'Antiques Roadshow' guest says 'you're kidding' after expert revealed the value of her toy soldiers
Vintage toys such as action figures are among the most popular collectors' items that appear on "Antiques Roadshow" along with movie memorabilia. Despite knowing this, a guest was left in shock after learning that her set of toy soldiers was worth nearly six figures. It wasn't an ordinary set as it featured in the movie, "Babes in Toyland" with Laurel and Hardy. The figures were used to create stop motion animation, and turned out to be quite valuable as expert Laura Woolley appraised them at $10,000 to $15,000 a piece, making the set worth $75,000.
"My grandfather worked for Hal Roach Studios. He was kind of second-in-command there. These are from 'Babes in Toyland' with Laurel and Hardy. And these were the toy soldiers that were done with stop-action," the guest told Woolley. She added that they got a set of ten soldiers, but she only kept five and gave away the rest to her nieces.
She further shared that the title of the original movie was changed over time, and when Disney picked it up, it was renamed again. "It was colorized, and so that was changed again. But originally, it was a musical. Disney wanted to pick it up. And they said it was too expensive to animate. And so that's when Hal Roach picked it up and decided to do it live-action," she explained.
Woolley then took over and said that the guest was right on the money. "Actually, it was an operetta done in 1903 by Victor Herbert. And when Hal Roach bought the rights, he decided to do this, and it was most famously a Laurel and Hardy film," she explained.
"Why I was very drawn to them is that this is a very key moment in film history for this particular type of technology. While we have examples in very, very early optics in the cinema of some stop-motion animation as early as the 1890s-- 1897 is one of the first examples," she added.
She went on to say that the set on the table ticked a lot of boxes for her, and she was sure that many collectors would be very interested to get a piece. "Because it's kind of early days of special effects technology, people go crazy for these early pieces," she mentioned.
Woolley noted that the collection had the burglar who stood out, which probably made him a favorite amongst collectors. "Right, my mother gave away the drummer. I wasn't happy, but he was beautiful," the guest added.
Woolley then asked the owner if she had ever got the set appraised, and the owner shared that someone once told her that the five pieces could be worth $1,000. However, Woolley begged to differ as she thought it was "somewhat unprecedented" to come across such rare early pieces. "So if you were to take one of these and put them in an auction, I would fully expect that they would reach at least $10,000 to $15,000 individually," she told the guest. The guest was shocked to hear the number as she said "Wow!"
Woolley further added that since she had five of the soldiers, the estimated total would be around $75,000. "You're kidding! That's amazing!" the guest said in response. She told Woolley that she had no idea, but now she would take very good care of the set.
The appraiser advised the guest not to dump all five of the soldiers at once. "I think the price would hold up if they were slowly leaked onto the market," she said in the end.
