Estate sale

**Newbie** · 11-19-2012, 02:15 AM

.................................................. .................................................. .................................................. .................................................. .................................................. .......... that was me, speechless.....i beieve my bp is now stable. I dream of this everyday !!!!!!!!!! Congrats on an amazing find !!!!!

**guns ltd** · 11-19-2012, 04:48 AM

Great Looking finds!!!

**Black Edelweiss** · 11-19-2012, 05:11 AM

what blows me away is that the "Son " didn't want to keep this stuff!!!!!! what is wrong with people ? .. it was his dad's! anyway not to take awy from the Score , but man ........id never get rid of this stuff .even if i was not into ww2 stuff .the amount of well preserved "meuseum pieces there is incredible ! not only for you ..but for us on a knowledge base ...as these appear to be genuine articles ...doesnt get more rare than a foot locker full of stuff from a vet ....ive saved some pics for reference ! thanks for the post ...and no presents for 5 years for you !!!!!!!!!!! haha

**RH1941** · 11-19-2012, 03:44 PM

Guys thanks for looking. All the items are still together and I have the uniform on display . Gary

**history-buff1944** · 11-19-2012, 07:52 PM

Thats a fantastic collection/find. I have not seen an estate sale with this amount of good stuff in at least 15 years. Last time I saw that--a farmers widow was selling everything and going into a retirement home. One item that caught most attention--was a large wooden trunk that had a complete-I kid you not--a complete Fallschirmjagers uniform--two helmets--one Grey--the other sandy painted, and his weapons--papers--everything. This stuff was supposed to go for auction but someone managed to give the widoaw a classic "line" and got away with about $30,000 worht os German stuff--for only $2,000

**RH1941** · 11-19-2012, 08:11 PM

Like a thief in the night . I bet he made the lady feel like she was robbing him.

**history-buff1944** · 11-19-2012, 08:27 PM

by RH1941

Like a thief in the night . I bet he made the lady feel like she was robbing him.

That was pretty much the case from what I heard. When I visited her--I asked her if she would let me contact a collector/friend of mine who has buckets of money to burn and who would treat her correctly on price. I got her number and went home to contact my friend who was not in officwe so didnt get the message till late afternoon. By then unknownst to me--it was too late and she sold to the next guy who saw her stuff a few hours after I left. I had $2,500 in my pocket that day--and I told her I was interested in the stuff but made sure she knew it was worth more than I had. At the time, she said she was keeping everything till the estate auction coming that Saturday. Well, apparently the guy who came after I did was sent over by her own Son--and she took his offer.

Anyway, the guy who bought this stuff told her all kinds of lies--which greatly irritated the area military collecting community to no end. The jerk who got this stuff was eugene mapes--who was well known for being a liar and a thief and has a vast VERY valuable collection thanks to being the pig he is. He learned to be a pig thanks to his mother--who had the biggest collection of WWI and WWII Sweetheart Jewelry collection I had ever seen. eugene had over 100 WWI and WWII German flags of all kinds including Regimental flags etc. I dont know how many Helmets--dozens-several early SS Coffee Can Kepis, SA Kepis, teller mines--a dozen or so Train Eagles, a KM Destroyers ships Eagle, hundreds of medal and ribbon bars. and the list is almost endless.

I got shafted by this jerk out of two LW Gravity Knives--both early take down models. It traded my mostly fake (though I had no way of knowing at the time) stuff-like a fake train eagle and such. It took the lesson of almost getting sued by me--to get my Gravities back. I got them back after it took almost 6 months fo going by the jerks home as well as making dozens and dozens fo phonecalls--none ever returned. Anyway, it finally called me up about a week before the next gun show and asked if I was going and if so? I would get my stuff back. I said I was going and went. On arrival, I went to its table and it produced my knives. One had been purposely ruined by the SoB. Luckily, through trading--I got most of the values back that I had into the gravities.

Anyway, end of story is that both eugene and his mother are now deceased (nobody in the collector community cares either) and its known that all that stuff is in a few storage lockers and everyone is looking for them and waiting for them to come up for auction.

**Black Edelweiss** · 11-19-2012, 08:33 PM

Karma is a Bitch !.......in the end the assholes get it !...remember man we only rent this stuff ....or as i like to say 'keepers of a time".......

**RH1941** · 11-19-2012, 09:28 PM

We all know a guy like him . The worst part is they don't care so they will do anything to get that next big score . So they end up with awsome collections.

**Reynard** · 11-21-2012, 12:47 AM

by RH1941

Triskelsonne thanks for the info after lots of searching on the net when I first got the pin I found the basic info you posted . The good thing about this pin is I use it as a tie tack and nobody knows what it is .

I recently found an identical DKW / Auto Union tie pin (albeit in not quite such good condition) in a box of my grandad's wartime uniform buttons and cap badges. So at least I now know what it is too.

It also goes nicely with some of my motorsport stuff - Auto Union made some stunning Grand Prix cars in the 1930s...

Nice collection of items, btw.

So glad it's still all together - sometimes the sum of something is worth far more than the individual parts. My uncle almost burnt grandad's stuff because it was "taking up too much space"... Sad thing is, some people *do* see this sort of stuff as junk and / or don't realise the true value, both historical and monetary of the items in question.