James and Sons First August Auction

An account of the first of James and Sons’ two August auctions.

INTRODUCTION

As I have previously mentioned the presence of a Bank Holiday at a crucial time means that James and Sons are having two auctions in August. The first took place yesterday and is the subject of this post. The second will take place on Wednesday, with setup happening on the Tuesday.

THE GOODS

For this first auction, which took place at our own premises on Norwich Street, Fakenham, the following items were going under the hammer:

Coins – lots 1-300
Stamps – lots 301-400
Postal History – lots 401-550
Cigarette Cards – lots 551-650
Postcards – lots 651-807

These lots would take somewhat in excess of five hours to sell at our usual rate of progress.

THE DAY FROM MY ANGLE

With viewing advertised as starting from 8AM it was necessary for someone to be present from that hour of the morning. My colleague Andrew would be turning up to assist with the IT setup, which left me with a choice of two options:

Get the 6:23 bus and arrive at the shop very early
Get the 7:30 bus and arrive at the shop a bit later than ideal

Being me I preferred the first option, and duly unlocked the shop at 7:20AM. I made a coffee, checked my personal emails, knocked up a poster to explain what was going on (screenshot and link to original below):
800 LOT AUCTION

The originals were A4 sized – Arial Black 64pt in bold for this interested in such matters, and I produced 3 copies, one for a window towards the town centre end of the shop, one for the window at the opposite end and one to go with the regular closed/open sign on the door which was also set to closed. Next up came transferring everything needed for the setup downstairs, and doing as much as could be done at that stage. Then, just as I decided to turn the downstairs lights on and acknowledge my presence to the world in general my colleague arrived and we were able to complete the set up, and I fetched a couple of extra chairs from behind the shop so that we had seating for five room bidders. When the auctioneer arrived I was then able to connect up both the computers we were using for the auction (one is his laptop), switch them on, log in to the correct screens in each (the operator screen on his laptop which we use as that master computer and the auctioneer screen on the other), get the slideshow going on the big screen and precheck audio and video so that even if no one at atgmedia (they are seriously understaffed) managed to do an official check I would know that they were working. At 9AM the auctioneer asked me to make a preliminary announcement in case anyone was already logged on, so I did so. A second announcement at 9:30 was heard by someone at atgmedia who confirmed that audio and video were working. Just after this our first room bidder arrived and I issued him with a bidding card (and later added his details to our client database as a coin buyer) and gave some advice about car parks (although I am a non-driver I am well acquainted with the ways of car parks in Fakenham, and my advice was sound – if he wants to park free then go to Tesco where he could park free for three hours, which as a coin specialist would be enough to see every lot of interest to him go under the hammer, if happy to pay use the car park behind our shop). At 9:50 I closed down the operator screen on the main computer, and relogged in from scratch, a regular precaution that I take. Finally, the time reached 10:00 and the start of…

THE AUCTION

The coins by and large sold well, with several bidders in the room and some action online. The stamps were quiet although some did sell, including a Chinese stamp which went for £85. The postal history also started quiet, but a large number of the later lots sold to an internet bidder. Some of the cigarette cards sold. There were some good sales among the postcards, and others which attracted no interest elsewhere were knocked down to a postcard dealer with whom the auctioneer has a regular arrangement. Each time an item sold to an online bidder whose name I did not recognize I noted their surname, paddle number and area of interest so that whatever else I have time to do in that respect actual bidders will definitely be added to the client database.

The last lot went under the hammer at about 2:30PM, and I then attended to clearing up the IT/ electronic equipment, and as my last work related action of the day sent an email written by the auctioneer to the buyer of postal history regarding some of the earlier lots in that section that he might have missed (he is based in the USA, so the first postal history lots went under the hammer quite early morning his time).

In total those items that did sell had a combined hammer price of just over £3,900 which made it a good day. We wait to see what happens on Wednesday.

PHOTOGRAPHS

I will end with some pictures that relate to this post:

Auction stock full — The whole stock for this auction in one shot

Bulky lots — The bulky lots down on the ground

PH and CC — postal history and cigarette cards

Lot 28 – sold for over double the upper estimate (3 images)

Lot 638 – I thought about bidding on this but decided not to – there is stuff on Wednesday that I want more than I want this.

This is lot 1053, which will be going under the hammer on Wednesday (5 images)

James and Sons’ July Auction

An account of James and Sons’ July auction – 1,500 lots over three days.

INTRODUCTION

On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of this week James and Sons had its July auction. 500 lots went under the hammer on each day.

MONDAY

This first day of the sale featured coins, banknotes, cheques, P&N covers and militaria. There were quiet moments in most categories, but also plenty of stuff sold, some of it doing very well. Here are some pictures from this first day:

Along the way, lot 377, one of the P&N covers, was knocked down to me:

376 — As an ardent user of libraries (King’s Lynn and Fakenham very regularly, Gaywood and Norwich when I am in the locality) this had particular appeal. A worthy addition to my collection.

TUESDAY

With stamps, postal history, a few postcards and first-day covers going under the hammer this was always likely to be the quietest of the three days and it was, although there were a few good sales. Here are some pictures from day 2:

WEDNESDAY

With postcards, cigarette & trade cards, ephemera, books, records and some interesting railwayana this was the day that we expected to go best, and it did. After a quietish start with the postcards, the cigarette and Liebig cards attracted in plenty of online bidders, some of the ephemera did very well, and both the large boxes of railway books found a buyer (someone who I had been in email contact with following a query about the contents of one of the boxes – I take the fact that she bought both boxes full as a definitive judgement as to the adequacy of my response!). I was also relieved because of its weight to see lot 1451 find a buyer. Lot 1379 went to me.

After a few minutes spent making the shop look more like a shop and less like an auction venue and a few more minutes spent consuming my sandwiches I finished up by adding details of those who had actually madce bids to the client database and printing out a complete list of those who had registered to bid online (196 of them on this occasion).

Here are some pictures relating to this third day:

Day3 — Most of the lots going under the hammer on day 3 were in this shot

On the bus home, although exhausted I was still alert enough to accept the opportunity to capture the ruins of Bawsey Abbey when it arose.

CLOSING THOUGHTS

Overall across the three days the total hammer price for sold items was just over £10,000, and while some of these were owned by external vendors, meaning that our gains are limited to the lotting fees, vendors commission and buyers premium, many were from our own stock. At the end of August we will be having auctions at our shop and also at Fakenham Racecourse.

Back to the Present: James and Sons June Auction

An account of James and Sons’ June auction.

INTRODUCTION

Having completed my series of posts about Scotland, I am now returning to the present with an account of James and Sons’ June Auction, which happened earlier this week.

THE AUCTION SCHEDULE

To set the scene for the rest of this post, the auction was arranged to run in two parts. Lots 1-600 went under the hammer at our own premises in central Fakenham on Monday June 26th, while lots 701-1300 were auctioned at Fakenham Racecourse on Wednesday June 28th. The Tuesday was set aside for getting things set up down at the racecourse, since experience had taught us that combining this with a day of auctioning at the shop was not a goer.

MONDAY 26TH – NORWICH STREET

The set up was accomplished fairly straightforwardly, and the sound and video checks went swiftly and easily. The auction got under way with 100 cigarette card lots, then 100 postcard lots, then some general ephemera, some numismatic and philatelic covers and ending with the stamps. The day started quietly, with the cigarette cards attracting very little interest and the postcards not much. It was the numismatic and philatelic covers that provided the only consistent sales of the day.

TUESDAY 27TH – SETUP DAY

We had loaded the first van load of stuff for the racecourse at the end of the previous week, so I headed straight from the bus to the racecourse to help unload that. This done and some stuff unloaded from the boss’s car it was back to the shop to load up the van for the second time. This van load then went to the racecourse without me, as I would be of more use working at the shop than down there. Then one of my colleagues was left alone at the racecourse and so I walked back down there to minimise the period for which this situation continued (the person who could drive the van was going to be at the shop for half an hour at least, and I could walk it in much less time than that). Finally, after a few final things had been brought down to the racecourse I got a lift back to the shop. At the end of the day I locked the shop, handed my key to a colleague who would need it on the morrow and headed home. Here are some pictures from the setup.

I was at the racecourse before my colleague arrived with a key, and this wagtail caught my eye while I was waiting.

Toys1 — We had a lot of toys in this auction.

WEDNESDAY JUNE 28TH –
THE RACECOURSE

This was a very tiring day. It was raining heavily most of the time, including for the entire duration of the walk from Fakenham town centre to the racecourse in the morning.

We had been assured by the racecourse that they now had working wifi, but this proved to be an optimistic assessment and we had to use a wired connection, which dropped out four times in the course of the day (fortunately never for very long).

Pre-auction — This was the scene immediately after I had carried out audio and video checks, as viewed from my seat.

The early lots passed quietly, but then with lot 633 the first tranch of toy lots went under the hammer, and the internet bidders got busy, with three figure prices the rule rather than the exception. The ‘Manod’ steam toys later on also sold spectacularly well. After a few books and related stuff went under the hammer it was time for a few jewellery lots, which also sold well. Then it was into the coins, which started with some proof sets which fetched remarkable prices.

LOT 933: THE BEST LAID PLANS OF
MICE AND MEN GANG AFT AGLEY

When you see the image gallery for this lot you will realise why I had had my sights on it to the exclusion of all else in this auction:

Unfortunately from a personal point of view I had competition, and although I bid up to £40, when that final bid of mine was topped I conceded defeat.

LOT 935: ROMAN STYLE COINS

Although these were not the genuine article I decided that at next to nothing they were worth securing as a tiny consolation for the disappointment of a few moments earlier.

935-a — …which is a combination of this…

935 - obverse — The first of two photos taken this morning.

The coins continued to sell well. After the coins it was time for some militaria. Lot 1051 fetched a good price, and then came lot 1052 fetching the only four figure price of the auction.

1052-a — Both faces of the medal, assembled from the close-ups below.

1052-d — Three images which combined as here show the rim in full detail (important as it is generally the rim that people look at when checking the authenticity of a medal – and this is definitely NOT done with a modern engraving machine – I have seen enough such to know whereof I write!)

1052 composite — This combination of the whole lot and all the close ups was the feature image in an alert sent out to militaria buyers (click the link below to view it in full).

JAMES AUCTION ALERT (Militaria)

The auction finished with 100 miscellaneous lots, which went fairly quietly, although even these attracted some interest. After Monday we had needed Wednesday to be a successful day, and it was.

For us there was still the clearing up to be done, but even that was accomplished sufficiently swiftly that I was able to get the 16:37 bus home. This departed late, but for an acceptable reason – the driver was resolving a situation created by another driver who was guilty of dereliction of duty – he had arrived from Wells, let off passengers, switched his destination to “Sorry Not In Service” and had then dashed off without picking up passengers. Stagecoach track their buses, and identified that this one had been parked up just outside Fakenham, and the rogue driver who by his selfishness had let down about 10 passengers was ordered back into service. This same thing had happened the previous day according to the waiting passengers except that he had got away with it, the passengers getting the later bus.

James and Sons March Auction

An account of James and Sons’ March auction with lots of photographs. Also a brief mention of the theme of my next blog post.

INTRODUCTION

James and Sons’ March auction took place on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of this week, with the first two days taking place at our premises on Norwich Street, while the third took place at Fakenham Racecourse.

DAY 1: LOTS 1-500

I arrived at the shop at 8:30AM, the setup was accomplished with no serious hitches, and the sale got underway at 10AM as planned. The first lots to go under the hammer were coins, and a few of them sold well, with a large internet presence making up for the fact that we had very few people bidding live. After coins came banknotes and related epehmera, including the first Traveller’s Cheques to feature in a James and Sons auction. Here are some pictures of lots in this part of the sale…

Lot 254 (two images – the first Travellers Cheque lot)

255-b — Lot 255 (six images, the other Travellers Cheque lot)

The remaining lots to go under the hammer on day 1 were cigarette cards, Liebig cards and match attack cards. None of these fared especially well. I therefore end this section with a picture of one lot that did sell and will feature in much more detail in my next post…

Lot 369 went to me. My next post on this blog will be about what I shall be referring as Autism Acceptance Month in preference to the older, less expressive and misappropriated (I won’t name the culprits, but if you want a clue think blue jigsaw pieces) Autism Awareness Month, and I shall display these pictures in the context of talking about special interests.

DAY 2: LOTS 501-950

This was in many ways the most stressful of the three days, because in addition to the middle part of the auction it featured the setup at the racecourse to enable people to preview the third day lots in advance. The auction part of the day was very quiet, although there was one brief moment of excitement around lot 696, a Chinese stamp for which I do not have an image (I rarely do stamps these days because they are easy to scan and my time is better spent doing the more difficult imaging).

After the auction part of the day finished I helped with the unloading of items of the racecourse to be set up for the morrow, took some close up photographs of a couple of items that were needed to enable me to answer last minute queries and walked back to the shop (it takes about 15 minutes from the Prince of Wales Suite, the part of the racecourse where we hold our auctions) to edit the images and answer the queries. I also got a small amount of April imaging done before closing time (having arrived early to ensure that I had time to do the IT setup, and given the day that I knew to lie in store for me on the morrow I was not going to burning midnight oil, and when the last of my shop based colleagues finished his day at 3PM and I had seen him out I called it a day myself. Here are some pictures of the lots I was answering 11th hour queries about…

DSCN5315 — The first five of these images relate to lot 1142.

DSCN5320 — The remaining images relates to lot 1117 – a gun stock without the barrel which would have been stored inside it. Both these items sold for good money in the end.

DAY THREE: LOTS 951-1560

In view of the fact that the catalogue advertised viewing at the racecourse from 8AM I decided to get the first bus of the morning to Fakenham, which leaves King’s Lynn at 6:28AM. I was therefore outside the Prince of Wales Suite at about 7:30AM, and had to wait for someone else to arrive with a key to open it up. Still, while waiting I did get this picture:

With the setup accomplished, and knowing that all was working properly I could get some pictures from the venue (the first had actually been taken the day before):

The books at the near end of this shot did exactly as expected (those familiar with my opinions ion the subject of books at auction will have no difficulty working that one out).

Sadly this sledge failed to sell, largely because at the last moment the vendor put a reserve of £55 on it.

After a fairly quiet start to the day the militaria sold well and the toys/ collectors models also fared well. As on the first two days it was the online bidders (who by the end of the auction numbered some 350) who were responsible for most of the action. The auction finished, it remained to dismantle the sale, load the goods up and transport them back to the shop. This was accomplished just quick enough for me to get the 3:35 bus home. The third day more than made up for the comparative quietness of the first two. James and Sons next auction is on April 24, 25 and 26, with all three days happening at our shop on Norwich Street. Here are a few final pictures to conclude.

951 — This was the first lot under the hammer on day 3.

1110 — This lot was the subject of query that led to the taking of a number of extra images (the sale price justified the extra work many times over)

1301 — This was the first of toy/ collector’s model lots.

1458 — This little thing did not make big money (I will be collecting it and paying for both lots that I won when I go back to work on Tuesday).

A Very Successful Three Day Auction

An account of James and Sons auction, which took place on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of this week.

INTRODUCTION

On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of this week James and Sons had its second ever three day auction. This one had the additional twist that two different venues were being used, our own premises in Fakenham on days 1 and 2 and the Maids Head Hotel, Norwich on day 3.

DAY 1: FAKENHAM

I caught the 7:30 bus from Lynn to Fakenham, thus arriving at James and Sons at just before 8:30AM (this bus doubles as a school bus, so follows a more circuitous route from Lynn to Fakenham than the usual X29 route and therefore takes 15 minutes longer to make the journey than a regular bus). Thus I was able to get the setup done in plenty of time, and the auction got underway at the appointed hour of 10AM. On this day stamps, postal history and first day covers were being sold. There were a couple of room bidders, and thankfully large numbers of online bidders (over 250 by the end of day 3). Although there were not many things going for big amounts of money a lot of stuff did sell, and the auction had started well. I have no pictures from day 1 of this auction, but here are some images of items that will be going under the hammer in our March auction, which will be on the 27th, 28th and 29th of that month.

1031-a — These first two pictures of lot 1031 in the March auction, which has an interesting story. This item is a grass sledge, designed and built by a craftsman in Sussex for use on the Downs.

394 — The remaining images here are cigarette cards photographed after day 1 of the auction finished and before I went home.

DAY 2: FAKENHAM

The routine was the same as on day 1, but the items under the hammer were different. This day featured photographs, postcards, a few books, records, ephemera, Liebig cards, cigarette cards, cheques and coin first day covers. For most of the day there was no one present at the venue who was not a James and Sons employee, but the internet was very lively for much of the time. I had two moments of good fortune. The first featured…

LOT 864

Here are the official images of this lot:

My opening bid of £10 was unopposed, and here are the photographs I took this morning showing the entire booklet in all its glory:

About 10 minutes later we got to…

LOT 891

Here is the image gallery for this lot:

My opening bid of £8 again went uncontested, and here is a much more comprehensive set of pictures of this lot…

ttrh — We start with front and back images of the cards in sets of six (the complete set contains 30)

ttrh-b — Then we have close ups of some of the more interesting cards – this one is Richard Trevithick’s Pen-y-Darren (that y is pronounced roughly as a “uh” sound), the first commercially operated steam locomotive ever. Steam engine technology predates this by approximately 1800 years – Heron of Alexandria designed a steam operated device for opening temple doors.

ttrh-d — The most famous of all the very early locos – Stephenson’s rocket.

ttrh-f — This Metropolitan Railway locomotive was designed specifically for operating in tunnels.

ttrh-p — Luxury travel on the Brighton Belle

ttrh-t — I travelled on this stock when I visited Scotland in 1993.

ttrh-u — The only other stock in this set of 30 that I have travelled on, the legendary Intercity 125.

Overall this was a better day than we had expected – there were only a few quiet spots.

DAY 3: NORWICH

The fact that we were in Norwich for the final day of this auction meant that the stuff had to be loaded up to be transported over there, which was done at the end of day 2. It also meant that since I was going to have be in Norwich earlier than I could get there using the X29 that I claimed £5.50 in excess travel expenses as the cost of travelling there on the First Eastern Counties X1 is £11 as opposed to £5.50 if I can use the Stagecoach X29 route.

As intended I left my flat at 5:15AM and was on the 5:30 bus from King’s Lynn to Norwich, arriving at the venue at 7:30. I had my laptop with me because James and Sons were one laptop short (two working machines when we needed three). The setup was just about completed before the first viewers started turning up, and there were no issues of any sort.

Here are some photos from that early period:

dscn3894 — This item sold for a fair amount of money.

dscn3895 — The rostrum – the black machine belongs to my employer, and we ran the operator screen (my responsibility) from it, while the white machine is mine, and we ran the auctioneer screen from that.

dscn3899 — Only a few of these big stamp lots sold, although both helmets found buyers.

dscn3903 — A distant view of the main display area, and visible through the window, the wall of the Cathedral Close.

THE FIRST PART OF THE SALE – COINS & BANKNOTES

There were no headline making prices, but most of these lots sold, some doing very well. We had decided to have a 15 minute break after lot 1,300 (we started the day at lot 1,000). Just before the end of the session we came to some commemorative medallions from the Gigantic Wheel, which was a feature of Earls Court between 1897 and 1906. The first was lot 1,286, which I ignored as being beyond my means. Lot 1287 however, which was only a little inferior in quality was cheaper, and my bid of £10 duly secured it. Here for comparative purposes are first the official images, scanned at 600 dpi and brightened up a bit, and then the two photographs I took today:

1287 — For auction purposes I scan each face and then produce a combined image as well as c,lose ups of each face

ecgw-a — The photographs from earlier today.

ecgw-b — For the record, these medallions are approximately the same size as a Queen Victoria penny.

THE SECOND PART: MILITARIA AND STAMPS

The Militaria sold well. A chess set with German markings achieved barely credible £170. Here is the official image gallery:

Plenty of other things did well as well. The stamps predictably enough did not fare very well, but everything else had done enough that the auction was an unequivocal success.

AFTER THE SALE

I had considered staying on in Norwich to attend a Green Party public meeting at which Richard Murphy would be speaking, but in the end after three demanding days I was too tired to even contemplate not being home until 11PM which is what that would have meant, and so after a visit to Norwich Millennium Library I took the bus home, arriving back in my flat just after 6PM.

James and Sons First Ever Three Day Auction

An illustrated account of James and Sons’ first three day auction.

INTRODUCTION

On Monday, Tuesday and Yesterday my employers staged their first ever three-day auction, all three days of the sale taking place at our shop in Fakenham. This post describes the event.

DAY 1: COINS, BANKNOTES, BANKING EPHEMERA AND MILITARIA

There were a few technical issues early on, and we had to dispense with the live video because it just would not work. However, with close to 200 online bidders (this tally rose past 300 before the end of the auction on Wednesday) signed up before the sale started and a few people there in person it was not long before good things started happening. The first and biggest headline maker was…

LOT 22

This 1863 penny caused an internet dominated bidding battle which finally stopped at £1,200 (the estimate had been £250-300, and the bidding had started around that level). The successful bidder then telephoned in to clarify whether he could return the item if it turned out not to be as expected. This led to a tricky photographic assignment for yours truly. Looking at the pictures below can you see what is unusual about the dating on thkis coin?

coin-2 — I took a photo of the whole coin (for this I needed a larger image than I could get by scanning), and produced from that two full face pictures and two pictures focussing only the date.

THE REST OF THE COINS

Although nothing else approached lot 22 the coins did continue to sell fairly well. I will feature one more lot, which although it did not reach great heights was contested…

LOT 141

This was a Lima Tramways Inauguration token. Two people were interested, myself and an internet bidder. When the online bidder went to £20 over my £18 I conceded defeat (I had decided that I was not going beyond £20 and adhered to that decision). In addition to the obvious public transport connection, there is also a more obscure and tenuous cricket related connection: Lima was also the birthplace of Freddie Brown, who went on Jardine’s 1932-33 ashes tour without being picked for a test match and captained the touring party for the 1950-51 ashes. Here is the image gallery for this lot to commemorate my near miss:

141 — The main image for this lot consists of two 600dpi scans (one of each face) joined together.

141-a — I also keep the individual images so that interested parties can look at each individual face if they so desire.

THE BANKNOTES AND BANKING EPHEMERA

The banknotes fared well, while the experiment with banking ephemera (mainly but not entirely cheques) cannot yet be judged – more of the stuff will be going under the hammer at our next auction.

MILITARIA

The militaria was again largely successful. In a pattern of consistent successes there was one stand out, early in the section. The star of this second half of day one was…

LOT 309

This lot, a Free Polish Airforce pilots badge and RAF Dingley escape whistle with an estimate of £80-95 eventually sold for £320.

FINISHING THE FIRST DAY

After the end of the first day at lot 550 the stuff for that part of the sale had to be moved upstairs and the stuff for day two brought down into the shop. My involvement in this process and the fact the we had finished later than expected meant that I did not get any imaging done before going home.

INTERLUDE – ON IMAGING

This post has featured scanning and photography, so here is a brief guide to myt appraoch to imaging at work:

I scan the following items:

Coins – 600dpi, scan each face, brighten the images (this both improves the clarity of the image, and since I have also adopted the policy of using a white background, effectively eliminates the background) and join the two images together to create the master image). I can image up 20 single coin lots at a time in this way, and the scanner I use works fast even at high resolution.

Stamps – 300-400dpi according to the level of intricacy of the pattern. Small stamps usually have an automatic black background because of the holders that are used. Usually I image these lots four at a time, but occasionally if the stamps are particularly suitably placed in the holders I can do more.

Postcards – 200-300 dpi according to time considerations. When there has been a real hurry on I have got away with scanning postcards at 150dpi, but I do not recommend going this low. The bed of my scanner is big enough for four standard size postcards, and in general if I have more cards than that in a lot I photograph rather than scanning.

Banknotes and related items – 200dpi is usually right for these.

Small ephemera: Any printed item that is A4 or less in size can be scanned. These items can be done at 150dpi.

All items not in the above list are photographed, and for items in the above list the decision to scan is dependent on small size – I do not for example lay out the contents of a huge box of coins on the scanner bed and scan.

DAY 2: POSTCARDS, EPHEMERA, FILM POSTERS, CIGARETTE & LIEBIG CARDS

A slightly fractious start to the day, as it was still not possible to run the video. Also, due to the confusion caused by frantic attempts to find a way to run the video the first couple of lots went under the hammer without audio either.

THE POSTCARDS

There was no danger of any of these not selling because one of our regulars had left a block of bids on all of them, and some ended up going to other people.

EPHEMERA AND FILM POSTERS

These as might be expected were fairly quiet, although even they did not completely bomb – some decorated menus sold reasonably well.

THE CIGARETTE AND LIEBIG CARDS

The big news from these lots was that the majority actually sold. Near the end there was a very minor controversy concerning…

LOT 789

This was the second and last lot ion the catalogue that was of personal interest to me. I opened the bidding at £16, and as I as recording this information an internet bit for the same amount registered. James and Sons policy on the matter is clear – a room bid has privilege over an internet bid. I thus pressed the ‘room’ button on the console to disallow the internet bid. The item was then knocked down at £16. Just in case the unlucky internet bidder is reading this, they would have had to go to £22 to get the item, since I was adhering to the same policy that I had adopted with regard to lot 141 – I was prepared to go to but not beyond £20. As a further point please note that had I secured lot 141 I would not have bid on this item. When I have been through it in detail I will produce a full post about this item, but for the moment here are the official images:

789-a — Close focus on some of the cards.

THE SWAP OVER

The moving of items so that the setup was ready for day 3 was swiftly accomplished, and having done fewer lots and the auction having run more smoothly there was plenty of time for me to finish the day with some…

FEBRUARY IMAGING

The February auction will be another three day affair, but with an extra twist – days 1 and 2 will be at the shop again, but day 3 (A Wednesday again) will be at The Maids Head Hotel in Norwich. Here are some of the images I produced on Tuesday afternoon…

1102 — Please do not draw any conclusions from the fact that I have included images of third Reich coins in this post!

DAY 3: STAMPS, FIRST DAY COVERS AND POSTAL HISTORY

The day started with a wait outside the shop as the colleague who was opening up was delayed, continued with a quick trip to get a replacement strip bulb because one was shining a very ugly shade of pink but the setupo went smoothly, and the auction proceeded with no problems. These lots were not expected to generate bidding fireworks, but a reasonable number of them did actually sell.

There was no immediate need to transfer the stuff, so I was able to do other work, starting with…

SOME HIGH VALUE FEBRUARY IMAGING

These needed to be done first as some would be featuring in the print catalogue…

1043 — This is about the biggest coin lot that could be sensibly scanned.

1265 — I departed from usual policy with banknotes and scanned this one at 600 dpi because it is a very rare item.

After lunch and a quick trip to the stationer for a box of paper I did some more ordinary imaging…

690 — A repeat of my earlier disclaimer re images of stuff from the third Reich.

751 — This whole set of 25 lots of Liebig cards had to be imaged – I have selected a range rather than sharing all 25.

CONCLUSION

James and Sons’ first three day auction was definitely a success. The use of the shop as a venue massively reduces overhead costs, and the fact that we can only seat a few people there is no great disadvantage. February’s auction, on the 20th and 21st at the shop and then the 22nd at the Maids Head Hotel, Norwich will provide an interesting comparison. I end this post with some pictures of the layout on the first two days of the January auction (day 3 did not warrant a picture):

dscn9172 — Most of the lots were laid on or under this table

dscn9173 — The small, high valued stuff such as coins was in this display cabinet.

dscn9176 — Day 2, followed by a couple of close ups (day three was not worth photographing).

Morning Moon and Evening Sun

Two pictures which book end my working day today – enjoy!

INTRODUCTION

I am just back from day two of a three day auction being held by employers (look out for a full post on Thursday sometime) and just to keep things rolling am sharing a couple of pictures from opposite ends of the day.

MORNING MOON

As I was walking from the bus stop at Oak Street in Fakenham to my workplace on Norwich Street I saw an impressive looking moon in what was by then a day time sky. After some editing to bring out the finest points of said moon this was the result:

EVENING SUN

On the bus back I saw an incredible looking sunset which I tried to capture through the window. In real life it was much redder than the picture looks…

The Periodic Table

A post built around Dan Green’s “The Periodic Table in Minutes” and an article that brought things even further up to date.

INTRODUCTION

This is a post that has grown from two distinct roots as you will see. At the end I will be sharing some photographs and other links that have caught my eye.

A BOOK AND AN ARTICLE

I spotted a small format book about the periodic table in the library a few days ago, and duly borrowed it (I have also read and enjoyed Hugh Aldersey-Williams’ Periodic Tales). It proved to be an enjoyable and informative read.

While I was still working out how I might work this book and some ideas the occurred to me from my reading of it into a post I came across this article about the approval of names for the four elements which had previously had placeholder names based on the Latin for their number (113, 115, 117 and 118). This leads to my next section…

NAMES FOR ELEMENTS

The four new names are in ascending atomic number order Nihonium (based on the Japanese name for Japan), Moscovium, Tennessine (for the state of Tennessee) and Oganesson (in honour of physicist Yuri Oganessian), this latter further tilting the list of elements named after people in favour of men. Although a few female mythological characters were honoured in earlier times the number of real life females to feature in the periodic table stands at two – Marie Curie with Curium and Lise Meitner with Meitnerium. There was nearly a third – element 102 was subject to vigorous dispute over its discovery between research teams from Sweden and Russia – the Russians were ultimately given credit for discovering it first, but by way of compensation it was given the name Nobelium chosen by the Swedes as opposed to the Russians preferred name of Joliotium (for Irene Joliot-Curie.

This paucity of females having elements named after them got me thinking about ideas for names for future use if more elements (if you have sensible suggestions in this regard please post them in the comments section) and I came with a few ideas:

Hypatium, in honour of the possessor of the last great brain to be nurtured in the Great Library of Alexandria.
Noetherium, for Emmy Noether, mathematical genius.
Angieron for science writer Natalie Angier.
Reichsine for forensic anthropologist and hugely successful novelist Kathy Reichs.

PHOTOGRAPHS

I given you a lot of text, so now here are some pictures…

dscn7856 — Three pictures from the lumiere shown on Greyfriars tower.

dscn7889 — Christmas lights in Fakenham (three pictures).

LINKS

My first link is to a post by Rob Gorski, who calls himself the Autism Dad. This particular post is about sorting out an issue of one of his sons being bullied.

My next two links are to posts on the blog that twitter legend Rachael Swindon has just started. The first is a challenge to Michael Dugher and Tom Watson. The second is her response to the decision by the Press Gazette to name Laura Kuenssberg political journalist of the year.

I end this section with a link to a piece on The Canary titled “The Transport Secretary just sent a massive f*ck you to exasperated rail commuters up and down the country” which leads nicely on to my final section…

PUBLIC TRANSPORT OF THE FUTURE

The text that appears below comes courtesy of Google translate, which I put to work on a piece from Spanish language website www.circuitodeprueba.com – if you can read Spanish, or would just like to see the piece in its original setting click the image that ends this post.

We are in a boom of artificial intelligence for vehicles and electricity as the main fuel, this is when IBM, a legendary computer manufacturer, wants to board the ship and for that he presented OLLI, the means of transport of the future.

Olli is a bus created solely with 3D printers that has automatic driving and is totally electric. In his brain we find the artificial intelligence system IBM Watson IA and its skeleton bears the mark of Local Motors.

The Olli Smart Bus has a capacity of 12 passengers (seated and stopped) and is currently being tested in the city of Washington DC, soon to reach other cities nearby (Miami, Las Vegas) later, specifically later this year, Begin the tests in Denmark.

IBM Olli public transport of the future 2

James and Sons November Auction

An account of James and Sons’ November auction

INTRODUCTION

James and Sons’ November auction took place yesterday at the Long Bar, Fakenham Racecourse. This post covers both yesterday and the aftermath today.

THE PRELIMINARIES

The setup was accopmplished on Tuesday, with more than a few hints of trouble ahead (see here for more details). There was a heavy frost in evidence when I set forth to catch the 6:28 bus to Fakenham (now that they have reduced the number of morning bus services I cannot get in early enough on an auction day on any other bus). The bus left on time, but only made it as far as Littleport Street (its first outward bound stop if anyone is there) before breaking down. The replacement bus took longer to arrive than it should have, given that the depot is only couple of miles away. This bus did make it to Fakenham, arriving at approximately 7:30, although it had no heating. The Long Bar is, for all its grand title, a wooden hut, and the heater would not work at first. When we did get it to work it pumped out smoke.

The IT setup did work however, and the auction started promptly.

dscn7682 — As well as posters and prints there are jockey’s silks on display at the Long Bar

THE AUCTION ITSELF

The auction started with coins, which fared very well. The coins were followed by banknotes, which sold phenomenally well. Then came the militaria, which was good in parts. After that came some aviation postcards. Lots 350-377 were toys, first toy cars, starting with the ‘Goldfinger’ Aston Martin DB5 in mint condition, and progressing through more toy cars, Hornby, Triang and a few dolls. After that we were into collector’s models – a few boxes of lead soldiers and a large quantity of model aeroplanes, which appropriately enough went sky high.

The stamp lots were patchy, and apart from a few bits of jewellery very little after lot 550 did anything of note, partly because the auctioneer was hurrying through things by that stage. A box of interesting beer mats went to me for £9.

Once the auction was concluded I was able to consume my sandwiches before helping with the clear up. I managed to get the 16:37 bus back, and this time I arrived in King’s Lynn in the same bus I had left Fakenham in! The only problem was the early evening traffic in Lynn (basically from Gaywood to King’s Lynn town centre was gridlocked).

TODAY

My only involvement with the aftermath of the auction was helping to unload to van – while three of my colleagues attended to the invoicing I was imaging some bulky stamp and cigarette card lots for our next auction on December 14, and in the process rendering the kitchen area navigable.

This was lot 268 – the last lot I imaged today.

Lot 478 – can you spot the ‘jewel in the dungheap’?

Overcoming Hurdles For The November Auction

An account of final preparations for James and Sons’ November auction.

INTRODUCTION

James and Sons’ November auction takes place at Fakenham Racecourse tomorrow, which combined with the somewhat stressed preliminaries led to the title of this post.

A CHANGE OF VENUE

Firstly, a miscommunication led to this auction being held in the Long Bar rather than the Prince of Wales Suite. Then when we arrived at the venue with the items for auction (as the picture below shows this was a very full van load) it was in state of disarray.

The next hiccough was the necessity of running a long cable from a building with an internet connection into the Long Bar, which involved stretching it across a bit of road that was due to be used by caravans, but some metal supports of the type more usually used for putting up shelving came in handy to provide a secure guard for that bit of wiring…

Also, the Long Bar has a very antiquated heater, which had clearly not been used in a long time.

I had a picture to take to resolve a query and also located a lot that had not previously been imaged…

46-a — This was the image used to resolve the query.

I also in odd quiet moments got some pictures from the Long Bar, and on the way back to the shop took a few pictures through the open window of the van…

dscn7667 — This horse turned its head at the key moment, so the white flash down the front of its head is not visible here.

BACK AT THE SHOP

Back at the shop I had some big stamp lots for our December auction (on the 14th) to attend to, and was then required to buy some paper (there is a stationer down the road who sells plain A4 at £17 for five reams).

	Thomas on England Just About Hanging…
	amsutcliffebtinterne… on England Just About Hanging…
	A Cornish Christmas… on A Cornish Christmas 1: A Curat…
	Karan on A Cornish Christmas 1: A Curat…
	GP on A Cornish Christmas 1: A Curat…

INTRODUCTION

THE GOODS

THE DAY FROM MY ANGLE

THE AUCTION

PHOTOGRAPHS

INTRODUCTION

MONDAY

TUESDAY

WEDNESDAY

CLOSING THOUGHTS

INTRODUCTION

THE AUCTION SCHEDULE

MONDAY 26TH – NORWICH STREET

TUESDAY 27TH – SETUP DAY

WEDNESDAY JUNE 28TH – THE RACECOURSE

LOT 933: THE BEST LAID PLANS OF MICE AND MEN GANG AFT AGLEY

LOT 935: ROMAN STYLE COINS

INTRODUCTION

DAY 1: LOTS 1-500

DAY 2: LOTS 501-950

DAY THREE: LOTS 951-1560

INTRODUCTION

DAY 1: FAKENHAM

DAY 2: FAKENHAM

LOT 864

LOT 891

DAY 3: NORWICH

THE FIRST PART OF THE SALE – COINS & BANKNOTES

THE SECOND PART: MILITARIA AND STAMPS

AFTER THE SALE

INTRODUCTION

DAY 1: COINS, BANKNOTES, BANKING EPHEMERA AND MILITARIA

LOT 22

THE REST OF THE COINS

LOT 141

THE BANKNOTES AND BANKING EPHEMERA

MILITARIA

LOT 309

FINISHING THE FIRST DAY

INTERLUDE – ON IMAGING

DAY 2: POSTCARDS, EPHEMERA, FILM POSTERS, CIGARETTE & LIEBIG CARDS

THE POSTCARDS

EPHEMERA AND FILM POSTERS

THE CIGARETTE AND LIEBIG CARDS

LOT 789

THE SWAP OVER

FEBRUARY IMAGING

DAY 3: STAMPS, FIRST DAY COVERS AND POSTAL HISTORY

SOME HIGH VALUE FEBRUARY IMAGING

CONCLUSION

INTRODUCTION

MORNING MOON

EVENING SUN

INTRODUCTION

A BOOK AND AN ARTICLE

NAMES FOR ELEMENTS

PHOTOGRAPHS

LINKS

PUBLIC TRANSPORT OF THE FUTURE

INTRODUCTION

THE PRELIMINARIES

THE AUCTION ITSELF

TODAY

INTRODUCTION

A CHANGE OF VENUE

BACK AT THE SHOP

WEDNESDAY JUNE 28TH –
THE RACECOURSE

LOT 933: THE BEST LAID PLANS OF
MICE AND MEN GANG AFT AGLEY