Looks like Heritage Auction Galleries' CEO is having a garage sale tomorrow at the Hall of State in Fair Park -- and you're invited, though you'll need a few big bucks should you want to purchase some items from his collection of Texas collectibles. Steve Ivy's looking to part with a few books, some maps, some autographs -- stuff like that. "I'm very pleased to be in a position now to share this passion with other collectors, and to help develop a collecting area that is growing stronger every single day," Ivy says here about the sale.
And among the junk with which he's parting: A little sumpin-sumpin titled, so very briefly, Translations of the Laws, Orders, and Contracts, on Colonization, from January, 1821, up to this time, in virtue of which Col. Stephen F. Austin, has introduced and settled foreign emigrants in Texas, with an explanatory introduction. In other words, only the earliest-known book printed in the state, the few remaining copies of which reside in New York, Yale and the University of Texas at Austin. The current bid's $130,000; should go for, oh, $150,000 to $200,000. Also being sold: Francis Moore's Map and Description of Texas, of which there are only three known to exist; a Sam Houston-signed document or two; and a dagger taken off a Mexican soldier at the Battle of San Jacinto in 1836. The entire list of items for sale is available here, just in time for the holidays. --Robert Wilonsky
