Tell that to Ellen Kelly, who bought her Aunt Nora's player piano for $25 at a family estate sale in Westernport, Maryland in 1992, long after Nora's death in 1969. One pedal was sticking on the piano, so Ellen had it repaired -- and found the pedal was being gummed up by a 1916 Sporting News Babe Ruth rookie card, as well as 110 other Sporting News baseball cards, including 22 Hall of Famers like Walter Johnson and Grover Cleveland Alexander.
Kelly figures that her father and uncle were hiding cards away from Nora, who apparently was a little fussy. (She wouldn't even let Ellen play the piano when a kid.)
Last month, the 110 card grouping was sold as one lot at a Beckett Goodwin Auction. Price? A hefty $4,420.
But the Babe Ruth card went for $130,053: nearly double the pre-sale estimate -- and far more than the last rookie card, which sold for $38,837 in Heritage Auctions a decade ago. (That card was graded higher for condition, too.)
It's not a Honus Wagner card (top price so far: $3 million-plus) or 1952 Topps Mickey Mantle card (top so far: $2.88 million)...but it's not chump change, either. Experts are saying that the market has revived for cards, provided they're special ones...and childhood favorites.
"Best $25 I ever spent," Kelly told Sports Collectors Daily.
Find out more here.
Shades of the old piano that produced 913 gold coins -- discovered by the piano tuner.
Gee, maybe I should have checked our upright before we gave it away to my piano students!
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