Richard Wolffers Auction
 

Hello,
So i posted in the B/S/T thread about how I bought several auction catalogs from old Richard Wolffers auctions that date from 1993 and up. But I was wondering if it was a big name auction house back then, meaning were the items all real. Cause some of the items are very nice. Like every auction had a Gehrig jersey, mint autographs including Mathewson, Chesbro, Tim Keefe, Anson, autographs of players you never see today like Dan Brouthers, Amos, Gloves used by Cobb, Mathewson, Josh Gibson,, etc. the list just goes on and on of the high end items.

i think thats when some of the fake stuff really entered the market, but not sure Dave Grob from MEARS had some good write ups on these auctions

If I'm not mistaken, I seem to remember the owner committing suicide :(

Duane Garrett was the owner and a political talk show host in SF. Jumped off the bridge ahead with a lot of debt.

Sadly, those auctions at least in the jersey world, contained a mix of things which were good and bad. The higher value you got to, the more likely you were looking at something which had issues. I got a list of prices for most of the auctions and what is clear is that even back then, some of the questionable jerseys never sold and just showed up again and again the catalogs.

At least as far as jerseys go, today the buyer has some chance as there are forums, photos, and people with knowledge.

There were many other questionable items that Wolfers sold besides jerseys.
Duane Garrett was a major art collector, sports memorabilia collector and political fund raiser. He did commit suicide by jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge.
I really don't know if the stories about bogus auctions and his suicide were connected, but stories were prevalent in the hobby prior to his suicide, about his auctions being questionable. One of the major news magazines had a full page story about his suicide. He left behind a wife and two teenage kids.

Many of the items in his auctions that apparently set price records never actually sold. It was a very sordid business, and hard to explain. Duane was a really easy person to deal with and I liked him, but there was some dark stuff going on.

Wolfers
 

Wolfers catalogs were amongst the most attractive in the hobby.
There were also a manageable number of lots.

We obtained well over $100,000 in items from Wolfers- most however,
came after the auction when the "buyers" disappeared. We attended a number of live auctions in SF.

In additional to some questionable financial practice as both a baseball guy and a stamp guy, Duane was close friends with another less than ethical guy by the name of Al Gore. He was behind Gore for President

Too bad he could not play by the rules- AUCTIONS were great, often held in SF hotels- good time great cards, "unreal prices"

Bruce

Politics on Net54?;)

Hey, he's only been back for a few weeks..how long did you think it would take?

-

"Whilst" looking through their catalogs it was obvious to many that Wolfers inventory in their catalogs were "amongst" the most questionable inventory in the auction world.
Wow, I never thought I would use whilst and amongst in the same sentence on Net54 :).

He Gored Himself
 

Barry and Dan

Our reference to the man whose fantasies extended well beyond "inventing the internet" were factual not political. It is quite clear that Duane who had issues with the truth was working with a man who believed that infidelity
was not a crime. We have no issues with AG's politics- clearly he has a lot more important problems to address. We are sure he will "cross that bridge"
when he comes to it.

Meanwhile Wolffers catalogs were certainly A+- and we did add 14 pieces to our collection (10 after the auction) to America's Most Distinguished Memorabilia collection.

Cheers


Bruce Dorskind
America's Toughest Want List
bdorskind@dorskindgroup.com

Have to admit that "cross that bridge" was pretty funny, in a very morbid way.

But as far as the catalogs being A+, there were far too many questionable items, and far too many bids that weren't real, to warrant such high marks. Sure, there were some very nice photos, scorecards, cards, etc., but just too many other issues to consider.

Yes Duane had many issues with what he was selling.
But I was not aware that infidelity is a crime.
Immoral yes, criminal??? Hardly.
And how could anyone call a catalog A+ when that catalog was littered with bogus items and the bidding was as fake as a $3 bill.
And I mean the catalog was littered, it made me scream.
And in the interests of full disclosure Duane was a customer of mine.
However, customers of mine would ask me about his catalog. I warned them continuously about it.
I believe Duane found this out and just stopped buying from me.

I had to Google Richard Wolfers Auctions and came across this old thread.
I was wondering, after reading it, what happened to Mr. Bruce Dorskind?

rip
 

on god's not so toughest want list. His obituary likely easily found and quite glowing as expressed by people outside this hobby that he interacted with over many years. I hope he finally found the comfort he sought in things before people....

Bruce died in Aug. 2013 after being sick for a while.

Being in the Bay Area, I remember Wolffers getting a lot of publicity on the local news outlets. Remember back then the sports market (not just cards) was really growing fast.

It struck me that Wolffers was more flash than cash, as some of the items, as has been stated, didn't seem right, and of course the glossy catalogs were beautiful. It seems the RW wanted to make his company into a Sotheby's / Christies of the sports world, and might have rigged some "record" sale prices for the publicity.

I don't know about the personal details but I think it was pretty well verified that he was trying to run his business somewhat in a ponzi style and was deep in debt.

Likely it was the damaged reputation that caused him to take the plunge more than the financial aspect.