Antiques Roadshow

GUEST

I bought them at an antique shop probably about 25 years ago. I think I paid between $125 and $150 for the camel.

APPRAISER

Uh-huh.

GUEST

And around $75 for the monkey.

APPRAISER

Well, you've done a little research on these.

GUEST

A little.

APPRAISER

And tell us what you found.

GUEST

Um, found a picture of the camel from a museum site, I believe, in Switzerland.

APPRAISER

Uh-huh.

GUEST

The monkey I didn't find.

APPRAISER

Mm-hmm, so you found this and you identified the maker and the year, right?

GUEST

Steiff, and the one that I saw was 1908.

APPRAISER

1908, yeah. Now, what did you want me to tell you about it?

GUEST

He had some bad hole damage.

APPRAISER

Mm-hmm.

GUEST

I did a little bit of repair. There's a lot that I didn't repair. I want to know how that helps or hurts.

APPRAISER

I see.

GUEST

I added these tassels.

APPRAISER

This is original.

GUEST

This is original.

APPRAISER

Yeah.

GUEST

These are original.

APPRAISER

Came with it, yeah, yeah.

GUEST

These little gold ones were added.

APPRAISER

Okay. These kinds of repairs don't really affect the value-- they actually help stabilize the toy. I generally would leave small holes alone. But anything where you have a large hole does not hurt the value. The tassels-- definitely leave them, they add to it. If anybody was upset with them, they could remove them. You're absolutely right about the age, 1908, and it is Steiff. And we've had Steiff on this show before. But generally, what we see are Steiff teddy bears. But the non-bear-type Steiff is also very, very desirable. And particularly when you get into this kind of size. This is probably the largest of the camels that they made in that era, with the cast-iron wheels, and basically, he's in pretty darn good condition. Most Steiff animals do have buttons in their ear.

GUEST

Right.

APPRAISER

Everybody's looking for the button. And you can see on the monkey, there was a hole where he did have a button. I'm not so sure that he had a button in his ear. There's no remnant of it, and I'm not 100% sure that they put buttons in the largest animals like this. I would say on today's market at auction-- and also, I think a retail dealer would probably ask about the same-- around $4,000 to $5,000.

GUEST

Really? All right.

APPRAISER

So, uh... I mean, I think it was a good buy for about $100...

GUEST

Is that together or the camel?

APPRAISER

Oh, no, that's just the camel.

GUEST

Okay.

APPRAISER

The monkey-- I think they called him Jocko the Monkey-- he's also quite early, quite large, with the very large arms. He has some condition problems.

GUEST

Pretty bald, yes.

APPRAISER

He's losing some, getting bald here on the back. But I would say he'd be in the $1,200 to $1,500 range.

GUEST

Oh, that's nice.

APPRAISER

So I think you did very well. I think they go great together.

GUEST

Yeah.

APPRAISER

And I'm really glad you brought them in.

GUEST

Thank you so much.

APPRAISER

Thank you for bringing them in.