A piece of one of the world’s most famous meteorites went on auction yesterday – but failed to draw out-of-this-world bids.
A 30-pound hunk of the Willamette Meteorite had been expected to fetch up to $1.3 million at Bonhams auction house in Manhattan, but was pulled from sale after bidding peaked at $300,000.
The 151/2-ton meteorite was found in Oregon in 1902, and the bulk of it is owned by the American Museum of Natural History.
Other items in the collection of space rocks and related items sold for a total of $750,000. The collection was billed as the first of its kind at a major auction house.
“I decided to buy something that my children would say, ‘What was Dad thinking?’ ” said Lawrence Golub, 48, a Manhattan investment manager who spent $14,000 to take home the 164-pound Campo del Cielo Meteorite, which fell in Argentina in 1576.
“This is a terrible investment.”
Fetching some serious coin was the “Claxton mailbox,” which was smacked by a space rock as it stood outside a home in Georgia in 1984. It sold yesterday for $82,750.
“The market for these abstract objects is going sky high,” said Darryl Pitt, a Bonhams curator.