♪ ♪ NARRATOR: Major funding is provided by Alex Cooper Auctioneers, appraisers and auctioneers of fine art, jewelry, and collectibles.

Online and in-person gallery auctions every month.

Serving buyers and sellers in Maryland and around the world for over 100 years.

♪ ♪ Second Story Books, celebrating 50 years of dedicated book selling.

CHRISTINE APOSTOLOU: Coming up on "Chesapeake Collectibles."

ED MORENO: What wonderful object did you bring today to "Chesapeake Collectibles?"

ROSS KELBAUGH: This grouping that you have brought in today is one of the most exciting groups that I have seen.

KATHLEEN HAMILL: Baltimore Glass Man was really drawn to the glass and the glitter for like the light and the spirit that he sort of found in that.

LINDSAY LUKEHART: We have Lady Germania, similar to Lady Liberty, and she's supposed to represent kind of loyalty, power, strength within Germany.

CHRISTINE: Your eye is superb because you have chosen a lovely example of Art Nouveau.

♪ (theme music playing) ♪ ♪ ♪ ROSS: This grouping that you have brought in today is one of the most exciting groups that I have seen, not only for this season, but for many of the seasons.

So could you tell me what'd you bring in for us today?

GUEST: What I brought in is a group that's related to a tail gunner on a B-17 in the Eighth Air Force.

So what brought my attention to it was this little badge here.

It is the Late Arrivals Club.

It's also known as the wing boot or the flying boot, and it was originated in Africa with the British troops.

And if a man went down with his plane or bailed out of a plane behind enemy lines and made his way back to his unit, he was awarded this.

American troops got over there in 1943, and they sort of adopted this also, and they became bullion.

Originally, they were cast silver.

And they were not allowed to wear them on their uniform because it wasn't a piece of official American insignia, so they would hide them under the lapels of their poc... or behind the lapels, or under their pocket flaps.

Um, so this was awarded to tail gunner Staff Sergeant James King.

He was on a B-17 named Moonbeam McSwine, flying out of Chelveston, England.

He was on a raid to go to Watten, France, to take out V rocket factories.

Just short of his, his target, the plane was hit.

The Moonbeam McSwine was hit in the left side.

A second round of flak hit the, the first and second engines.

Uh, some of the crew was able to bail out.

The pilot went down with the ship.

Sergeant King hit the ground with six of his other crewmates.

Five of them were taken prisoner right away.

He was able to escape and evade capture because he landed on the other side of a hedgerow.

ROSS: Hmm.

GUEST: He scurried to a haystack and hid there.

As night fell, he was able to come out and, in the ensuing days, make his way across France.

He was hooked up with the Shelburne Escape Line, which was, I guess, an underground French group that, that helped him to escape and evade capture.

Eventually, he was put in touch with Operation Bonaparte.

It was gunboats that were picking up airmen on the beaches of France and then taking them back to England.

He was repatriated with his unit.

Eventually, he was offered an opportunity for another assignment in England.

He chose to go home.

When he got back home, he went to the 328th Army Air Base unit, which was in Gulfport, Mississippi, and there he continued to train replacements for the rest of the war.

ROSS: Now, how did you acquire this material?

GUEST: So this was online, and these first two pieces, and I reached out to the family.

They had all this other insignia, but most importantly, some of these fake documents that were created to assist him in his evading capture.

And we have photographs over there of the planes.

There's before it took off.

There was another one in flight that was snapped just seconds before that plane was hit and went down by a famous photographer named Dan McGovern, and that's recorded in a book that was written about him.

But I was able to bring it all together, and it's quite a story, and it gets more interesting as I find out more and more about it.

ROSS: Well, amongst the group that you brought in, part of which just completely stunned me to be able to see for the first time, documents that I have seen reproduced in books that I thought I'd never have the opportunity to be able to see the originals, and this would be these documents over on this side.

These were identity papers.

Everybody under the thumb of the Third Reich had to have identity papers.

These identity papers were, are fake.

They were created by the French Underground, and they had to be made so well that they would be able to pass because you wanted to save the lives of the people who were carrying them.

Something that can be easy to forget is the price that the people who made these documents could have paid for helping these pilots to be able to escape.

They would have been arrested.

They would have been unmercifully tortured to reveal the names of people who were involved in the French Underground, and then they would've been murdered.

That was the risk that they and the others along the route that helped him to be able to escape faced over and over and over again for all of the British and the American airmen that they helped to be able to escape.

Have you ever had any of this ever appraised?

GUEST: I have not had it appraised.

ROSS: Well, it's just such an incredible group, and it's just part of a large number of other material that you have that all goes with him, and you have a letter from his wife describing his experiences even after the war.

And didn't he have some trouble after the war?

Did he have some post-trauma war?

GUEST: He did have some post-traumas described in the letter.

The letter was a draft that was, I think, being written to the VA Administration when he was on his deathbed, basically, at a VA hospital.

And she described how, I guess, he was suffering from post-traumatic stress syndrome.

Maybe this was before it was actually diagnosed, and she was appealing for benefits for him.

But she described it that the effects of the war sometimes made it difficult for him to stay at a job for long periods of time.

He would sometimes just, I know, abandon is a strong word, but for lack of another word, he would abandon his family for long periods of time, and she attributed it to his effects of war.

And obviously, family stuck by him throughout his lifetime and... But just a horrible testament to what he went through and... ROSS: It's hard to imagine, uh, really.

I, I, I have been on a B-24, and rode on it, and the tail gunner, they said, "Well, you can go ahead and get, get into the tail if you want."

Realized this was a young man's game, because I realized if I got in there, I didn't know if I was going to be able to get out easily.

Well, this such an impressive group.

As I say, particularly the papers.

I've seen the papers reproduced in books, but never, ever seen the original forgeries.

Just, just incredible to be able to see them.

I would put a minimum valuation on this group of everything that you have of at least $10,000.

GUEST: Oh, my goodness.

ROSS: And I think it could very well go, being able to tell the whole story, go more than that.

So it is such an incredible group.

I know all our viewer, viewership, will enjoy being able to see what this man's life was and hear about what his life was about and his artifacts.

And I want to thank you for bringing it in to help tell his story.

GUEST: I, I am staggered by that appraisal, but I'm so glad to be able to share it and be a steward for the next generation to see this, the story preserved, and this is just one of thousands.

(cash register bell).

♪ ♪ ED: Good afternoon, what wonderful object did you bring today to "Chesapeake Collectibles?"

GUEST: Uh, well, thank you for having me.

This is a silver creamer from a tea set that belonged to my fifth great-grandparents, Norman Bruce Boyle and Susannah Gardner Key.

It was handed down to me by my mother, Elizabeth Manadier Scott Boyle.

And it has been in the family since, since my fifth great-grandparents.

ED: And where were they?

Where did they, did they live here in, in Maryland, or... GUEST: They did, yeah.

They lived in, in Frederick County.

My grandfather, my great-grandfather came from Scotland, and... ED: Ah.

GUEST: ...my fifth grandmother was born in southern Maryland.

They got married in the 1600s.

They built a house outside of Frederick.

The house is still standing.

ED: Oh, good.

GUEST: Yeah, it's... ED: Have you been inside of it?

GUEST: I have; I've toured it twice.

ED: Good, very nice.

GUEST: The name of the house is Myrtle Hill.

ED: Uh-huh.

GUEST: I know all of the ancestors that have owned this tea... ED: Owned this piece, yeah.

GUEST: Yeah, so it was... ED: And now you, and now you own it.

GUEST: And now, and now I own it, yeah.

And so... ED: That's fabulous.

GUEST: ...my great-grandfather, Joseph Bernard Boyle, had it, my grandfather, Norman Bruce Boyle, and they handed down to my mother, and handed down to me.

ED: So, interesting piece.

It, it, I, it caught my eye because there are certain, certain characteristics of this style that are New England.

GUEST: Oh, okay.

ED: I'm originally from the New England area.

And in fact, it is a New England piece.

GUEST: Really?

ED: And the reason I'm bringing this up is that I think it's interesting how this ascent of silver, you can get it from different family members; you can come in through the family, through the, the wife, or it can be bought retail.

Even though a person lives in one state, it comes from another state.

GUEST: Okay.

ED: The construction, particularly the, this spout has been added, is... GUEST: Really?

ED: ...a New England form.

GUEST: Really?

ED: New Englanders were frugal, and they still are.

GUEST: Okay.

ED: And so rather than making a huge disc of silver... GUEST: Okay.

ED: ...they would actually make a smaller disc and then add on the spout.

GUEST: Okay, okay.

ED: So that leads me to think, okay, New England.

Now, then, you come to a really funny thing, which is that the spool foot is early, about 1710.

GUEST: Okay.

ED: But the handle is much later.

GUEST: Oh, really?

ED: So again, you oftentimes have this in New England, either to look like it's filling in a set or because it's an old-fashioned person that wants a more old-fashioned look.

GUEST: Really?

ED: So you have a Rococo handle, a spool foot that is fairly old, that's about 1710.

GUEST: Okay.

ED: But the Rococo handle is about 1740, '45.

GUEST: Really?

ED: So that's where I'm going to be looking at to place this object.

GUEST: Okay.

ED: On the bottom, you're going to see four marks.

GUEST: Okay.

ED: Those are, I, it looks like an I, but it's actually a J. GUEST: Okay.

ED: An A, so that could be Avery, Joseph Avery of... GUEST: Okay.

ED: ...of Rhode Island.

However, I have not been able to concretely establish that's the maker.

It is a New England maker for sure.

GUEST: It is.

ED: So somehow or another, this peripatetic little piece of silver descended from somewhere... GUEST: Okay.

ED: ...in New England and ended up down with your family, probably in the 1740s rather than an original piece.

GUEST: Oh, okay.

ED: See?

GUEST: Okay.

ED: There has been some extensive repair to it over the years.

GUEST: Really?

ED: You will see that here, where the handle's attached, it's been reattached.

GUEST: Okay.

ED: We're not too sure about the bottom terminal, but I'm sure the top terminal has been reattached, and there's been a lot of repair on, on dings and dangs, which is normal.

The reason why you see this as pristine as it is, it's because it has been repaired, and then after repairing, they do something that silversmiths like myself call pickling.

GUEST: Okay.

ED: Where you heat it up and throw it into this acid bath, bath.

And then you get more and more pure silver... GUEST: Okay.

ED: ...and then you burnish it, and you get this wonderful patination.

GUEST: Oh, wow.

ED: So, it's a great piece.

GUEST: Okay.

ED: Have you ever had it appraised?

GUEST: No, no, I haven't, no.

ED: So, things with lineage go for a lot more money than just a regular pot.

GUEST: Uh-huh.

ED: So, we know that it was in your family.

We know that it got there around mid-century, mid-18th century.

GUEST: Okay.

ED: And it's been there since then.

GUEST: Yeah, yeah.

ED: It has two crests; one of them, at least, has been added later.

But that's all right, because it's a family piece.

GUEST: Yeah.

ED: Value of this is somewhere, even though it's fairly, you know it's mid-century, it's still in the 3 to $4,000 range.

GUEST: Okay, wow.

ED: But of course, you're never going to sell it because... GUEST: No, no.

ED: ...it's a family piece.

And you're going to hand it down... GUEST: Yes.

ED: ...down the road, so.

GUEST: Of course, yeah.

ED: It is really a fun piece, and it's nice to have pieces that have a history... GUEST: Okay.

ED: ...in this area, so.

GUEST: Wow.

ED: ...thank you for bringing it in.

GUEST: Wow, yeah, thank you.

So interesting.

ED: It really was.

There was a lot of different little pieces here that were, were fun to examine.

GUEST: Oh, oh.

ED: So, thanks again.

GUEST: Wonderful.

ED: And we'll see you next year with something else just as good.

GUEST: Yes, yeah, absolutely, thank you.

ED: Not at all.

(cash register bell).

♪ ♪ KATHLEEN: Hello, and welcome to "Chesapeake Collectibles."

GUEST: Thank you.

KATHLEEN: So I'm so excited, what did you bring me today?

GUEST: I have a few pieces of the Baltimore Glass Man art.

KATHLEEN: We love the Baltimore Glass Man.

GUEST: Yeah.

KATHLEEN: So tell me about them and how you acquired them.

GUEST: Well, this was my first piece.

KATHLEEN: Okay.

GUEST: I bought it at a local auction.

And if I, I don't recall all the details, but at the day of the auction, John Waters was in the gallery.

KATHLEEN: John Waters, okay.

GUEST: And I lost my mind.

My recollection is that I was bidding against him.

Whether that's true or not, I don't know.

But I was the prevailing bidder, and I won it for, I think, a total of $70.

KATHLEEN: That is fantastic.

GUEST: Yeah.

KATHLEEN: And when was that?

GUEST: When I first moved to Baltimore, so that was probably 15 years ago at this point.

KATHLEEN: Wow.

GUEST: Yeah.

KATHLEEN: When you moved to Baltimore, and you went to this auction, were you familiar with the Baltimore Glass Man, or was it just the hype of seeing John Waters that... GUEST: Well... KATHLEEN: Did you know what you were buying, or was it... GUEST: I had seen his work in the American Visionary Art Museum.

KATHLEEN: Okay, yes.

GUEST: When I first came to town, it was one of my most favorite places to spend my, my, spend my time.

KATHLEEN: At the Visionary, yeah.

GUEST: Mm-hmm, and so I knew it looked familiar.

I had hoped that it was something that was like what I had seen in the museum.

KATHLEEN: Right.

GUEST: But I wasn't really certain.

Again, I was blind because he was in the gallery, and I was so starstruck, so.

KATHLEEN: That's so funny.

So yes, so Baltimore Glass Man, his real name is Paul Darmafall, and the Visionary Art Museum and a visionary artist is also called like an outsider artist, meaning that they're not classically trained.

GUEST: Uh-huh.

KATHLEEN: They're sort of, just kind of creating art, sort of with found objects.

A lot of times, they have a mental illness.

Baltimore Glass Man suffered from schizophrenia.

GUEST: Yeah, I think I read that.

KATHLEEN: Yeah, and he was known to disappear from his house for days at a time and come back and not know where he had been.

He was really drawn to the glass and the glitter, for like the light and the spirit that he sort of found in that.

GUEST: Mm-hm.

So this was my last acquisition, I, I bought it from a local collector who was also an art dealer.

KATHLEEN: Mm-hmm.

GUEST: And she said she acquired it from him directly.

I, I actually acquired two at that time, and she said she could pick out bits of car tire bits and glass and stuff that she said was on the sides of roads.

And so it just spoke to me.

I had the other two already, and you know.

KATHLEEN: Um, and then this one, tell us what this one says.

GUEST: Well, "Anniversary," but it's misspelled.

KATHLEEN: Right, because... GUEST: Yeah, and I'm not sure what the motivation is.

I bought that at auction locally.

KATHLEEN: Uh-huh.

GUEST: And that, that I've enjoyed for maybe five years at this point, I think, five or six years.

KATHLEEN: Right, and we see the use of the stars and the glass again, and the glitter... GUEST: Yeah.

KATHLEEN: ...sort of the freedom and the light and the airy... GUEST: It was such a bold image that I, I had to have it, kind of thing.

KATHLEEN: Have you ever had this collection... you have four pieces, right?

GUEST: Yeah.

KATHLEEN: Have you ever had any of these appraised, evaluated, insured?

GUEST: Never, no.

KATHLEEN: Well, he is in a museum, so you own artwork that's in a museum collection.

They are at the Baltimore Visionary Arts Museum.

GUEST: Uh-huh.

KATHLEEN: So I would say that your four pieces are probably worth about 2 to 3,000.

GUEST: Okay.

KATHLEEN: ...collectively at auction.

GUEST: Uh-huh, yeah.

KATHLEEN: So I think that's very exciting.

GUEST: I love it, I love it so much, I just love that it's a local guy more than anything.

KATHLEEN: And I'm sure you're not going to get rid of it.

GUEST: No.

KATHLEEN: Especially not the one that you won from John Waters.

GUEST: Heck yeah, never.

KATHLEEN: Thank you so much for coming.

GUEST: Thank you, thank you so much.

(cash register bell).

♪ ♪ CHRISTINE: Welcome to "Chesapeake Collectibles."

GUEST: Thank you.

CHRISTINE: Thank you for bringing in this gorgeous collection.

Can you tell us a bit about it?

GUEST: Well, there's a wonderful history, Christine, of the, these pieces coming down from my mother to me, and then to my daughter, Ashley.

It started when I was growing up in California.

My mother had a garage full of things; she used to go to sales all the time, and my father said, "Get rid of all that stuff in the garage."

And so my mother decided to open an antique shop.

And when I was old enough, I was about 12... CHRISTINE: Mm-hmm.

GUEST: ...I started working in my mother's antique store.

And so when it came time to paying me for coming in after school and working, she gave me a choice.

I could either take money and a salary, or I could choose jewelry.

And at the time, I said, "Hands down, I'm going to take the jewelry."

CHRISTINE: And I understand your siblings worked there as well, and they didn't make quite the selections that you did.

GUEST: No.

She gave all of us a choice of if we wanted to take jewelry or we wanted something else.

This was at our birthdays.

CHRISTINE: Mm-hmm.

GUEST: And I was the only one who said, "Take me to the safe deposit box.

I want a piece of jewelry."

And so, and so that's how the collection started.

CHRISTINE: Mm-hmm, well, what I love is that it's worn.

GUEST: Yes.

CHRISTINE: It wasn't something you collected and put away.

You wore it.

You encouraged your daughter to wear it.

GUEST: Yes.

CHRISTINE: And it encompasses a variety of periods... GUEST: Yes.

CHRISTINE: ...in jewelry history.

GUEST: Yes.

CHRISTINE: And your eye is superb, because you have chosen a lovely example of Art Nouveau, here, this pin, that has wonderful enamel work.

It has the flowing foliate form indicative of Art Nouveau, and it has the plique-à-jour, the transparent glass behind it.

Intact, wonderful condition.

It can be worn as a pendant or a pin.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

CHRISTINE: Very versatile, turn of the century.

And then we move on in time to Art Deco, the '20s.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

CHRISTINE: And we've got a Cartier Jabot.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

CHRISTINE: Completely classic.

Focus on the diamonds, with gorgeous onyx that highlight and don't detract from the stones.

A great period, one of the most collected periods in all of jewelry.

And then we have this very special ring... GUEST: Yes.

CHRISTINE: ...that you have.

More modern, 1950s.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

CHRISTINE: Tiffany, in a rare red box... GUEST: Mm-hmm.

CHRISTINE: ...that we haven't seen before.

GUEST: You want to tell this story?

GUEST: About going into Tiffany?

GUEST: Yeah.

GUEST: So we've been into Tiffany's before, and we've said we have our, you know, my grandmother's engagement ring in a red box.

And inevitably, every time we've been in, they've said to us, "Well, we don't know anything about a red box.

We didn't do that.

It's got to be the Tiffany blue."

And we said, "No, no, no, we have this box."

CHRISTINE: So, an unusual piece, to be sure, and together with the original paperwork here.

GUEST: Yes.

CHRISTINE: The receipt, dating from 1955, the shank with a beautiful personalized engraving on it.

And have you ever had this collection appraised before?

GUEST: No.

GUEST: No.

CHRISTINE: Okay, a fair market value that I would assign to the Art Nouveau pendant brooch would be 1,500.

The Cartier Jabot we would put at 6,000 to 8,000, and the Tiffany ring, 3,000 to 5,000.

GUEST: Wow.

GUEST: Wow.

CHRISTINE: Thank you so much for bringing in this... GUEST: Oh, you're welcome.

CHRISTINE: ...gorgeous collection to "Chesapeake Collectibles."

GUEST: You're welcome.

Thank you for having us, Christine.

CHRISTINE: Thank you.

(cash register bell).

♪ ♪ LINDSAY: Welcome to "Chesapeake Collectibles."

What have you brought for us today?

GUEST: We brought a tapestry from Germany.

My father, I mean my husband's grandfather, actually was in the World War II, and he was an engineer, and he actually stayed after the war to help build bridges and tunnels, and all the road, roads.

And he actually picked up some souvenirs and brought them back to America.

LINDSAY: Okay.

And you guys originally thought this was from World War II?

GUEST: We thought it was, yes.

LINDSAY: Okay.

GUEST: I mean, that's when he went over there... LINDSAY: Yes.

GUEST: ...and he brought it back.

LINDSAY: So it's very interesting.

On the reverse, it actually says 1906, so it's much earlier than World War II.

GUEST: Okay.

LINDSAY: This actually was a tapestry.

It was used to symbolize the Franco-Prussian War, so 1870s.

And because it says 1906, we know it's a little bit later.

It was memora... for the Veterans Association; it was memorabilia.

And so, this it could've been used, you know, they could've been flying it at parades.

They could have had it in military halls, Veterans Association halls, you know, wherever.

It could've even been in a beer hall.

Um, so, but on the, this side, we have Lady Germania, similar to Lady Liberty, and she's supposed to represent kind of loyalty, power, strength within Germany.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

LINDSAY: You have the olive branches that show that.

This little saying right here, it says, "With God, for empire and emperor," and that was their saying actually from 1871 to 1918, so before World War II.

And then after that, they transitioned slogans.

But that, so the slogan is much earlier than World War II, so that's very... GUEST: Oh, interesting.

LINDSAY: Yeah.

GUEST: That's great.

LINDSAY: And then condition-wise, you know, the condition... GUEST: It's not good.

LINDSAY: It's not in great condition.

There is some dry rot throughout, but interestingly enough, this is actually common condition for most of these tapestries.

It's hard to find them in great, great condition.

Have you ever had the tapestry appraised before?

GUEST: No, we have never, we've... LINDSAY: Okay.

GUEST: It's been in the basement, hanging up in the pool hall, so.

LINDSAY: And no one's looked at it?

GUEST: Nope, no, we've never had anybody look at it.

LINDSAY: Okay, so at auction, this would probably go for $2,500 to $3,500.

GUEST: Ooh, even in the condition it is?

LINDSAY: Yes, even in the condition.

The damage is quite common.

GUEST: My husband wants to maybe get it restored and then also give it back to Germany, so wherever it came from.

LINDSAY: Yeah, that would be nice.

GUEST: Wonderful.

LINDSAY: Well, thank you so much for coming in today.

GUEST: Thank you for having me.

LINDSAY: It was a pleasure to have you.

GUEST: Thank you, I appreciate it.

NARRATOR: Major funding was provided by Alex Cooper Auctioneers, appraisers and auctioneers of fine art, jewelry, and collectibles.

Online and in-person gallery auctions every month.

Serving buyers and sellers in Maryland and around the world for over 100 years.

♪ ♪ Second Story Books, celebrating 50 years of dedicated book selling.

GUEST: Why don't you tell them?

GUEST: Sure, this has been so much fun today.

We kind of didn't know what to expect.

GUEST: Really, it's a great experience just to come here, see what other people are bringing.

GUEST: This was so fun, everybody was really friendly, and I couldn't recommend it highly enough.

GUEST: We had a wonderful time here, we brought three items here, and we got some good surprises on things.

GUEST: It's been a really enlightening experience, you learn more about items that you have, you thought you knew.

NARRATOR: Stream anytime, anywhere with the free PBS app.