Enola Gay Authentic Navigator's Flight Log Realizes $358,500 in Heritage Auction! The flight log kept by navigator Dutch Van Kirk onboard the Enola Gay during its fateful August 1945 flight to drop the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan sold for $358,500 in a public auction
News-Antique.com - Oct 29,2007 - Enola Gay Authentic Navigator's Flight Log Realizes $358,500 in Heritage Auction!
Documents Bombing of Hiroshima, Birth of the Atomic Age
DALLAS, TEXAS: The flight log kept by navigator Dutch Van Kirk onboard the Enola Gay during its fateful August 1945 flight to drop the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan sold for $358,500 in a public auction conducted by Heritage Auction Galleries of Dallas, Texas (www.HA.com ) on October 25, 2007. Other important, historic Americana items in the auction included letters written by Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Jefferson and Ben Franklin, and a lock of hair that documented the capture and death of Marxist revolutionary, Che Guevara.
"The auction is still ongoing, so I don't have final figures yet," said Tom Slater, Director of Americana auctions for Dallas-based Heritage Auction Galleries, "but we're very pleased with the results so far. We've already seen more than $1.7 million in prices realized, and there are still several sessions yet to go."
"This is an enormously important piece of history," Slater said, "which definitively documents the moment at which our world changed irrevocably. The bombing of Hiroshima was a watershed event in human history, and this is first-hand documentation from one of the participants, akin to having eyewitness accounts of the printing of the first book or a recording of the first telephone call."
"Although this auction is far from over," Slater said, "we're already hard at work preparing our next offering of rare books and manuscripts, which will be held here in Dallas on February 21 & 22, 2008. I'd invite anyone interested in this fascinating field to visit our website at www.HA.com , where they can watch the auction grow through full-color enlargeable images and our complete and thorough catalog descriptions. Closer to the auction, you'll even be able to enter bids online from the comfort and convenience of your home or office."
Navigator Theodore "Dutch" Van Kirk's Enola Gay Log, in pencil, 2 large folios, 26" x 20.25" and 26" x 10". Tinian Island to Hiroshima, Japan, and back, August 6, 1945:
For more information about Heritage's auctions, and a complete record of prices realized, along with full-color, enlargeable photos of each lot, please visit www.HA.com.
Prospective consignors and sellers of political memorabilia, Americana, and related collectibles are invited to visit www.HA.com/Sell. Or simply email Tom Slater at TomS@HA.com.
To reserve your copy of any Heritage auction catalog, please contact Customer Service at 1-800-872-6467, ext. 150, or visit www.HA.com/Catalog to order by email.
