Memorabilia

Flight Journal, Dec 2001 by Gertler, Joe

Countless millennia of evolution have firmly embedded the "hunter-gatherer" instinct in humans. There's no use fighting it. At best, we can delight in treasures great and small that bring joy, amuse and inspire us. At worst, it can grow to an obsessive, unmanageable demon that consumes us. Remember the bizarre tales of the wealthy Collier brothers, who for decades bought up every treasure they could find? In the end, they were found buried under the toppled piles of their collection in a home that could be navigated only by crawling through tunnels in the mounds.

But time has changed the methods of collecting. Where it used to take months of searching and volumes of long,

drawn-out correspondence to find the "good stuff," the Internet has transformed the collecting process as dramatically as it has changed all communication. Collectors used to follow a chain of hard-earned leads with a flurry of correspondence. On the average, every 30 letters might result in one significant acquisition for a collection. Now, any Internet search engine will lead to dozens of sites for virtually any collectible theme. The most significant and successful thus far is the eBay auction site. An aviation collector can search under "aviation" or "aircraft" and find nearly 10,000 items to bid on. Even fine-tuning your search with more specific classificalions, such as "WW I," offers hundreds of items. No dickering, haggling, or cajoling. At the end of seven days, if you are the high bidder, it's yours. The amazing-- and inexpensive-ability to connect millions of international offerings with millions of potential purchasers allows us to transport ourselves to virtual yard sales and flea markets in every comer of the world.

Aviation collectibles for ever specialized interest and budget are available online for the enjoyment and satisfaction of anyone who has enough time and motivation to investigate the possibilities. For a few dollars, you can usually acquire out-of-print volumes from the popular series of Profile Publications that give a detailed report on a specific aircraft type and model. Not all treasures are priceless rarities. It is easy to put together a fascinating and enjoyable collection of aviation history that is recorded on specially illustrated envelopes called "covers." I put together a thick album of Wright brothers commemorative examples for under $100. Buying them one or two at a time for pocket change, I thoroughly enjoyed the thrill of the hunt without significant financial sacrifice.

Printed material ranging from books, catalogs and trading cards to photographs signed by famous aces and designers is among the easiest collectibles to find in a very wide variety of prices. The reading enjoyment provided by an inexpensive reprint of a 1912 E.J. Willis aeroplane catalog for $15 is comparable to obtaining one of the first books ever written about the Wright brothers: the 1909 German "Die Bruder Wright," which can go for $5,000. Similarly, postcards, photos and letters signed by the "aces" or famous aircraft designers can be won at the auctions for a few dollars up to a few thousand dollars. An original photo-printed and signed close to the time of the actual event-is worth much more than a reprinted photo, signed decades later by the same person. Post-WW II signed photos of Adolf Galland may go for less than $100, while an original 1940 document or photo of him might bring several times that. One photo signed by America's first ace in WW I, Douglas Campbell, recently brought in more than $800. According to the most respected value guides (offered by dealers who track such sales over decades), a WW II vintage photo of the ace of aces, Luftwaffe pilot Erich Hartmann, whose 352 victories will probably never be surpassed, has an aver age value of $345. These price guides are available from numerous Internet sources. Trying to figure the value of photos signed by two dozen Luftwaffe aces with more than 1,500 combined victories may be possible only by submitting them to auction to see what price such a collection would bring.

Hundreds of aeronautical-theme periodicals have been published since the late 1800s in all languages. From time to time, single and bound issue runs of several years are offered. Each collector/bidder decides on the era he wishes to bid on. Popular titles include the British Flight, the American Aviation and the German Flugsport. All of these were of such high quality and interest that they were published for several decades or more. Single issues are routinely offered; and generally, the older the publication, the more desirable/collectible they are. Ten-yearold aviation periodicals might cost only a dollar or two, while pre-WW I-era issues can sometimes exceed $100 each. Special older issues that featured Lindbergh and Harry Houdini (the first man to fly in Australia) can bring up to $250. Early aircraft and aero-engine manuals from aviation's infancy can range from $20 to many hundreds of dollars. Oddly, rarity is not the deciding factor here. Sometimes, a very rare manual is available for a plane or an engine that was only produced for a few months, was a terrible and unsuccessful design and is as uninteresting today as it was many years ago.