JACK MINER JACKPOT
Simeron Matijasevic holds a letter with Jack Miner letterhead dated from 1929 after dozens of stolen historic papers were discovered at a yard sale. Matijasevic has since returned the relics to the Jack Miner Migratory Bird Foundation in Kingsville.
When Simeron Matijasevic bought a box of old documents at a yard sale in Kingsville earlier this month, he just wanted interesting stamps. What he found inside were documents believed to be connected to famous Canadian conservationist Jack Miner.
“I was stunned when I saw what was in the box,” said Matijasevic, who lives in Windsor. “I said, ‘Simeron ... you’ve got a Canadian national treasure.’ ”
The box appeared to contain hundreds of documents from the Jack Miner Sanctuary, where Matijasevic has returned them.
The papers are believed to have gone missing when Kirk Miner was foundation director for the Kingsville sanctuary started by his grandfather, known to many as Wild Goose Jack.
Kirk Miner was fired by the Jack Miner Migratory Bird Foundation and evicted from the sanctuary house in 2012. In 2015, the foundation sued him over Jack Miner memorabilia he sold to the Detroit Tigers, including a Tigers bat and ball signed by Ty Cobb, and five letters written by the hall of famer.
A Michigan judge ordered the items be returned to the foundation and ruled Kirk Miner, who did not mount a defence, to pay US$2.5 million in damages. An Ontario Superior Court judge later confirmed the order applies on the Canadian side of the border.
As well as the baseball memorabilia, the judges ruled the foundation owns letters written by then Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King and President Herbert Hoover. It owns other letters from inventor Thomas Edison and industrialist Henry Ford, a Queen Elizabeth coronation figurine and an antique baseball glove, the courts found.
While the foundation was able to get the Ty Cobb memorabilia back and put it on display, there were still a lot of items missing, said executive director Mary Baruth.
Matijasevic’s yard sale documents include letters and documents from 1920-40 about the impact wolves and crows had on migratory bird populations. There are also blueprints for a banding net that is still in use today.
“I stopped at the yard sale because it was a Thursday, which I thought was different,” he said. “I told the lady I was a stamp collector and was looking for some. She said she had a box of old papers in her back shed and asked if I wanted to look through them.”
Later that night, he opened his $20 purchase and couldn’t believe his eyes.
“There was a letter in there from U.S. President Herbert Hoover’s secretary on behalf of the president thanking Jack Miner for the invitation to visit the sanctuary,” Matijasevic said. “And another from the Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie King.”
Matijasevic grabbed the documents, stuffed them into a garbage bag and headed out to the sanctuary to see if they were authentic. Baruth said often people come across what they believe to be real documents only to discover they are old photocopies. “When I took them out of the bag I started to shake,” Baruth said of the papers Matijasevic brought her.
How they ended up in back shed in Kingsville remains a mystery. A Kingsville OPP officer, who investigated, spoke to the owners of the home where the yard sale was held, Baruth said. No charges are being laid and it’s believed the couple were not aware what the documents were or that they belonged to the foundation, she said.
Another bizarre twist to the tale is that 20 years ago Matijasevic admitted to the Star he sometimes posed as Red Wings’ superstar Sergei Fedorov’s brother.
Shortly thereafter he was convicted of a fraud under $100 in Michigan for selling falsely autographed pictures and cards of the hockey player and was given a year probation, he acknowledged Tuesday.
When this was brought to Baruth’s attention, she noted that the incident was a longtime ago and that the documents returned to the Jack Miner Migratory Bird Foundation “are not forged.”
Baruth offered to reimburse Matijasevic the money he paid for the documents, but he declined. He just wanted to drive back to Windsor and get the rest of the papers to return them to the foundation.
Matijasevic said his reward “was doing the right thing ” and making sure the papers got into the right hands. For Baruth getting the documents back was a “the find of a century” and a chance to fill in some historical gaps about Jack Miner, who died in 1944.
“It’s not only the history and heritage of Jack Miner. It’s the history and heritage of the Canadian conservation movement. It really tells us Miner’s stand on wildlife. This gives some insight,” she said.
Jack Miner founded his sanctuary in 1904 and corresponded with prominent people around the world to garner support for his conservation efforts. He and his son Manly became close friends with Cobb, who wrote in his autobiography that knowing Jack Miner was “one of the finest things that happened to me in the wonderful world I found away from baseball.”
Baruth gave Matijasevic a Jack Miner goose band and outfitted a Canada goose with a band that has Matijasevic’s name inscribed on the inside.
He will also choose the Bible verse for the 2018 commemorative bands later this year.
“I was really happy I was able to help them out,” he said. “I would do the same thing again. (The documents) are back where they should be.”
A full review of the documents is underway and an exhibition of the recovered material will be featured during the Migration Festival weekend, Oct. 19-22.