1953-1954 "Playboy" First Issues | Jacksonville, Hour 2 Preview

they were my grandfather's he loved beautiful women and taking pictures of beautiful women so an playboy came out he thought what a perfect magazine got'em each one by one saved them all and over the years Pema kind of lost her pizzazz with them she knew about your grandfather owning them oh yeah no problem she had no problem with the mone we weren't under the bed or anything no no out in the open they didn't have any problems with it it was just when it came time for them to move or when she wanted to clean the house she'd want to throw him out right and he kept saying no no no and then finally he would agree and he lowered his collection incredibly down to just this when he passed she still wanted to throw him away and we said no right so good so someone had said to the family yes well it's an incredible collection I thank you for so much for bringing them in they're really interesting what we have here are the first twelve issues of Playboy so the first issue of Playboy the one with Marilyn Monroe was issued at the end of 1953 we have monthly additions into 1954 have you read them may I ask I have looked through a few but it was when I was younger and I wasn't supposed to so I Begley remember the details of what's inside all right they're very interesting obviously the very first issue which we have out here had Marilyn Monroe on the cover she was not actually the centerfold they didn't call the centerfold then she was the sweetheart of the month which obviously is very quaint way to call it the interesting thing is that Hefner was very enterprising he worked for Esquire magazine and then decided to start this magazine for men as he called it and borrowed a thousand dollars from his mother to start it and produced the mock-up of this first copy in his kitchen in Chicago one of the things that these are prized for actually is not just the so to speak illustrations but of course the articles and the writing many of the great writers in America published in this publication we have one of the first C realizations of Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury one of the most important works of post-war literature Kerouac Kurt Vonnegut's Ian Fleming who wrote James Bond also published in Playboy so they're not just a pretty face so to speak one other interesting thing is that the Playboy logo of the bunny that we see in know very well was actually in the first issue he commissioned an art directed to make it and it appeared in the second issue and on from that one forward obviously it's on the cover here of the fifth issue in April of 1954 have you ever had them appraised or any sense of the value well the thing about magazines like this it really comes down to condition it actually turns out that it wasn't that uncommon the first issue was printed in over 50,000 copies which of course for publication is a modest number but there's means there's a lot of them out there and for collecting purposes people really prized the ones that are in perfect condition as more valuable some have sold for five six seven thousand dollars the first issue but this one and the rest of the ones that you have because they were obviously read and well-loved are not in the best of condition nevertheless I'd say they're sort of in the middle range for a set in this condition I would estimate at auction that it would have an estimate of two thousand five hundred to three thousand five hundred dollars so it was a good idea of you to stop your grandmother from throwing them away absolutely

Channel: Antiques Roadshow PBS

Views: 885,823

Rating: 4.700326 out of 5

Keywords: Antiques Roadshow (TV Program), appraisal, Appraiser (Profession), Florida (US State), Jacksonville (City/Town/Village), Playboy (Magazine), magazine, magazines, first, issue, issues, Marilyn Monroe (Celebrity), men, entertainment, Fahrenheit 451 (Book), bunny, Public Broadcasting Service (TV Network), wgbh, preview

Id: PNlZAq45iJg

Length: 3min 30sec (210 seconds)

Published: Tue Oct 14 2014