A pair of Dorothy’s ruby slippers, worn by Judy Garland in “The Wizard of Oz,” sold Saturday at an auction for $32.5 million, making the glowing footwear essentially the most precious film memorabilia ever offered at public sale.
The slippers are certainly one of 4 surviving pairs from the 1939 film and have been as soon as stolen from a museum that housed them.
Live bidding for the pair of ruby pink heels began at $1.55 million, according to Heritage Auctions, and have been initially estimated to go for $3 million or extra.
The public sale home stated in a information launch that the slippers handed that quantity “inside seconds” and that no different pair of ruby slippers has gone for near that quantity.
One pair offered in 2000 for $666,000, Heritage Auctions stated. In 2012, Steven Spielberg and Leonardo DiCaprio paid $2 million for an additional pair and donated them to the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles.
These slippers additionally helped Heritage Auctions break a document for an leisure public sale, with Saturday’s totaling virtually $40 million. The public sale additionally included the hat worn by the Wicked Witch in “The Wizard of Oz,” which offered for $2.9 million.
Perhaps this pair’s star energy contributed to the excessive promoting worth.
They have been famously stolen from the Judy Garland Museum in Grand Rapids, Minnesota, in August 2005 by 77-year-old Terry Jon Martin. He used a hammer to smash the glass show case and snag the footwear, the Associated Press reported.
Thirteen years later, in 2018, the FBI received a tip and recovered the stolen slippers in a sting operation.
The footwear have been cross-referenced with a pair on the Smithsonian to verify their authenticity as a result of sooner or later, the pairs have been swapped, every containing one shoe from two totally different pairs of ruby slippers, in line with the public sale home.
The FBI then returned them to their unique proprietor, Michael Shaw, earlier this 12 months. Shaw had loaned the footwear to the museum, in line with the AP, and gave them to Heritage Auctions for Saturday’s public sale.
Martin confessed to the crime in courtroom paperwork final 12 months, saying he needed to tug off “one final rating,” in line with Heritage Auctions.
He pleaded responsible in October 2023 and was sentenced to time served in January due to poor well being, in line with the AP. At the time of his sentencing, he was in a wheelchair and on supplementary oxygen.
Martin was impressed to commit the crime after an affiliate hypothesized the slippers have to be adorned with actual jewels to justify their $1 million insurance coverage worth, in line with the AP.
When a separate affiliate informed Martin the jewels have been really simply glass, he ditched them, his lawyer stated, in line with the AP. The lawyer didn’t reveal how he removed them.
The second affiliate was indicted in March and can go to trial in January, the AP reported. He has not entered a plea, however his legal professional has stated he isn’t responsible.
Among Saturday’s bidders was the Judy Garland Museum, which was on a quest “to carry 1 of 4 remaining pairs of Ruby Slippers Judy Garland wore in ‘The Wizard of Oz’ (1939) house to Judy’s birthplace in Grand Rapids, Minnesota,” the museum wrote on Facebook.
Shortly after the public sale, the museum wrote that it “sadly did not win the Ruby Slippers,” regardless of asking for donations to complement cash already donated to the trigger from the City of Grand Rapids, which raised funds at its annual Judy Garland pageant, the AP reported. Minnesota lawmakers additionally supplied $100,000 to assist the museum win the slippers, in line with the AP.
