The experts at the auction house felt the piece was much more valuable because it was believed to be one of only three similar items known to exist. Still, they decided not to purchase it for their collection, so Mary took the pendant to Sotheby's. Upon inspection by the British Museum, the pendant was described as "an important find," and they estimated the market value to be around £4,000. I emailed the Museum to ask if the painting was covering a hole in the wall, but I didn't get a reply. In 1999, The Museum of Fine Arts in Houston purchased the painting for $1.25 million dollars. They agreed and were able to verify that the piece of artwork covering the hole in his wall was a previously unknown Heade painting, since named Magnolias on Gold Velvet Cloth. Through his research he found the Kennedy Galleries in Manhattan, which handles many of Heade's works, and asked them to take a look at his painting. So he went online and found that his painting was similar in style to the work of Martin Johnson Heade, an American still-life artist best known for landscapes and flower arrangements. Much to his surprise, one of the cards in the game featured a painting of flowers that looked a lot like the one he had on his wall. Some years later he was playing a board game called Masterpiece in which players attempt to outbid one another for artwork at an auction. But his wasn't the last valuable rock dug out of that Arkansas soil. It was later cut down to 12.42 carats and sold for $150,000 in 1971 (about $800,000 today). No matter how valuable it is."īassum's big find, nicknamed "The Uncle Sam Diamond," was the largest diamond ever discovered in North America. Best of all, the park's policy is: "You find it. Sitting on top of a volcanic pipe (a geologic tube formed by an ancient underground volcanic explosion), the park is the only diamond site in the world that is open to the public. It might surprise you to hear that he wasn't digging in one of the famous South African diamond mines at the time, but was near Murfreesboro, Arkansas, at a site that is now the Crater of Diamonds State Park.
Basham found a giant of a gemstone in 1924 - a 40.23 carat diamond.
Sadly, there is no word on whether or not the hammer was ever found. The Hoxne Hoard is now on permanent display at the British Museum, drawing thousands of people every year. However, the government is required to pay fair market value for a treasure trove, meaning the farmer and Lawes split a cool £1.75 million.
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While looking for the hammer, Lawes happened upon something else of interest - 24 bronze coins, 565 gold coins, 14,191 silver coins, plus hundreds of gold and silver spoons, jewelry, and statues, all dating back to the Roman Empire.Īs required by British law, the so-called "Hoxne Hoard" was reported to the local authorities, who declared it a "Treasure Trove," meaning it was now legally the property of Britain.
In November 1992, a farmer living near the village of Hoxne in Suffolk, England, lost a hammer in one of his fields, so he asked Eric Lawes to use his metal detector to search for it. If you haven't found a fortune in your backyard, don't give up! This kind of thing happens all the time. A lucky couple in Northern California found $10 million in rare gold coins buried on their property.
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