Nadeau’s Auction Gallery, Inc., Windsor, Connecticut

For 16 years, Ed Nadeau has staged auctions on New Year’s Day. For many antiques buffs in the Hartford, Connecticut, region they are thoroughly enjoyable, must-attend annual events. Nadeau’s gallery is a spacious, high-ceilinged, well-lighted place with seating for over 300 people, most of it in upholstered theater-type chairs. A rather elaborate buffet adds a festive touch. But of course, the main attraction is the antiques and collectibles coming to the block.

For 2005, Nadeau included a wide variety of upscale furniture, decorative accessories, art, jewelry, and collectibles. Nadeau said there were some 30 consignors, most of them estates, from all over Connecticut, including Hartford, Lakeville in the state’s northwest corner, and several shoreline towns on Long Island Sound. Three major consignments were in the sale, the largest being 90 lots from the estate of Georgette Auerbach Koopman of West Hartford. Koopman was the great-granddaughter of Gerson Fox, founder of G. Fox and Company, a prestigious downtown Hartford department store from 1918 to 1993.

The auction brought 554 lots to the block, and there was strong bidding throughout the sale. A trio of very different types of items achieved the day’s highest prices. Heading the results was a gigantic (13'6" x 21' ) Farrahan Sarouk carpet from the Koopman estate. Estimated at $20,000/30,000, it left the block at $36,800 (includes buyer’s premium).

The runner-up in the sale’s prices was a suite of French Empire gilt metal-mounted and gilt-decorated mahogany and beechwood seating furniture from the first half of the 19th century. It had a sofa and six fauteuil armchairs, all upholstered and with original Aubusson tapestry panels on the backrests. Ed Nadeau said he had sold the same set in 1997 for $38,000. This time around the lot made $32,200 (est. $30,000/40,000).

In third place was a framed 14½" x 21¾" oil on canvas painting of two berry baskets, one overturned, with strawberries. The work was signed by Charles Ethan Porter (1847-1923) and went to a bidder on the phone at $23,000 (est. $15,000/ 20,000).

Other paintings did not appear to be of strong interest to the bidders, and most topped out near or below their low-end estimates. Three paintings each sold for $3450: a framed oil on canvas moonlit scene on Lowell Canal, Massachusetts, signed by Elisha Taylor Baker (1831-1890), estimate $4000/6000; a country landscape signed by Frank Bicknell (1866-1943), estimate $3500/5500; and a 25" x 30" western mountain landscape signed by Robert Wood (1889-1979), estimate 3500/5500.

The auction began with a run of 74 lots of jewelry, 28 of them from the Koopman estate. The first lot offered was a pair of 14k gold fur clips in a stylized "open fist, closed fist" design of two hands, each set with three small rubies and two diamonds. The lot certainly got the sale off to a skyrocketing start. Estimated at $250/400, it opened on a $300 absentee offer. Telephone bidders quickly eliminated would-be buyers in the room, then, after a protracted bidding battle between two of them, the lot sold for $6900.

The second lot in the sale provided a similar surprising result. It was an antique gold and silver brooch with a leaf and flower pattern of stones, diamonds, and an oval blister pearl. It also went soaring over its $400/700 predicted price to $2645. Other moneymaking jewelry lots included a platinum flower pin at $3105 (est. $1500/2000) and a platinum bow pin at $2875 (est. $1200/1500).

Over the years, Nadeau’s gallery has become known as a primary source for furniture made by Margolis and Fineberg, two well-respected families of cabinetmakers who had their shops in Hartford. The 2005 sale included 11 lots of signed Margolis pieces and another six attributed to that maker. Differing from most Nadeau auctions, there was only one lot of Fineberg furniture. Ed Nadeau said there was no special significance to that situation; it was simply "the luck of the draw" in what was consigned.

Top price results for Margolis furniture went to a signed custom Federal-style 73" x 41½" x 26" inlaid mahogany and mahogany veneer sideboard at $12,650 (est. $6000/8000); another signed inlaid mahogany veneer sideboard after the original attributed to Aaron Chapin at $21,850 (est. $10,000/15,000); and a rare signed custom mahogany carved Chippendale-style slant-front shell-carved desk with secret compartment, 39" x 42½" x 23", at $6325 (est. $10,000/15,000).

The only Fineberg piece in the auction, a custom 72" high x 35" wide mahogany Chippendale-style highboy, made $4600 (est. $3000/4000).

Among the surprising results in the furniture lots was a Victorian two-piece maple and bird’s-eye maple bedroom suite expected to sell in the $3000/5000 range but finding a buyer on the phone at $10,350.

Four tall-case clocks were in the sale and sold at prices close to their estimates. Making $11,500 (est. $8000/12,000) was an 8'8" Edwardian marquetry mahogany clock by the Tobey Furniture Company, Chicago, Illinois. Two circa 1910 carved mahogany clocks came to the block. One by J.B. Japp, Cincinnati, Ohio, sold for $10,350 (est. $7000/10,000), while another, measuring 8'2", signed by Walter Durfee and marked Tiffany and Company on the dial, topped out at $9200 (est. $8000/12,000). The fourth clock, a 7'11" mahogany example signed by the Waltham Clock Company, fetched $3737.50 (est. $4000/6000).