DAILY NEWS, Wednesday, February 6, 1974, page 4C
Oink Your Heart Out,
Chase Manhattan
Some people put their
money in the bank and get 6%. Others put it in stocks and get ulcers.
Bernard Danenberg, who has scads of it, puts his money
in piggy banks. Yesterday, he put $700 into one. That's what it cost him to buy
Paddy and the Pig, one of 64 mechanical banks auctioned at the very prestigious
Parke-Bernet Galleries at 171 E. 84th St.
News photo by Richard Corkey
Geraldine Van Der Kwast and Uncle Sam bank.
Hopes to Sell for Twice the Price
By the time Danenberg finished wiggling his bidding
paddle to catch auctioneer West Thorn's attention, he had invested upwards of
$10,000 in more than a dozen banks, none of which cost more than a dollar to
produce when they were manufactured 80, 90 or even 100 years ago.
Shrugging off the suggestion that it seemed to an
inordinate sum to be spending on what seemed to be tired old toys, Dannenberg,
an art dealer, replied, "I'll put these things down in my cellar for two
years, get them out, dust them off and sell them for twice what they cost
me."
In two years, the reasoning
goes, the country will be marking its bicentennial and Americana will be very
big. And very profitable.
On the other hand, Mark Haber, a rich and retired man
from Wethersfield, Conn., got up at 5:30 yesterday morning to make sure he
caught the bus to get here on time for the auction.
Day's Biggest Buy
Then, he laid
out $2,200 — the day's biggest bid — for a trifle of a bank called
"Girl in Victorian Chair." Seeing it in an antique shop window, you
might put its value at $40.
"It's worth it because I wanted it," Haber
said, explaining that he was offered $2,500 for it minutes after he'd bought it.
One guy who was shut out when the bidding hit $500
shook his head and remembered what another man said when someone asked why he
climbed Mount Everest.
"Because it's there," the man said.
