Loretta reports:
The Green family was one of the Significant Families of Worcester, Massachusetts. I still regard them fondly because of Dr. John Green, who founded the Worcester Public Library (its early incarnation at left). His collection included some extremely rare and beautiful books—the sort NHGs expect to find only at big university libraries. Or in England at some duke’s place. Though not in this priceless category, some of the elderly volumes I consulted for Mr. Impossible bore Dr. Green’s name.
Then there was a Green Hill Park, where once upon a time, the family had lived in a great (for Massachusetts) estate. To my everlasting grief, the house, like so many others, was long gone by the time I discovered it, through old photographs. It included, I recently learned, a museum for the family. And now it turns out that some or all of this collection—art, furniture, furnishings, clothing, books, letters &c—ended up in the care of one lady. When she died, not long ago, the treasure trove went to descendants who do not strike me as being of the Nerdy History persuasion. My big clue was their nicknaming the experts evaluating their inheritance “antique geeks.” So I was troubled, but hardly surprised by their decision to sell off the lot.
Yes, it’s all being auctioned off this week, in the same city where that handsome estate with its private museum once stood. Here’s the story in the local paper.
If you’ve got some time on your hands, you can examine all the catalogs at the auctioneer’s site. Or you can hurry on over to the DCU center in Worcester and bid on something.
But before or after that, would you tell me something? If you were the one who inherited all this stuff, what would you do?
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