Harry Kellar Illusion Head, ca. 1900
GUEST: I'm a magician, and I'm really passionate about magic history...
APPRAISER: Mmm.
GUEST: ...in addition to Performing and magic technique. So sometimes, when antiques and magic collide...
APPRAISER: Mmm.
GUEST: ...that's really exciting to me. Found this online, and basically, a antique store in London that didn't specialize in magic...
APPRAISER: Mmm.
GUEST: ...but just, like, high-end antiques, they had this head. They acquired it from an artist who acquired it in New York in about the '60s. And they bought it with the understanding that it had belonged to Houdini and it was used in illusions. Based on some research I've done...
APPRAISER: Mm-hmm.
GUEST: ...think it's, uh, actually Harry Kellar.
APPRAISER: Mm-hmm.
GUEST: Which is where Harry Houdini got his name, Harry.
APPRAISER: Mm-hmm.
GUEST: Because Harry Kellar was, like, the O.G....
APPRAISER: Mm-hmm.
GUEST: ...magician and, like, an idol to Harry Houdini.
APPRAISER: Yeah.
GUEST: And Harry Kellar had actually gifted Houdini his props and things like that towards the end of his life. So logistically, that would match up.
APPRAISER: It's made from hardwood.
GUEST: Yeah.
APPRAISER: It's very well-carved. You look at pictures and posters of Harry Kellar, and there's a pretty astonishing resemblance. I'm right there with you, I believe it is Harry Kellar. Harry Kellar is known as the dean of American magicians. He was born in 1849, and had kind of an odd career beforehand. Had a couple of false starts as a performer. And his career really hit it big in the 1880s. He quickly, over the course of a 40-odd-year career, became one of the most important American magicians, period. Previously, a lot of magicians relied on vaudevillian sleight of hand, quick stage acts that you could perform anywhere. He really mastered the art of larger stage shows.
GUEST: Yeah, for sure.
APPRAISER: Uh, performing for, i, in Brazil and South America and all over the world. And what he did is, he relied more, not so much on sleight of hand, but more of larger illusions and mechanical tricks and devices to help him do his performances. And in the magic world, those props are custom-made.
GUEST: Yeah.
APPRAISER: They can be unique to the ideas and the techniques that magician uses. And those secrets are held very, very closely. They don't often enter the open market. A lot of these stage illusions, especially, are going to be traded behind the scenes. With regards to Harry Kellar, he retired in 1908. He was good friends with Houdini later in life, and, yeah, a lot of his stuff went to Harry Houdini, but this never really shows up anywhere. I'm not able to find any idea of what kind of trick it was used for. At a guess, is, my thought, it was probably used for a spiritualism trick of some sort, a levitating head of some sort. Do you have any idea how you might use it?
GUEST: We kind of think that it could be a spirit-cabinet-type thing...
APPRAISER: Mm-hmm.
GUEST: ...where, like, the face will, like, float around...
APPRAISER: Mm-hmm.
GUEST: ...and, like, in this ethereal-type...
APPRAISER: Mm-hmm.
GUEST: ...ectoplasma or something.
APPRAISER: Another interesting little tidbit about Harry Kellar is that all those props sank, uh, in a shipwreck.
GUEST: Yeah.
APPRAISER: So we know it's probably not from before that period-- it, it's gotta be later. And this is an older man. It's probably around 1900 or so. In that era, a lot of magicians would build their own props, uh, their own illusions. But this is a very, very skilled carving, and my suspicion is, he probably had it commissioned. Do you remember what you paid for this?
GUEST: Yeah-- total with shipping and everything...
APPRAISER: Mm-hmm.
GUEST: ...from Europe was about $5,000 U.S.
APPRAISER: Because of the scarcity of high-end magic props and effects entering the open market, I would not be comfortable putting an auction estimate on it, because we don't know what these trade privately for. But I would have no problem putting an insurance estimate of $60,000 to $80,000 on it.
GUEST: Oh, yeah... (chuckles) Wow. Ha! (laughing)
APPRAISER: And I'm sure that there are a few people who would probably pay much more. But again, it's all a secret.
GUEST: (snorts) Yeah, true. Yeah, wow. I've showed it to a few people. Um, and they're definitely, uh, jelly for sure.
APPRAISER: (laughs)
GUEST: But this is kind of my first time really displaying it openly.
APPRAISER: Mm-hmm.
$60,000 - $80,000 Insurance
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Understanding Our Appraisals
Executive producer Marsha Bemko shares her tips for getting the most out of ANTIQUES ROADSHOW.
Value can change: The value of an item is dependent upon many things, including the condition of the object itself, trends in the market for that kind of object, and the location where the item will be sold. These are just some of the reasons why the answer to the question "What's it worth?" is so often "It depends."
Note the date: Take note of the date the appraisal was recorded. This information appears in the upper left corner of the page, with the label "Appraised On." Values change over time according to market forces, so the current value of the item could be higher, lower, or the same as when our expert first appraised it.
Context is key: Listen carefully. Most of our experts will give appraisal values in context. For example, you'll often hear them say what an item is worth "at auction," or "retail," or "for insurance purposes" (replacement value). Retail prices are different from wholesale prices. Often an auctioneer will talk about what she knows best: the auction market. A shop owner will usually talk about what he knows best: the retail price he'd place on the object in his shop. And though there are no hard and fast rules, an object's auction price can often be half its retail value; yet for other objects, an auction price could be higher than retail. As a rule, however, retail and insurance/replacement values are about the same.
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