1980 "Miracle on Ice" Jim Craig-signed Ticket Stub
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GUEST:
This was a gift that I received when I was about ten years old from my Aunt Tricia. I didn't realize the significance of it then, but about ten years ago, when my mom gave me a box of things from my bedroom and said, "You better go through this before you throw it away," I rummaged through that box, and I, what I found is a ticket from the 1980 Winter Olympics, and it's from the Miracle on Ice game. My Aunt Tricia actually attended that game. She had gone to Lake Placid with a friend, had asked someone to just get them an assortment of tickets, and by some miracle, received the semifinal hockey ticket. This ticket got her into that historic event. And so after the game, Tricia and her friend Julie went out into the Olympic Village, and were celebrating with the rest of the town and the country, and she managed to meet members of the hockey team. Tricia, being a, a very enthusiastic person, was able to get the autograph of one of the players from the U.S. hockey team.
APPRAISER:
You got one really cool aunt, for sure. So what we have here is a, a ticket to the 1980, uh, Miracle on Ice game. The, uh, medal round game, uh, between the, Team U.S.A. and the USSR. It was the game to get into the gold medal game. February 22, 1980, of course, the United States team made up of college kids coached by Herb Brooks, and they went up against the USSR, the greatest hockey team possibly ever assembled, and they had won, I think, five of the last six Olympic golds. Nobody gave the U.S. a chance. But, of course, uh, Herb Brooks inspired these guys, and famously, they've made films about it, and they beat the Russians, and it was a monumental event in sports history. Certainly in United States sports history, and in Olympics history. But what a lot of people don't realize is that the game itself, which the U.S. won 4-3, was not televised live. You know, "Do you believe in miracles?" Yes, Al Michaels, that actually aired later on that night. I love tickets in particular, because these things were there-- they're ephemera, but they're kind of time travelers, too, right? I mean, that, that is the ticket to that event.
GUEST:
Yeah.
APPRAISER:
This is not a full ticket, this is the stub, and Jim Craig was kind of the hero of the game, the goalie, stopped 36 of 39 shots on goal. Jim was from, uh, B.U. He eventually played in the NHL, as well. But, I mean, this was his, of course, his shining moment. She met Jim Craig in the Olympic Village right after the game, and she had him sign it.
GUEST:
With an inscription that to me, is the most inspiring part of the ticket, because it doesn't say, "Miracle on Ice." It doesn't say, "Do you believe in miracles?" It says, "Going for the gold." It gives me goose bumps to say that, because that tells me where his mind was at that time, which was, "Yeah, we beat the Russians, but we're here to win the gold medal."
APPRAISER:
The gold medal game was, I think, two days later.
GUEST:
Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER:
So there was a very short, finite amount of time that he would have signed it like that, which makes this really special. Lake Placid was kind of a small town to host the Winter Olympics. To rub shoulders with these Olympians right after this monumental moment...
GUEST:
Right.
APPRAISER:
Incredible.
GUEST:
Yes.
APPRAISER:
And, and will never, ever happen again. One of the up-and-coming markets is tickets, and for many, many years, it was kind of like a second thought, like, "Oh, you know, everyone's had, has ticket stubs, whatever." But now these things, people are realizing they're, they're very precious. This one's particularly precious, because there was a find of full tickets to this game against the Russians, and those tickets sold, and they did very well out on the open market, and a lot of these Olympians later on signed them, and, and they would sign them, "Miracle on Ice," and, you know, "Do you believe in miracles?"
GUEST:
Right.
APPRAISER:
The stubs are much, much rarer. Usually, it's the other way around. So that's what makes this particularly precious. And then of course, that incredible inscription. I would insure it, probably, for around $15,000.
GUEST:
Wow.
APPRAISER:
And it's one of these things that I think will continue to appreciate in value.
GUEST:
It's priceless to me. It's something I keep prominent in my living room.
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