1898 Kansas City Fire Chief Presentation Badge
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GUEST:
When I was a kid, I went to an estate sale and thought it was neat, picked it up, kind of had it around the house ever since.
APPRAISER:
Any idea or remember what you paid for it roughly?
GUEST:
I don't-- it was too long ago.
APPRAISER:
But I'm assuming you didn't go overboard as a kid spending a lot of money.
GUEST:
No.
APPRAISER:
What you're looking at here is in my opinion one of the finest examples of a fire badge I've seen. It encompasses a lot of different areas of interest. You're dealing with a fire badge, you're also dealing with a fine piece of jewelry. It's a presentation badge which was given to the Kansas City fire chief, George Hale, just before the turn of the century. It's 14-karat gold.
GUEST:
Oh, wow.
APPRAISER:
You have really fine enamel work here. It's engraved and then they set it in blue and red enamel. This is top quality work. If you look here, the wheels on the fire hose turn. These are moveable wheels. So you're not dealing with just an ordinary badge that someone's going to be wearing. If we turn it over, there's a wonderful inscription on the back of it and it's thanking him-- this was given to him by one of the companies in regard to a fire in which he was there protecting their property. Basically, the inscription is for appreciation for the fine job that he did during the course of action during this fire. What's important is that this was made by a really, really fine jeweler. This is signed at the bottom very tiny, it says, "Mermod and Jaccard," which is a St. Louis jeweler of really high quality.
GUEST:
Oh.
APPRAISER:
You have a phenomenal inscription, you have a 19th-century fire badge, presentation badge, to the most important fireman in the city of Kansas City at the time who's a fire chief.
GUEST:
Right.
APPRAISER:
When I was trying to come up with a value for this, I consulted with a few different appraisers on the show and we all kind of came to the same conclusion. At auction, I wouldn't hesitate to estimate this at $10,000 to $15,000.
GUEST:
No way!
APPRAISER:
It's probably, from what they've said and what I think, probably one of the finest fire badges I've ever seen.
GUEST:
Oh, my gosh!
APPRAISER:
It's tremendous. It's got all the bells and whistles.
GUEST:
I'm amazed.
Appraisal Details
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