Zane Grey Material Flies (Unexpectedly) High

by David Hewett

Lang’s Sporting Collectables, Inc.’s two-day sale in Boxborough, Massachusetts, featured some outstanding fishing-related offerings, such as Heddon lures, reels, fly rods, boxes of hand-tied flies, and advertising pieces, and brought a total of $1.7 million. That figure made it Lang’s most successful auction ever.

The people at Lang’s know their fishing stuff pretty well and were able to come up with presale estimates that were quite realistic for most lots. John and Debbie Ganung purchased Lang’s from its original owner five years ago and have amassed a list of 25,000 active collectors. They know what will fly, what won’t, and what people will pay for most fishing-related objects.

For the April sale, however, they were at a loss to come up with estimates for one group of material consigned to them. The grandson of the secretary to Romer Grey, the son of American author Zane Grey, consigned a mixed batch of material to Lang’s, some 67 lots in this sale. Evidently, after Zane Grey’s death, most of the estate went to the surviving family members, his wife, Dolly, and another son and daughter. The house in California went to son Romer. After Romer’s death, his heirs wanted his secretary, Norine Fife, to have something of value, so the family gave her the contents of the office.

Zane Grey (1872-1939) was brought up to be a dentist by his farmer, preacher, and dentist father but won a scholarship to the University of Pennsylvania based upon his prowess on a baseball diamond. He actually played on a minor-league team at one time. His brother, Romer, played for the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Zane Grey had other interests too. One, which would remain with him throughout his life, was revealed when he was named in a paternity suit while still in college. As for writing, Grey wanted to do pieces on the sporting life and did, but a western trip inspired his foray into the genre that would make him famous.

Riders of the Purple Sage was his breakthrough book and sold over two million copies. He could then devote his time to his true love, fishing. He wrote about 90 books about fishing, the Old West, and baseball. His stories were reworked into several movies, and Zane Grey owned a movie studio in California at one time, which he sold to Famous Players-Lasky Corporation (which became Paramount).

The general public may not be aware of how famous Zane Grey was in his day, but the characters that sprang from his stories include the Lone Ranger, King of the Royal Mounted, and Sergeant Preston. He also popularized deep-sea sport fishing and held several records for various species. A brand of fish line even bore his name.

The Ganungs felt comfortable assigning estimates to most of Grey’s fishing material. Prices for books by the western specialist can also be found, but the really personal items left them up in the air.

“We had no idea how popular his non-fishing material was,” said Debbie Ganung. “We didn’t know that there would be thousands of people going after his personal stuff. We put one hundred to two hundred dollars on some lots, like one hundred pages of manuscript or a group of fifteen letters, because none of that stuff had ever been sold publicly before. That stuff took off and went for thousands, many thousands! Only then did we learn that it had traded privately for those figures.”

Debbie Ganung is correct. The demand for Zane Grey handwritten material is phenomenal. One hundred and forty-five pages of handwritten stories and notes on fishing, estimated at $200/300, sold for $6160 (includes buyer’s premium). A 33-page handwritten answer to critics in the 1920’s brought $3080. An 85-page personal journal covering the year 1918 brought $5600. You know a subject is popular when his passport, the first lot offered, estimated at $200/300, brings ten times that at $2240. One book, Tales of Fishes, a 320-page edition from the 1920’s by the British publisher Hodder & Stoughton, brought $4500 from an Internet bidder. It was signed. Unsigned copies are available on the Internet for under $100 and 1919 first editions for under $500. Evidently the signature adds about $4000 to the book’s value.

“What we were amazed by was the kind of life Zane Grey led. He had a very advanced marriage,” Debbie Ganung said. “He had sexual affairs with other women, a lot of other women,” she said.

“He went on trips with more than one woman and described what happened to his wife, Dolly,” Debbie Ganung continued, “and sometimes you could tell that she was bothered by it, and in others she seemed more reconciled to what was going on.” Six lots containing 12 to 18 letters by Zane to Dolly or Romer brought prices ranging from $1960 to $3024.

“There’s a bit of mystery in those personal letters regarding what has to be descriptions of their sexual practices,” Debby Ganung said. “There was a code that was used in his letters to his mistresses, I guess, for lack of a better word. They pop up at odd places, like he will be writing about something else, and then all of a sudden he starts in with his code.”

The highest-selling lot in the small grouping was a 179-page handwritten account of one of Grey’s fishing trips that was later published in Physical Culture magazine in 1931. Estimated at $300/500, it brought $14,560.

A lot of 390 pages of handwritten manuscripts—one story is believed to be the draft of Hole in the Wall, the other Amber’s Mirage—estimated at $100/150, brought $10,640.

A lot with 25 documents and books, including two copies of Zane Grey’s 1922 Christmas book, The Bonefish Brigade, brought $7280. A single spool of Zane Grey-owned Ashaway Line labeled fishing line, with original box, sold for $1200 to an Internet bidder.

The lots at the end of the Zane Grey grouping consisted of stationery and canceled checks. A group of blank letterheads, envelopes, and business cards brought $2760, and five lots of 20 to 25 canceled checks brought from $1344 to $1512 per lot.

Lang’s November 2 and 3 sale will feature more of Zane Grey’s personal possessions, including the fighting chair and harness he used to land record big-game fish; flags, including the broadbill flag flown from The Gladiator, the “ZG” initialed banner flown on The Fisherman, a mako shark flag, and others; leather pants worn on his Western adventures; large colored fishing photos; luggage; leather-bound and signed first editions; original Lambrie & Mabry blueprints of The Fisherman II (the ship that caused near-bankruptcy for Grey); South Bend Bait Company prototype lures; important original art; items from Grey’s camp; autographs, letters, and more. It should cause another fishing frenzy.

For more information, contact Lang’s Sporting Collectables at (315) 841-4623 or visit www.langsauction.com

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