Photos: Courtesy of Bonhams
There was an off-world look to the recent Bonhams annual Space History Sale earlier this month.
The New York scene is a room packed with active bidders as they competed with each other, along with online bidders and buyers listening in via telephone.
Up for sale were 250 lots that documented the space race, space exploration and U.S. missions to the moon, all totaling $1.2 million.
According to Julie Saunders of Bonhams, the top lot of the sale was Alexei Leonov’s 1975 Apollo-Soyuz flown space suit. It sold for $242,000 against a pre-sale estimate of $100,000-$150,000. The spacesuit was sold to a North American bidder.
Other items included The Fédération Aeronautique Internationale certificate confirming Alan Shepard’s suborbital success on May 5, 1961. The document was particularly noteworthy and sold for $9,760 (pre-sale estimate $8,000-$12,000).
Furthermore, Bonhams Space History Sale took place on May 5th, 50 years to the day after Shepard took his 15-minute suborbital hop onboard the Freedom 7 Mercury capsule.
HAM’s neck tag
And there was also a bit of monkey business. HAM, the space chimp’s flown brass neck tag sold for $12,200 against a pre-sale estimate of $2,000-4,000.
Other notable items included Buzz Aldrin’s flown Apollo 11 flight plan sheet. That documentation went for $32,940 (pre-sale estimate $25,000-$35,000), a lunar chart signed by a member of every lunar flight crew for $31,720 (pre-sale estimate $8,000-$12,000) and a set of the most extensive notes recorded while on the Moon for $30,500 (pre-sale estimate $30,000-$40,000).
Bonhams is a privately owned British auction house and one of the world’s oldest and largest auctioneers of fine art and antiques.
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By Leonard David