Here's some more first hand info on that auction in VT. A friend was there,
and his comments on the article are below:
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Hi Stu,
Yes, that is the auction I attended. It was quite near where I live in
Vermont. I new this guy for years. Most of the locals knew he wasn't hurting
for money and had the big stash of old cars. They also knew not to deal with
him unless you wanted to get screwed. There really was $1Meg in gold buried
under the school house floor. His houses were also completely loaded with old
antiques he picked up around the country for almost nothing. After they both
died there was a 24 hour deputy sheriff on duty to keep people from stealing
the stuff. The IRS claimed he never filed an income tax in his life and they
were after their cut; I seem to recall they eventually backed off their claim
because he never worked anywhere. The local rumors were that he was too
eccentric for his rich family in New Jersey and they paid him to stay in
Vermont. For years his daily driver was a 49 Ford with! a dead battery; he was
always asking people for a push start. In later years he drove those total
rust bucket VW bugs; never could understand what he saw in that crap heap of a
car. In the summer he sometimes drove one of the old Stutz cars. I went to
the auction with $15 K in my pocket but nothing went for less than that except
junk so I came home empty handed . The high rollers would bid on the good
stuff in $5K or $10K increments and a car would be sold in 1 minute or so. On
the old VW bugs the bid would go up slowly in $10 increments and take several
minutes to sell as the hippies agonized over the $300 price; it was sort of
comic relief from the high rollers. It was quite a memorable experience.
Toby
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