The adage “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” certainly applies to people who have spent a lot of money on extremely bizarre purchases. Some very peculiar items went under the hammer, selling for some very hefty sums during auctions. Here is a list of the strangest and a few coolest items that people have spent a lot of money on.
A letter written on the Titanic
In a heartbreaking prediction that “if all goes well, we’ll arrive in New York on Wednesday,” the last letter ever written on board by a passenger who died when the Titanic sank has been sold at auction for a record-breaking €141,000 Alexander Oskar Holverson, a first-class traveler, wrote his mother a letter on three pages of embossed White Star Line stationery the day before the liner ran into an iceberg.
Celebrities’ hair
A lock of hair from the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll, Elvis Presley, sold for €1,300. Elvis’ personal barber, Homer Gill Gilleland, who toured with Elvis for more than 20 years, had saved the lock, which is in excellent shape. At Catawiki, locks of hair from the Beatles, Napoleon, Marilyn Monroe, and each of the four Beatles sold for over €8,000. The market for late celebrity hair is quite lucrative, according to Mark Borgman, since super fans think that by purchasing their icon’s hair, they will always own a piece of it.
A banana taped to a wall
A banana that was taped to a wall once sold for an astounding $120,000. The piece of art, titled “Comedian,” was produced by Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan for the Art Basel show in Miami. David Datuna, a late Georgian artist, ate the banana before it was replaced. He claimed that the artwork was about “the idea,” not the banana itself. According to Datuna, he made the piece to “question what art is.”
Queen Victoria’s undies
In addition, cotton underwear once worn by Queen Victoria—Queen Elizabeth’s great-great-grandmother—were sold for $16,300 in 2015 when the topic of lavatories came up. The underwear, which was embroidered with Victoria Regina’s royal initials, “VR,” was in immaculate condition due to being wrapped in tissue and maintained in a temperature-controlled space. These spacious drawers, which sported a 45-inch drawstring waist, had something special about them. According to auctioneer Richard Edmonds, “On these particular knickers, there is a chevron section, which is where they were taken up slightly as Queen Victoria got older and essentially shrank in stature.”
Justin Timberlake’s leftover toast
Twenty years ago, Justin Timberlake, then a teenage NSYNC band member, was being interviewed on the Z100 morning show in New York City when he accidentally left some of his unfinished French toast behind. Two of its slices were playfully listed for sale on eBay by the station’s DJ, and were eventually purchased for $1,025 by a teen named Kathy Summers. The teen enthusiast said, “I’ll probably freeze-dry it, then seal it, then put it on my dresser,” when asked what she would do with the leftover, slightly charred toast. A wise investment, undoubtedly.