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#2855: Dramatic Withdrawal of Haitian Documents from Auction Bloc in Phila (fwd)
From:Karioka9@cs.com
Dramatic Withdrawal of Haitian Documents from Auction Bloc in Phila
Twenty-six lots totaling more that 2,500 Haitian historical documents were to
be auctioned off tomorrow, March 16th, at Samuel T. Freeman & Co., "America's
Oldest Auction House" in Philadelphia, when their mystery owner abruptly
withdrew them, less than 24 hours before the sale. The only explanation
offered for this dramatic turn of events was that the minimum bids allowed,
ranging from $150 to $3,500 per lot, were not acceptable to the owner. The
material in question ranged from administrative correspondence and
documents of the Christophe, Petion and Boyer era, to the late 19th century
and the first US occupation of Haiti. One letter copy book (lot #859)
contained more than 1,000 letters to and from Haitian historian Beaubrun
Ardouin. Freeman's catalog, sale #1050, is available at
www.freemansauction.com.
The auction house would not officially reveal the identity of the seller, but
various indications, including a cursory examination of several lots, point
to an identical provenance with the two Kurt Fisher collections of Haitian
historical documents available at the New York Public Library and the Florida
University archives at Gainesville. The provenance of those two collections
has been recently challenged, notably by the Haitian Genealogical Society.
The Florida institution, which purchased its collection directly from Kurt
Fisher, naively believes that they were salvaged somehow from the 1958 Hazel
hurricane in Jeremie, and subsequently sold to Mr. Fisher. Kurt Fisher was a
noted Austrian archeologist and collector of Haitian artifacts who died more
than 20 years ago.
In this particular case, it is not only reprehensible that Kurt Fisher's
heirs, Haitians by birth, should continue to appropriate important documents
that belong by right in Haiti's national archives. To divide those documents
into arbitrary lots and to auction them to the highest bidder is an act of
extreme contempt and irresponsibility. Typically, a better informed or less
callous dealer would offer the undivided lot for sale to the two Florida and
New York institutions, in an effort to minimize their dispersal.
Daniel Simidor