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Brochure nabs top price at Deere Collectors Center auction

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By John Willard | Friday, November 16, 2007 11:58 PM CST | () comments

A King Corn silo sales brochure from the early 1900s sold for $1,700 Friday, fetching the highest price of the 184 items that went on the block during the opening session of a John Deere memorabilia auction held at the John Deere Collectors Center in Moline.

The auction’s first round focused on sales brochures and other printed materials such as annual reports, matchbooks, mechanical pencils and even a couple of neckties. The remainder of more than 600 items, all from the collection of Nicki and Henry Lindeman, of Clark Lake, Mich., will be up for auction beginning at 10 a.m. today at the center, 320 16th St., Moline.

About 200 people attended the sale, one of the few memorabilia auctions held at the center, which offers collectors such services as a restoration area, exhibits of equipment and memorabilia and a specialty retail shop. Bidding also was conducted simultaneously on the Internet during the auction, conducted by Aumann Auctions, Nokomis, Ill.

Kurt Aumann, auctioneer and president of Aumann Auctions, said the auction was unique because of the high grade of the items. “They are unsurpassed in quality,” he said. Persons who attend the sale “will see John Deere memorabilia you will get to see never again,” he added.

Standing on a mezzanine above a bank of vintage John Deere calendars and lighted clocks, he used an accomplished motor-mouth delivery to hawk sales brochures, stationery, commemorative books and similar items.

“Never throw out an annual report,” he said after a grouping of five annual reports from 1945 through 1949 sold for $900. A complete set of annual reports from the 1970s brought $375.

Other items bringing in high dollars included a 28-page sales brochure for a “California Special” Waterloo Boy tractor that went for $550. Other brochures for the Waterloo Boy, which helped Deere get into the tractor business before 1920, sold for $375 and $400.

Among the rarer items was a leather-bound edition of “The Story of John Deere,” one of 50 presented to Deere executives. Inscribed with a hand-written presentation message, it brought $700.

Few items seemed to sell for less than $100. A thermometer from a Marshalltown, Iowa, John Deere and GMC dealer went for $100. An ash tray brought $70.

Other collectibles and their sale prices included a vintage John Deere necktie imprinted with tractors and in its original cellophane, $75; a vintage string tie, $50; 1941 correspondence from John Deere dealers written on two pieces of company letterhead stationary, $60; eight sheets of John Deere letterhead stationary, $50; an ash tray, $70.50; and a matchbook featuring an 820 tractor, $70; and a mother-of-pearl John Deere mechanical pencil depicting a Model H tractor, $150.

Among those bidding was James Bollinger, a John Deere tractor and memorabilia collector from Chelsea, Mich. He said he spent about $3,000 on the 16 items, which included a rare Overtime tractor brochure at $650.

“The prices were fair. We are very pleased with what we bought,” he said.

Also happy with the results were the Lindemans, who have been collecting memorabilia since the early 1970s, long before the hobby became popular. “This is bittersweet, but we are very pleased,” she said.

The city desk can be contacted at (563) 383-2450 or newsroom@qctimes.com.