Want - Don’t need
Next Monday, Gibson’s Auction House in Melbourne will hold a live Auction of Australian, Maritime & Exploration items. Viewing will be on Friday 20 June, 11am - 5pm & Saturday 21 June, 11am - 5pm. The full catalogue is available HERE but in the meantime here are seven items that caught our eye.
Two paddle steamer captains navigational charts of the Darling River, from Wilcannia to Menindee and Wentworth to Portee (sic), circa 1870-1890
Indian ink on waxed linen or sailcloth, charting the river course, landmarks, hazards and built establishments, wound onto wooden rollers
21 metres long
NOTE
together with a photographic record of one entire chart.
See similar housed in the collection of the Powerhouse Museum, Sydney, Object No. 86/1251
Estimate: A$2,000 - A$3,000
Starting Bid: A$1,800
Two antique iron double fluted whale harpoons, 19th century
both stamped IW to throat
84 and 98cm
Estimate: A$1,200 - A$1,500
Starting Bid: A$1,000
(Not Sure how this snuck into a Maritime Auction but its cool! Ed)
The earliest known surviving manuscript for 'The Thorn Birds', by Colleen McCullough AO, published 1977, together with associated material including the author's personal typewriter
comprising the typewriter upon which Colleen McCullough wrote the novel, three document boxes, one containing an incomplete manuscript including Chapters One to Four (Chapter Five absent), the Chapters Six to Nineteen, the second containing Chapters Three to Twelve, together with a letter from Robert D. Hale (then president of the American Booksellers Association, to Mr Roger W. Strauss III, of the publisher, Harper & Row, New York City, and annotations by Frieda Fishbein, (McCullough's literary agent), and the third box containing numbered and unnumbered pages including headings and pages from Chapters Twenty, Twenty Three and Twenty Five, together with various numbered and unnumbered photocopied pages, annotations throughout
PROVENANCE
Estate of Colleen McCullough
Sotheby's Australia, 30 October 2019, LOT 134
Private Collection
NOTE
'THE THORN BIRDS is a wowser of a novel, meaning, simply when you turn the final page all you can say is "WOW". Colleen has done it again...' (Robert D. Hale to Mr Roger W. Strauss III)
'The Thorn Birds' was only Colleen McCullough's second novel enjoying immediate success, and becoming Australia's best-selling novel; it also soared to become one of the biggest selling novels of all times realising over 30 million copies sold world-wide. Published in over 20 languages the novel, an epic tale chronicling Australian pioneering life through three generations, has never been out of print.
The book was adapted for television in 1983, becoming one of the most highly watched mini-series of all times in America.
Colleen McCullough was awarded a Doctor of Letters by Macquarie University in 1993, and appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia in 1996. In 2000, McCullough received the distinguished literary honour, The Scanno Prize, Italy's equivalent of the The Nobel Prize for Literature, for her monumental historical series, Masters of Rome.
(All works copyright Estate of Colleen McCullough)
Estimate: A$20,000 - A$30,000
Starting Bid: A$18,000
Three Australian red ensign flags, three patriotic textiles and a collection of smaller flags on poles, and two shields
comprising Pretoria Bobs on Union Jack, and two commemorative Coronation textiles for King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra, largest flag made by Thomas Evans, Melbourne
largest flag 350cm x 177cm
second largest flag 310cm x 157cm
Estimate: A$400 - A$600
Current Bid: A$320
An interesting collection of seven Admiralty nautical charts of New Zealand and Hobson's Bay Victoria, circa 1950s
Lampton Harbour and Evans Bay (and Port Nicholson); Castle Point to Cape Palliser; Karamea River to Stephens Island; Auckland Harbour; Hobsons Bay, River Yarra and Melbourne; Hobsons Bay; Hobsons Bay, River Yarra and Melbourne
70 x 105cm approximately
Estimate: A$700 - A$900
Starting Bid: A$500
A desktop Unigraph barometer, thermometer and calendar, 1930s
in chrome and painted black metal
14cm high, 26cm wide
Estimate: A$200 - A$300
Starting Bid: A$160
A finely crafted wooden model of a cruising yacht, mid 20th century
complete with model furniture, rowing boat, chain and anchor, metal fittings on a cradle
35cm high in cradle (without flagpole), 100cm wide, 27cm deep
Estimate: A$300 - A$500
Current Bid: A$300
Register to bid HERE