REVEREND GOMES ESTATE ATTRACTS LARGE CROWD Grogan and Company's March 24th and 25th auction realizes over 1.2 million dollars and attracts a standing room only crowd for the Estate of Reverend Gomes and a bevy of International bidders.
News-Antique.com - Apr 03,2012 - Dedham , MA- Never before has the Dedham gallery of Grogan and Company Fine Art Auctioneers and Appraisers been so alive and filled to capacity, as it was for the March 24th auction of property from the Estate of the Reverend Peter J. Gomes. The large collection of fine art, antiques furniture and decorations from the Reverend’s two residences: Sparks House, Cambridge and Oceanside, Plymouth, Massachusetts, brought friends, colleagues, collectors and admirers together and realized over $350,000 for the Estate.
The Reverend Peter J. Gomes (1942 – 2011), Plummer Professor of Christian Morals and Pusey Minister of the Memorial Church at Harvard University, has been described as one of the most distinguished Christian preachers in the history of the English-speaking pulpit. Born in Boston and raised in Plymouth, Massachusetts, Reverend Gomes was a self professed anglophile who had a passion for collecting. “Not only do we bring other people’s things into our world and make them, however, temporarily, out own, but we are also possessed by that which we possess and seek;” writes Gomes in an article titled “An Unruly Passion for Things”, published in Every Room Tells a Story, Tales from the Pages of Nest Magazine, edited by Joseph Holtzman, “Thus does the past live, recreated by our hands. Collecting is the ultimate redistribution of wealth and beauty.”
Highlights from Reverend Gomes Spark’s house collection included a Scottish Tall Case Clock, circa 1820, that he acquired in 1970 for $500, which sold for $4,425 to a former student of Peter’s. His Harvard chair commemorating his 25 years of service sparked competitive bidding before it finally sold to a local woman bidding from the back of the room for $3,068, and an American school Landscape depicting a Native American by a Lake at Sunset, sold for $3,245 to another former student of Gomes. The five piece American Tea Service that Gome’s used at his coveted Wednesday tea parties, sold for $3,245 to a local antiques dealer, within it’s $2,000-4,000 presale estimate, while an American Silver Chalice, monogrammed PJG and inscribed Good Life December 2002, was bought for $3,068 by one of his closest friends. The chalice will be donated to the Bates College Chapel, which is slated to be renamed this fall in memory of Peter J. Gomes.
Property from his Oceanside Plymouth residence included a Gilt Metal and Crystal Twelve Light Chandelier, once gracing the dining room, which sold for $7,080 and a George III Inlaid Mahogany Secretary Bookcase, estimated at $3,000-5,000, which brought $6,490. The living room’s Oushak Carpet sold for $5,310 and a pair of Gothic White Painted Iron Hall Benches, exceeding the $1,500-2,000 presale estimate to sell for $4,425. “The auction attracted a large number of new clients,” commented President and Chief Auctioneer, Michael B. Grogan, “Many of them expressed how pleased they were to purchase a memento from Reverend Gome’s collection.”
The second session of the auction was held on Sunday, March 25th and was comprised of property from various estates and collections. The 450
