Mel Fisher and the Atocha Treasure

[Dan]

(well not exactly to do with metal detecting, it still deals with treasure hunting)

Hi, I was wondering if anybody could share some thoughts on this:

I was at a tiny little house this morning. The old man who owns the house runs a used book shop in the garage. I was poking about looking for anything interesting and came across a book about the treasures of the Atocha. Cool. I have read the stories about Mel Fisher and his finds. I asked how much for the book. He said that this was a special book because it was autographed by 4 people who actually worked on the Atocha recovery. The autographs include Lee and Kim Fisher. Mel's autograph is not in it. Apparently they were at a jewelery store displaying and possibly selling finds from the Atocha. They had books for sale telling the story of the find. The old man bought a book on the basis that everybody sign it. The local paper ran an article on this and the old man clipped it and saved it in the back of the book. He wants $60.00 Canadian for it.

Is this a worthy purchase or a waste of money?
Thanks, Dan.

[Beachcomber]

Re: Mel Fisher and the Atocha Treasure

If you are looking at it as something to buy and then resell at a profit it may not be that great of deal. But if you are interested in owning a piece of history and something that is more special than just owning the book without the signatures then it may just be a fair price. Since he has the newspaper article about the book signing which I would assume would go along as part of the purchase and which would go a long way toward verifying that the signatures are authenticate. The values of anything that may be of historical significance or of things that are rare is always subjective at best and when it comes right down to it all that really matters is how much you really want it!!!!!!!!!!! If you are a Mel Fisher fan and collect Mel Fisher Memorabilia then thsi book might just be something that you would enjoy having in your collection even at $60. Mel Fisher has always been one of my heros JMHO

HH

Beachcomber