butterfly aution in Ohio

[jshuey]

I was reading antique weekly - and there is apparently an upcoming auction of butterflies in Ashland Ohio. Dr Raymond Thomas - liked riker mounts and insect art stuff - and they have apparently auctioned off three lots already (>100 lots each), and have a fourth lot scheduled for Aug 10th. The old catalogs can be found at preview.oldrelics.com/ - but the upcoming one is not online. I thought someone may be interested..

John

[leptraps]

The Butterflies were auctioned in two parts. Part one in January 2018 and part two in February 2018.

I was unaware that he had died. I only met him once and it was at a West Virginia Entomology Society Meeting in the early 1980's(??) I never saw his collection although he brought some specimens to the meeting for ID help.

All of us are not getting younger.

[leptraps]

I found Raymond Thomas Obituary on line. He died 6 Jan 2017. He was living in Phoenix, AZ. He was a WW2 vet and died at the age of 95.

[jshuey]

I just saw a print add alluding to an additional set of lots going up on Aug 10th.

[jhyatt]

The earlier sale lots look like a mix of self-collected north American material, and dealer specimens. All immaculate and well-prepared... BUT - was there any data? Some collectors put data labels on the back side of Rikers, behind the specimens. Wonder if prices realized are available form the auction house?

Cheers,
jh

[jshuey]

Go here to see prices for one of the lots www.proxibid.com/asp/Catalog.asp?aid=140463


The photos load really slow - but the two I checked had data on the back of the riker mount

[leptraps]

I just visited the link,and looked at the material in the collection. Even in riker mounts, that is some collection.

[jhyatt]

Interesting... the papered material went quite cheaply (although I still wonder about data -- looks like some of the US envelopes only had numbers on them), and the showy but common exotic material was very high-priced. I'd have to guess that $30/Riker was the minimum bid allowed, since so many went for $30-35.
jh

[leps6789]

i was able to buy some north american material from these auctions beautiful specimens according to the data most of the material was collected from the late eighties to the early nineties he had traveled extenisly to establish his collection.obtained rare speyaria and many indra specimens.one of the nicest specimens is a pair of papilio zelicon nitra pair exx pupae almost solid black never seen anything close in color to these specimen s and jim bennet at priemere auctions was great even with exchange and fees auction shipping and custom still have a grin on best wishes walter

[trehopr1]

Just had a look at the many lots that went up for auction. As jhyatt said, the common exotic material went for some high prices. Especially, anything Ornithoptera or Morpho. Wow, $85 for a pair of Trogonoptera brookiana. Yikes, $125 for a pair of O. priamus (with just about the worst case of brown wing stains I've ever seen). At least, the owner used the "classic" riker mounts with the soft cotton. Much easier on antennae and the anal folds of the hind wings than those cheap "re-pop" rikers they sell now with that garbage fiberfill stuff.
The material itself was pretty descent overall in preparation. Virtually all the rikered stuff had data on the back. I noticed most of the rikers had hangers on the back so it makes me wonder if this material was spread out all over the walls of the owners house vs. just being stacked in a fumigated cabinet to avoid light and pest problems. Lots of nice Western butterflies there...
I especially liked the frame with the aberrant Papilio troilus (male), a couple of frames with some Papilio multicaudata, some of the Western fritillary stuff, and a couple of the Pierid frames.