rarest

The World of Rare Baseball Cards: Honus Wagner Still Highest Priced

Filed under: Sports

Wikipedia still reports it as one of the seminal moments in the trading card collecting field: In February, 2007, a 'near mint-mint' Honus Wagner sold for $2.3 million. At that point it was probably the highest sale a baseball card in history.

Then, in September last year, the same card was sold again. This time it went for $2.8 million to a private collector.

The card in question, a T206 Honus Wagner, was made by the American Tobacco Company in 1909. There are estimated to be fewer than 100 in existence. This card was once owned by hockey great Wayne Gretzky and has been called the 'Mona Lisa of Baseball cards.' It may be so rare because Honus Wagner himself didn't want his image to be used to sell tobacco and stopped production of the his card, or at least that's part of the mythology surrounding the famous card.

Honus Wagner was a shortstop who played in the major leagues from 1897 to 1917. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1936, receiving more votes than Babe Ruth. He is considered by many baseball historians to be the greatest shortstop of all time.

Tags: baseball, Honus Wagner, HonusWagner, Rarest, trading cards, TradingCards

The World of Rare Books: The Gutenberg Bible, First and Most Valuable

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed) —

There are countless rare books in the world, but by most expert's standards the rarest of them all is the Gutenberg Bible. It was the first book ever printed back in 1456, and although several hundred copies were originally printed finding a complete first edition would net you $25-$35 million. In today's market single pages alone go for $25,000 each, and several years ago just 1 volume (it's a 2 volume set) sold for $5.5 million.

Besides the Gutenberg Bible other rare books include the first edition of Shakespeare's collected works from 1623 (worth $6 million), a collection of Leonardo da Vinci's manuscripts (potentially worth as much as $100 million), and of course any first edition copy of the Declaration of Independence (worth $8 million). Edgar Allen Poe's work also makes in onto the "rarest books" list with his first published poem ("Tamerlane") being rare and difficult to find due to a byline of simply "By A Bostonian." It's worth as much as $200,000 to the right buyer.

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Tags: Bible, book, books, Declaration of Independence, DeclarationOfIndependence, Edgar Allen Poe, EdgarAllenPoe, first edition, FirstEdition, Gutenberg, rare, rarest, Shakespeare, the rare, TheRare

The World of Rare Cats and Dogs: Meet the Ashera and the Lundehund

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Pets

If you're an animal lover you probably have at least one cat or dog, if not several. And whether you're into mixed breeds from the local animal shelter or purebreds worthy of showing, pretty much all pet owners think their little baby is the most beautiful and unique of all. And although that may be true (I've got 3 unique sweeties of my own) there is something to be said for which kinds of cats and dogs really are the most unique, or in this case, the most rare. When it comes to rare breeds different experts have different opinions, but regardless who you ask certain names keep popping up.

The rarest cat breeds seem to be the Sokoke, the Egyptian Mau, and the Ashera. Of those the Ashera is the most expensive($20,000+), the Sokoke the most exotic (from the wilds of Africa), and the Egyptian Mau has the coolest history (lived with the Egyptians).

As for dog breeds, the one that keeps popping up on all the 'rare' lists is the Lundehund, or Norwegian Puffin Dog. Bred originally by the Vikings to hunt Puffins its most unique characteristic is its incredible flexibility in the joints. Other rare breeds include Otterhounds (about 350 in the US) and Stabyhounds (about 100 in the US).

Tags: ashera, breed, breeds, cat, cats, dog, dogs, egyptian mau, EgyptianMau, lundehund, otterhounds, pet, pets, rare, rarest, sokoke, stabyhounds

The World of Rare Signatures and Autographs: William Shakespeare

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed) —

Think "autograph" and images of crowds of screaming fans mobbing celebrities comes to mind, or maybe a more organized event with people lining up in droves and the celebrity sitting behind a table. Either way the end result is the same: a lot of signatures leaving with a lot of satisfied fans. And that's great for all those people who now have a souvenir to cherish, but not so much for collectors. In order for a signature to be worth a lot in terms of money it has to be fairly rare.

He may have done a lot of writing, but with only 6 of them in existence William Shakespeare's signature is one of the rarest of all and is valued somewhere around $3 million dollars. And as far as present-day celebrities go it's a harder call to make, but this past year Will Ferrell topped the list of worst celebrity signers (which would, in theory, make his John Hancock just a little more rare).

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Tags: autograph, autographs, celebrity, ferrell, rare, rarest, shakespeare, signature, signatures, will ferrell, WillFerrell, william shakespeare, WilliamShakespeare