The former home of the author of the extremely popular books series "The Lord of the Rings," J.R.R. Tolkien, was the setting where a builder about to demolish the home came across three postcards addressed to Tolkien, which should birng a significant amount of money to the builder.
According to the lucky fellow Stephen Malton, "Before we demolish a house we do an internal strip out.
"One of the main features was a fireplace, and upon removing that we came across three postcards. The third one was a postcard dated 1968 and addressed to J.R.R. Tolkien."
The significant discovery will add to the already valuable carved wooden fireplace in the house, which inludes a marble inlay, and is probably worth about $250,000 on its own, according to preliminary research by Malton on the Internet. Adding the postcards will about double the value of the overall find in the house to about $500,000.
He has already communicated with the Tolkien Estate, which gave their blessing to him on selling the pieces.
One of the postcards was signed only "Lin,' which is assumed to be Lin Carter, who wrote a book about Tolkien in 1969 titled, "Tolkien: A Look Behind 'The Lord of the Rings.'"
Tolkien had lived in the home in the town of Poole from 1968 to 1972. He died the next year at the age of 81.
Well here I do not understand as it is possible to destroy art!
Posted by: Bernard Lavilliers | July 9, 2008 4:14 AM | Permalink to Comment