January 16, 2013

What’s in a Fruit Plate?

Arc’s Value Village Brooklyn Center recently sold a 1890’s book with 96 Tree and Fruit plates for over $500 on Arc’s eBay site.  Selling items on eBay has proven to be a great way to maximize the value of unique donations.

An assistant manager at the store said she had never seen anything like the book in all her years of working at the store.  She quickly determined that, “this item was clearly very unusual, very old, handcrafted, and some of the plates were hand painted.”

Additional research indicated that the charming little book of botanical plates was made in the late 1800s and was designed to help nurserymen and salesmen sell plants to gardeners and farmers.  The salesman could buy these in a variety of ways; some were bound assortments and some were purchased individually.

The University of Minnesota Library at the MN Landscape Arboretum in Chaska came in with the highest bid on the eBay auction.  The staff had never seen a sample book like this in their search and said that they are delighted to add it to their collection of historic nursery and seed catalogs.

And we think it’s delightful that they found this beautiful donated treasure.