Antiques Roadshow

GUEST

My mom owned a little restaurant, it was a trolley car. Our town is pretty small. And a man came by one day, and didn't have any money for food, and he asked my mom if he could have breakfast for this piece. And my mom says, "How about three breakfasts?" So he came three times in a row, and this is how I received it.

APPRAISER

You grew up in this restaurant so you remember this man?

GUEST

Yeah, I was about probably ten to 12.

APPRAISER

Where did you keep this?

GUEST

I kept it underneath my bed in a box. Probably nine, ten years in that box. Never even taken it out to look at it.

APPRAISER

You know what it is, it's a cigarette box.

GUEST

Right.

APPRAISER

It opens up, and then the cigarettes went in here. And there was another hinged part off on the side, and you could see the striker. And that held the matches. They used strike-anywhere matches. And it's a gold box.

GUEST

Oh, my goodness.

APPRAISER

Now, you know it's pretty heavy. We tried to weigh it, and I put it on the jeweler's scale, and it went off the mark, because that only goes up to two-and-a-half ounces. We weighed it on the silver scale, and figured out that, just to melt it, it's 18-karat gold, would be about $2,000 in scrap gold.

GUEST

Oh, my goodness.

APPRAISER

And the first thing that struck me as soon as you put it down on the table was the wonderful design. It looks sort of like the Faberg-style boxes from the turn of the century, the alternating stripes of blue enamel, and then this stripe here with a wreath-like design. And then there's the center plaque. That's platinum and diamonds.

GUEST

Oh, that is diamonds?

APPRAISER

And filigree. And those are real diamonds. They're rose-cut diamonds, they're not quite as sparkly. They wanted a lesser sparkle, more subtle. And there's more diamonds here, on the lip of the front of the box, where you would open it. And when I opened it, I noticed there was a little dimple on the lip of the box, which is a typical place for a French hallmark, and we found it there. And the French made the most beautiful boxes.

GUEST

Oh, my goodness.

APPRAISER

And now, we looked at the lip along the front of the box here, and there's where we discovered the signature of Cartier, Paris.

GUEST

Oh, my goodness!

APPRAISER

So the news just keeps getting better. But we have some issues with condition.

GUEST

Okay.

APPRAISER

There's some chips in the enamel on the top section here. There's some wear spots near the thumb rest, just from it being opened and closed so many times.

GUEST

Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER

I believe that if this was to be sold in as-is condition, it would achieve a price today of about $7,500...

GUEST

Oh, my goodness!

APPRAISER

As it is.

GUEST

Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER

It's possible to restore this box, and a master restorer could put back the enamel that's missing from it in the damaged sections. It might cost a couple of thousand dollars. In restored condition, I think the collectors would be eager to buy it at a price of about $15,000.

GUEST

(laughing) Oh, my goodness! I never... I would have just thought, $50, $75 is what I really thought. Oh, my goodness. I'm shocked. Never thought of that.

APPRAISER

So, you know, it pays to do good deeds for hungry men, I guess.

GUEST

I guess, yeah. Yeah, now I have to go home and see what else she has in that box.

APPRAISER

I think that's worth checking out.

GUEST

Yeah. Oh, my goodness.

APPRAISER

And you can't help but wonder who this man was. When you had a gold cigarette box from Cartier's at the turn of the century, you were somebody.

GUEST

Oh, my goodness.