oakvander

Hi Oakvander,

I'm located in Petaluma, CA, just north of San Francisco. I've spent my life in the maritime community here (my dad was in the shipping business with American President Lines.) I've been involved with other models folks sought to donate to the local museums through my connections with the late Karl Kortum, the founder of the San Francisco Maritime Museum. (I am an attorney by profession and a local maritime historian by avocation.) I've been building ship models on and off, as well as building, sailing, and maintaining my own wooden yachts for over fifty years. I've studied ship models "in person" in maritime museums in the U.S. and Europe. While I don't consider myself a "professional" in the field, I have to say that I can't imagine there is any museum that would be interested in accepting this model for any purpose other than to sell it off to a decorator or auction house, which for their purposes, would not be worth the effort because of the cost to restore it to marketable condition may well exceed the value of the model itself once it's restored. This isn't to suggest the model is "worthless," but only that those in the business of buying and selling models are looking to make a profit and little else. Moreover, the model is of a vessel with absolutely no local connection, so museums wouldn't be interested. Finally, as is becoming apparent from the posts in your thread, the model itself has no remarkable provenance, although we do know it appears to be a copy of the 16th Century NMG model whose prototype itself cannot be identified. 

As someone mentioned, there may be a library, a yacht club, or a waterfront bar that might be interested in it for use as decor, but I doubt any of these would pay money for it nor provide an IRS deductible donation receipt for it for anything more than the statutory $500 maximum limit without a written appraisal for it that satisfied the IRS requirements. Here again, none of these would be interested in the model unless it was restored, the cost of which would far exceed the amount of any net recovery from a charitable donation deduction.

Another problem with selling models is that they are very expensive to ship anywhere because their cases must be properly crated to prevent breakage and they require very special handling by specialist shippers. They rarely survive a long-haul ride in the back of a semi-trailer. Here again, the shipping and special handling costs could well exceed the market value of the model, so the market area is likely to be limited to local buyers.

If the above discouraging assessment proves to be the case after their further efforts, I'd hate to see this otherwise nicely built model end up in the back of a Goodwill truck or the like. As I have done with deserving models before, I would be happy and grateful to "give it a good home," and restore it for my own "collection," which is hardly what anyone would call "museum quality," but interesting nonetheless. I hate to see well-build models die. However, the economics of it all being that the most I can justify offering for the model is to restore, preserve, and and appreciate it. If that it appears to the owners to be the best option left to them, I'd be happy to have it.

If you or they wish to discuss it further with me, you can contact me at robert@cleek-elin.com or phone at 415-408-8464.

BOB CLEEK