Big Disney auction pulls in $1.8 million
The recent auction of Disney theme-park items — ranging from animatronics to ashtrays — exceeded the expectations of the California-based auction house. The two-day sale of 1,500 items brought in more than $1.8 million in winning bids during the “A History of Disneyland & Walt Disney World” event, the cofounder of Van Eaton Galleries said.
“With an auction, you never know what’s going to happen,” Mike Van Eaton said Monday.
Of the Walt Disney World-oriented items, two animatronic tiki birds that were part of Magic Kingdom’s Enchanted Tiki Room attraction, went for $121,000, which was about 50 percent more than the gallery had anticipated.
“All these parks have an enormous fan base, and they’ve been around long enough where stuff from the parks — especially early stuff — has become quite collectible, and that market has just sort of starting to move up,” Van Eaton said.
In 2015, a guidebook, signed by Walt Disney himself, sold at a Van Eaton auction for $15,000. That item resold for $56,000 at auction. Also sold was a telephone from Walt Disney’s personal apartment at Disneyland. It was expected to go for $2,000 to $3,000. The winning bid was $36,000.
The auctioned items were from collectors, not directly from Walt Disney Co., Van Eaton said.
“I mean everything obviously comes from Disney at one point of time,” he said. “These are things that are either thrown away or
County staffers had suggested something that displeased the theme park giant. So Universal lobbyist John McReynolds fired off an email to several top county officials, saying: “If I show this to my Chairman we will be annexing tomorrow.”
Quite the community partner. (As a side note: The Sentinel filed a public-records request for those emails back in September. But the county didn’t release them until two weeks before the vote. Reporter Jason Garcia scoured thousands of emails to find that one. He also found emails where county staff asked Universal to help sponsor a charity event and economic summit involving Demings. In both cases, the theme park was happy to accommodate the mayor with checks of $2,500 and $3,000 apiece.)
Also related to charity: Universal persuaded Second Harvest Food Bank to attend Tuesday’s hearing to talk about all the good things the company does to support the region’s largest food bank. were collected by employees. A lot of stuff, especially when it comes to signage, they actually let the employees buy it a lot of times.”
A PeopleMover vehicle sold for $129,000 (the estimate was $25,000).
“Disney actually sold that on eBay back when Ebay first started — either there or at one of their fan conventions — they sold for a few thousand dollars,” Van Eaton said. And a headboard from a Disney
The comments from a Second Harvest exec obviously had nothing to do with road-building. Instead, they seemed designed to soften the image of a company that was playing hardball to get taxpayer dollars.
Universal, however, was less willing to talk about how many of its new employees would make enough money to not need foodbank services.
While the theme park has talked of 14,000 jobs and starting wages of $15 an hour, the park hasn’t provided answers about how many of those jobs will be full-time with benefits.
When Demings asked McReynolds for a specific number Tuesday night, the lobbyist responded: “I don’t have the breakdown.”
Hmmm. McReynolds also noted the number of full-time jobs might “fluctuate a little bit with seasonality.”
That seems important. Stable jobs — the kind upon which families can rely for health insurance and to make mortgage
hotel room sold for $7,000.
“It’s just a headboard,” he said. “You never know, you know? It’s funny.”
He said all but two of the 1,500 items sold (an unsold one was a Jungle Cruise cast member costume, he said).
“Everybody has a lot a great memories of Disney World or Disneyland. And, so, when this stuff is seen outside of the park, it just has tons of nostalgia. People just say ‘I’ve got to have that’,” Van Eaton said.
Bidders were heard from around the world, including Japan, China and the United Kingdom.
Van Eaton Galleries has multiple Disney and pop-culture-driven auctions per year. For this auction, items were on display in its Sherman Oaks, Calif., offices. The company considered bringing the merchandise to Florida for display, Van Eaton said.
“The problem became getting the stuff there was very expensive,” he said. “The truth is the majority of bidders are online. We could be in Wisconsin and it wouldn’t matter.” payments — don’t “fluctuate.” But hey, Universal won. The question is: At what cost? One of the most powerful speakers Tuesday night was an Episcopal priest who was disturbed by the park’s threats to county officials and its naked attempts to promote its charitable endeavors.
Father Jose Rodriguez admitted he wasn’t a political expert, but said: “I’m not out of my element when I turn to the Orlando Sentinel and see an email that basically says: Give us what we want or we’re walking.
“I know scripture. And scripture says if someone’s with you and they leave, they weren’t really with you. A Universal threat to leave the county shows they’ve never been with us … They’ve only been for their bottom line. They only care about them. And their willingness to walk away says they are not a true community partner.”
But yeah, Universal got its road money.
play the “Please call me back” game when I get a phone message. I’m ticked off at a particular person who refuses to simply say what the call is about, repeatedly, even though it’s just as easy to actually convey information. Don’t be passive-aggressive and pretend you’ve done your part and now it’s my responsibility. It isn’t. You haven’t communicated a thing, you’ve simply wasted both my time and your own. Try doing what you’d like done if someone is trying to reach you, and leave a real message instead.
at the ad agencies that make the annoying commercials. Especially the ones that use voiceover people to imitate deceased stars. Come on people, let the Colonel and Jimmy Dean rest in peace! And while you’re at it, quit using the older music to promote your junk.
for a pizza, a woman went to the counter and started snapping her fingers at the staff to get their attention, saying hello, hello, hello. The staff were doing their jobs, taking care of an issue on the other side of the equipment. All that customer wanted was something added to her order. What a spoiled-rotten, self-centered brat she is!
ticked about cars being lower in the front, the reason cars have lower front ends these days is aerodynamics. They are paying much more attention to this to help improve miles per gallon.