Getting steamed at the other bidders.
Coinstartled
Posts: 10,135 ✭✭✭✭✭
I just entered a way too high bid on a coin. Let em come at me.
1
Coinstartled
Posts: 10,135 ✭✭✭✭✭
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I'm like 0-25 this weekend so I'll probably get snapped here as well!
Good luck! Though that can mean a few different things here
Fairly unusual piece so I am bidding blind. What the hell.
Wasn't there a notorious auction bidder back in the good old days who would stand up in an intimidating way and brow beat other bidders into refraining from adding to the bidding auction so he would get the lots?
A frequently told story about John J. Pittman.
There have been some strong bids this weekend...I have only had one win out of several bids.
BST transactions: dbldie55, jayPem, 78saen, UltraHighRelief, nibanny, liefgold, FallGuy, lkeigwin, mbogoman, Sandman70gt, keets, joeykoins, ianrussell (@GC), EagleEye, ThePennyLady, GRANDAM, Ilikecolor, Gluggo, okiedude, Voyageur, LJenkins11, fastfreddie, ms70, pursuitofliberty, ZoidMeister,Coin Finder, GotTheBug, edwardjulio, Coinnmore, Nickpatton, Namvet69,...
I just entered a high bid and still lost.
Out bid.
I made HA and some consignors a few bucks. Didn’t win anything though.
This all just hints at an upward turn in the coin market...............
Pete
"It's crazy out there...."
I don't play in the Signature Sales. But there appears to be some trickle-down to the weekly Sunday auction. (Lower priced stuff). But even there, things are pretty dang active. A string of mostly "Genuine" large cents sure generated a lot of live bidding!
I did get an XF-40 1822 Bustie at a semi-reasonable price....but I was expecting to get knocked out.
Outbid on a way too high bid. Seems like a common story lately.
Would not bother me a bit. I would find it humorous that someone thought they could intimidate.
On a related note, non coin, I watched a woman buying stuff at auction, and she would be reading and just sometimes hold up her number until she won, and then, sometimes, just ask what she had won. No intimidation, just "I am buying it, no matter what the price."
Live auctions are an interesting study in human behavior..... While I have never attended a live coin auction, I have been to several live firearm auctions....it does get crazy. Cheers, RickO
That may have been John Jay Pittman. From an old thread:
https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/789354/old-thread-numismatic-history-john-jay-pittman
Quote << The Statue of Liberty Play
His intense love of coins, which won J.J. Pittman many admirers, proved daunting to at least one fellow collector, Phil Kaufman, the buyer of the boxed 1844 Proof Set, recalled seeing Pittman at several numismatic
gatherings. “I never spoke to him,” Kaufman said. “His knowledge was so superior to mine, I felt intimidated about approaching him.”
Kaufman was not alone. David Akers recalls an auction 41 years ago when one of the legends surrounding Pittman was born. “It was April 27, 1956 in Indianapolis,” he recounts as if it were yesterday, “during Abe Kosoff's
auction of the Thomas G. Melish Collection. John Pittman came there determined to own all five Proof Indian Head gold dollars on sale—at reasonable prices. How he did so is pure Pittman and explains how he was given the
nickname, ‘Statue of Liberty.’
“As Kosoff called Lot 1742, a Proof 1854 Indian Head gold dollar, Pittman stood, walked to the front of the room, turned his back on the auctioneer and faced the crowd. Then he raised his arm and held it aloft through all the
bidding. He glared intently at each bidder as the auction continued. He stared them down and made them blink. He did this for all five coins and won them at reasonable prices.” >>
However, according to Q. David Bowers, “…somehow, it has crept into print that John bid in a “Statue of Liberty pose,” resolutely standing with his hand fixed in the air, as to frighten all competition, in practice this may have been the case once or twice, but was not his normal method. Instead, John liked to lay red herrings across the trail. If he desired Coin A, any presale discussions were bound to center around Coin B or Coin C. If Coin A were brought up to John, he would brush it off, indicating it seemingly was of no interest. Of course, this was simply a clever way to protect his own strategy. As a longtime auctioneer I saw him do this many times, and also engage in other activities so as not to attract attention—such as giving secret signals to the auctioneer or placing the bids with someone else. If anything, John was smart, smart.”
That may have been John Jay Pittman
That's right - he would sit in the front row and, when a lot came up that he wanted, he would stand up and turn around and face the other bidders in the room with his best Clint "Go ahead, make my day" Eastwood face on. Of course, this was back in the day when he didn't have to worry about internet bidders, just everybody in the room.
Member ANA, SPMC, SCNA, FUN, CONECA
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I have noticed this at a lot of auctions that I have been to. If a woman wants something, anything at all ,not just coins, but any old thing, her hand is in the air until she gets it, no matter what the cost, no matter how much she overpays. I have thrown in a few higher bids then I wanted to on some coins only to try to get a person like this to run out of money--they never do. My biggest fears at auctions are women bidders like this. Men, for some reason, seem to stay to their price range. Some women have no price range. If they want something they will buy it. I hope they are there when I sell my stuff!
Attitudes and social conventions change over time. The old-time dealers and senior collectors who told me stories about JJP didn't especially like him, but practically nobody would cross him.
I observed the man at a few ANA conventions years ago (he would thoroughly patrol the bourse floor and absolutely insist that any non-numismatic items be removed from showcases). I believe that I shook hands with him at the Cincinnati ANA around 1980. I was unaware of the extent and depth of his collection at that time, but he was well-known as one of the biggest dogs in the ANA.
I guess JJP wouldn't be able to pull his tactic these days, but I'm sure he would love sniping. HA guidelines for bidders: https://www.ha.com/c/ref/web-tips.zx#guidelines-increments