company has agents all over America and will travel to inspect most collections.