GUEST:
This is a piece of lawn furniture. It's a rocking chair that my, uh, my grandfather made in the '20s. He did a lot of work in wrought iron. And then transitioned into, uh, aluminum after the war. He made two of these, one for himself and one for his wife. We were visiting my uncle, and my sister sat down in one of them, and was rocking back and forth and said, "Aren't these great?" And he said, "You want one?" And he packaged it up and sent it up to us here in Alaska.

APPRAISER:
And what year did you receive the chair?

GUEST:
We got this chair, we think, in, somewhere in the 2000s.

APPRAISER:
Your grandfather's name was...

GUEST:
George C. Hyde. But he never went by George, he went by Ted. He passed away when I was 24. So we got to spend some summers together and, and, uh, Christmases and things like that. He was very kind and very generous. He had a big sense of humor. And he talked to us about his work a little bit. He said he was always interested in the line. It was the flow of the line.

APPRAISER:
That's amazing.

GUEST:
So one of the things I love about this chair is, this whole hoop right here is one piece that starts here...

APPRAISER:
Right.

GUEST:
...goes all the way around...

APPRAISER:
Right.

GUEST:
...and then ends down here in the curve. He was born in 1899. Left-handed. And, uh, when he went to school, they wouldn't let him be left-handed. They made him learn to write right-handed.

APPRAISER:
Okay.

GUEST:
So he was ambidextrous. He put out a lot of work. And one of the people that was in his community said, "How can you put out this much work this fast?" And Ted said, "Just watch." And so he held the, the work with his left hand - and hammered with the right on it. And when his right arm got tired, he switched the tongs over to the left side, and hammered with the left hand.

APPRAISER:
Wow, well...

GUEST:
And the guy said, "That's not fair."

APPRAISER:
(chuckles): And that's how he got so much produced, right?

GUEST:
Yup.

APPRAISER:
Did metalwork all over, from Greenwich, Connecticut, to Watertown, New York.

GUEST:
Yup. He made andirons, he made fences, he made furniture. He made all kinds of things.

APPRAISER:
This chair was made, I, I'm guessing, late '20s. Marcel Breuer made the Wassily Chair...

GUEST:
Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER:
...in 1925.

GUEST:
Oh.

APPRAISER:
A tubular chair. It was a, one of the first metal chairs.

GUEST:
Okay.

APPRAISER:
Five years later, your grandfather is making this totally modern chair. It could be se, 1970, 1975.

GUEST:
Yeah.

APPRAISER:
Made of aluminum...

GUEST:
Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER:
...which had only been used in America since 1924. He was the cutting edge. This chair is such a revolutionary creation. If you think about it, in 1929, Modernism was going on in Europe. He's making this in America, in Watertown, New York. He's coming up with these, these armrests, which curve, and I sat in it before, when you weren't looking, okay?

GUEST:
(laughs)

APPRAISER:
Sorry-- and it was so comfortable. You told me you rolled it across the lawn.

GUEST:
Right, you can roll it across the lawn to get it where you need to go.

APPRAISER:
I mean, that's brilliant.

GUEST:
Yeah.

APPRAISER:
This is pure Modernism.

GUEST:
Mm.

APPRAISER:
This piece has such a great patina because you have the aluminum, and then you have the aluminum, uh, rivets...

GUEST:
Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER:
...but the seat is brass.

GUEST:
Yup.

APPRAISER:
And I love the, the, the verdigris here at the top...

GUEST:
Yup.

APPRAISER:
...uh, from being outs, outdoors. Can we rock it a little?

GUEST:
Sure, sure.

APPRAISER:
Is that okay?

GUEST:
Go ahead. That's what it's for.

APPRAISER:
That's nice, nice, uh, nice. George C. Hyde is a name that I believe the world of modern furniture is going to know.

GUEST:
Oh.

APPRAISER:
To discover a craftsman like this, who people don't know about, and they should know about, is exciting. A conservative auction estimate on this chair would be $3,000 to $5,000.

GUEST:
Wow. Wow.

APPRAISER:
And I think on a good day, maybe much, much more.

GUEST:
That's great, that's great.

APPRAISER:
An insurance value on this chair...

GUEST:
Yeah.

APPRAISER:
...could easily be $7,500. $7,500.

GUEST:
Wow. Wow, that's crazy. That's crazy.

APPRAISER:
It's, it's fabulous.