APPRAISER: We found an extraordinary masterpiece that will forever be a major part of
ANTIQUES ROADSHOW history.
APPRAISER: I recall, vividly, that I was standing at the table
and I was actually appraising some small pre-Columbian heads when I heard
Don Ellis' voice behind me and he was very insistent in the way he was calling
out and I said "Don I'm busy, I'm busy." I turned around and I saw that Don was
holding a striped blanket and I knew what this was. I excused myself from the
pre-Colombian lady and I went back and Don was literally speechless.
GUEST: It was given by Kit Carson, who ever–, I'm sure everybody knows in his history, given to
the foster father of my grandmother.
GUEST: As a young boy, uh, six, seven, eight, nine years old. During the years I was living with my
grandmother, it was on the bed where I slept and then in the cold winter days it was
probably thrown over me.
APPRAISER: Well, Ted did you notice when you showed this to me that I
kind of stopped breathing a little bit?
GUEST: Yeah you did (laughs).
APPRAISER: I'm still having a little bit of trouble breathing here, Ted.
GUEST: It took you by surprise because I, you know, didn't think much about it. Probably a chief blanket.
APPRAISER: That's exactly what it is. And it's not just a chief's blanket, it's the first type of chief's blanket made.
These were made in about 1840 to 1860 and it's called a Ute, first phase.
GUEST: A Ute?
APPRAISER: A Ute, first phase, wearing blanket.
GUEST: A Ute, first-phase wearing blanket.
APPRAISER: But it's Navajo made, they were made for Ute chiefs. And they were very, very valuable at the time.
This is sort of... this is Navajo weaving in its purest form. All of these things that we see later
with diamonds and all kinds of different patterns comes much later than this.
This is just pure linear design. This is the beginning of Navajo weaving
GUEST: Wow.
APPRAISER: And not only that, the condition of this is unbelievable, unbelievable. We see these...
we've got a little bit of damage over there. It's made from hand-woven wool, but it's so finely done it's like silk.
It would repel water, and this here is dyed with indigo dyes. It was a very valuable dye at the time,
it's an extraordinary piece of art, it's extremely rare, it is the most important
thing that's coming to the ROADSHOW that I've seen, um, do you have a sense at all of
what we were looking at here in terms of value?
GUEST: I haven't a clue.
APPRAISER: Are you a wealthy man, Ted?
GUEST: No!
APPRAISER: Well, sir, I'm still a little nervous here, I have to tell you.
On a really bad day, this textile would be worth $350,000.
On a good day, it's about a half a million dollars.
GUEST: Oh, my God.
APPRAISER: You had no idea.
GUEST: I had no idea. It was laying on the back of a chair.
APPRAISER: Well, sir, you have a national treasure.
GUEST: Wow...
APPRAISER: A national treasure.
GUEST: Gee!
APPRAISER: When you walked in with this, I just about died. Congratulations, congratulations.
GUEST: I can't believe this.
APPRAISER: Now, the value of this, that I'm giving, is not using the Kit Carson provenance.
Provenance is sometimes very difficult to ascertain.
If we could do research on this and we could prove without a reasonable doubt that Kit Carson did actually
own this, the value would increase again, maybe 20%.
GUEST: Wow. I can't believe it. My grandmother, you know, were poor farmers. They didn't... She had...
her foster father had started some gold mills and discovered gold and everything, but there was no wealth.
No wealth in the family at all. Wow. I can't believe it!
APPRAISER: Congratulations.
GUEST: Thank you. Gee.
GUEST: I had no idea that it could be worth anything like that. I thought maybe $5,000 or $6,000...
you know at the most it might be worth, which should've been a big something for me at that time.
I knew we couldn't afford to keep it and it would be better served to be
someplace where it can be preserved properly. I immediately contacted Donald Ellis...
to see if he would be interested in, in buying it.
He gave us $300,000 with the idea that we would split whatever he was able to sell it
for about $300,000.
APPRAISER: That was the summer of 2001 and basically
Don, very quickly, had a deal and we had 9/11 and Don's deal suddenly
evaporated, so here he had this enormous amount of money invested in the blanket
and his deal just disappeared. Now this went on for actually several
years and Don finally wound up selling this.
GUEST: It sold I think for around $400,000, $450,000.
It was sold to an anonymous buyer who
donated it to Detroit Institute of the Arts. It's still there on display.
APPRAISER: The Navajo weaving market is crazy now and so I think that with a collection
history that we have on the piece, I could probably support a price on this
higher than a $1 million.
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