GUEST: My daughter and I collect bears, and we used to do doll and bear shows quite a bit, and a lady approached me one day and said that she had bought this bear in England, in an antique shop, and that the gentleman who owned the antique shop told her that someone had made him out of an old coat. Some of my peers had sent her to me because I love black bears and they knew that, and she said she wanted it to have a really good home, and so we decided, well, sure, it was great, so we gave her all the money we had in that day and we went home with him. And later we did some research, and I kind of got the idea that he could be a Steiff. In 1912 when the Titanic sunk, Steiff made black bears for England, and they called them a mourning bear.
APPRAISER: Okay.
GUEST: So I thought perhaps that's what he was, and I sent some pictures to a teddy bear appraiser, took measurements, and she said she definitely knew he was a Steiff. She was 99% sure.
APPRAISER: Right, correct. Okay, what you have there, Carol, is a wonderful Steiff bear with shoe-button eyes, mohair, felt pads. I mean quality all the way. I mean, Steiff bears, when you look at them, they have a look. They're well formed, they have a hump in the back, as you see on this guy. Somebody's added the clothes, which are not original. He's straw-stuffed. He's sort of listing a little bit with age. They also, a Steiff characteristic, are the very long arms and the big feet. There's three different sizes, this being the largest size.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: So, you thought it was probably Steiff and he really is Steiff. You said somebody appraised him for you?
GUEST: Well, she felt that since he was a Steiff from 1912, she said that she felt maybe around between $10,000 and $15,000.
APPRAISER: $10,000 to $15,000 is a lot of money for a bear, and black is the rarest color Steiff made, and, you know, I think... I don't know, would you sell him for $15,000?
GUEST: No.
APPRAISER: Well, I wouldn't sell him for $15,000, either. He's more in the range, I would say, in the $20,000, $25,000 to $30,000 range.
GUEST: Oh, my God.
APPRAISER: The last one that was sold at auction, I think it brought $30,000 and it was a little bit smaller, and there's not a lot of them around. I mean, I know of maybe 20 black bears that are known, so you're quite lucky.
GUEST: Wonderful.
APPRAISER: What did you pay for him again?
GUEST: $65.
APPRAISER: $65, so you did okay.
GUEST: Oh, my gosh.
