Basketball Rules Sell for $4.3 Million at Sotheby's, Topping Custer Flag
"The Rules of Basketball"
Sotheby's via Bloomberg
"The Rules of Basketball," written by James Naismith who invented the modern game, was sold at auction for $4.4 million.
"The Rules of Basketball," written by James Naismith who invented the modern game, was sold at auction for $4.4 million. Source: Sotheby's via Bloomberg
"Custer's Last Flag"
Sotheby's via Bloomberg
"Custer's Last Flag: The Culbertson Guidon from the Battle of The Little Big Horn." The flag was found by Sergeant F. A. Culbertson after the battle of the Little Big Horn, on June 25, 1876.
"Custer's Last Flag: The Culbertson Guidon from the Battle of The Little Big Horn." The flag was found by Sergeant F. A. Culbertson after the battle of the Little Big Horn, on June 25, 1876. Source: Sotheby's via Bloomberg
"The Emancipation Proclamation"
Sotheby's via Bloomberg
"The Emancipation Proclamation," once owned by Robert and Ethel Kennedy, is one of the 25 copies of the executive order known to survive.
"The Emancipation Proclamation," once owned by Robert and Ethel Kennedy, is one of the 25 copies of the executive order known to survive. Source: Sotheby's via Bloomberg
A tattered, stained silk flag from General George Armstrong Custer’s calamitous last stand failed to generate as much action at Sotheby’s in New York yesterday as an 1891 two-page typed list of 13 rules for a new game called “Basket Ball.”
The red-white-and-blue cavalry guidon, or swallow-tail flag, recovered three days after the 1876 Battle of the Little Bighorn, sold to an unidentified phone bidder for $2.2 million, at the low end of its presale estimated range of $2 million to $5 million. The seller, the Detroit Institute of Arts, will use the funds for future art acquisitions, according to a Sotheby’s press release.
The rules for the game of basketball, invented by James Naismith when he was a physical-education teacher in Springfield, Massachusetts, fetched $4.4 million, more than double the $2 million presale estimate and a record for sports memorabilia at auction.
The buyer was David G. Booth, an alumnus of the University of Kansas and chairman and co-chief executive officer of Dimensional Fund Advisors Inc. Naismith was the university’s first professor of physical education and varsity coach for basketball and track and field.
The document was sold by his heirs to benefit the Naismith International Basketball Foundation. The sport’s first game was played with soccer balls and peach baskets, according to Sotheby’s.
Also eclipsing the Little Bighorn flag was a copy of the Emancipation Proclamation signed by Abraham Lincoln that sold for $3.8 million, well above the presale estimate of $1 million to $1.5 million.
The document, one of only 25 known copies, had belonged to Robert and Ethel Kennedy and hung in their Virginia home. Abraham Lincoln signed the proclamation in 1863 during the Civil War, setting the stage for the abolition of slavery.
The late Kennedy, a civil-rights champion who served as U.S. attorney general under his brother, President John F. Kennedy, acquired the document in 1964 at an auction.
To contact the reporter on the story: Lindsay Pollock in New York at lindsaypollock@yahoo.com;
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Manuela Hoelterhoff at mhoelterhoff@bloomberg.net.
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