80 | New Scientist | 21/28 December 2019I
N 1976, a NASA intern named Gary George
attended a government surplus auction
in Houston, Texas. He was hopelessly outbid
for a special agent’s car, a souped-up Porsche- But he did shell out $218 for
three truckloads of NASA film reels, more
than enough to fill his bemused parents’
garage, in the hope that they could earn
him some beer money.
He sold some and trashed others, donating
what remained to a local church. But George
followed his father’s advice and kept three reels
labelled “Apollo 11 EVA”, figuring they might be
worth something one day. He wasn’t wrong.
Earlier this year, on the 50th anniversary of the
moon landing, the tapes (pictured below) – the
clearest known NASA recordings of the first
moonwalk – sold for $1.8 million in New York.
George was lucky. But he isn’t the only
person to have taken advantage of a recent
boom in interest in scientific items at auction.
These days, obscure scientific ephemera have
become high-grossing, headline-grabbing lots
at the world’s largest auction houses.
From fragments of a bible once flown to
An interest in science isn’t just good for the brain, finds
Bethan Ackerley – it can also be a boost for the wallet
Science for sale
Items that have already made
a fortune at auctionJames Watson’s Nobel prize
sold for $4,757,000 in 2014Apollo 11 moonwalk tapes
sold for $1,820,000 in 2019Alan Turing’s notebook
sold for $1,025,000 in 2015Apple 1 motherboard
sold for $905,000 in 2014Albert Einstein’s violin
sold for $516,500 in 2018Stephen Hawking’s wheelchair
sold for £296,750 in 2018
CO
UR
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SY
SO
TH
EB
Y’S
Apollo 11 film reels
(below) and Fabergé egg
with lunar artefact (right)the moon and now ensconced in a Fabergé
egg (over £8000, pictured below right), to Alan
Turing’s forgotten manuscripts, rescued from
a locked desk ($1,025,000), long-neglected
scientific curios are on their way to becoming
the new Picassos and O’Keeffes (see “Science
for sale”, below).
So what sells? And how can you, the science-
savvy investor, find tomorrow’s treasures amid
the uninspiring academic flotsam of today?
For a long time, scientific items paled in
comparison to the paintings and objets d’art
that commanded the highest prices. Now,
things have changed. Over the past few years,
auction houses such as Christie’s, Sotheby’s
and Bonhams have expanded their dedicated
scientific sales, driving an explosion of
interest – and profits. During its last auction
season, Christie’s London sold £4.5 million
worth of scientific material, comprising more
than a third of its auction turnover within its
books and manuscripts department.
Across the pond, Sotheby’s held its first
History of Science and Technology sale in
New York in late 2017, raising $1.4 million.
Just a year later, the company’s first “Geek
Week” focusing on science, technology and
space exploration yielded $7.4 million.
“The first auction that I did for space
exploration made $800,000,” says Cassandra
Hatton of Sotheby’s. “The one that I just did
made $5.5 million.” In six years, the market
has changed dramatically.
In that time, the going rate for certain
items has rocketed. Take Enigma machines,
the encryption devices used by the German
military in the second world war. In 2012, you
could buy a pristine example for £85,000. In
2017, one sold for more than $547,500.
An object doesn’t need to be high-tech to
be high-value. A shabby leather jacket of Albert
Einstein’s sold for £110,500 in 2018, despite – or