Expert: Barbara K. Acchino - 3/30/2010

Question
Hello,  My mother had a long beautiful life. One of her passions was collecting thimbles. We lost her last year and for the past year her collection was displayed in our church's hall.  Now we have them back, but no one in the family is interested in keeping the collection together. Everyone agreed the fun was watching Mom's enjoyment in obtaining all her finds!  I have found 2 ladies who live approx. 4 hours away who are interested in purchasing  the collection.  She had such an assortment. We are looking at approx. 800 thimbles with such diversity. She had several sets: the presidents, state flowers, the 12 apostles, Snow White and the 7 Dwarfs to name a few. Most of the thimbles are porcelain, but she did have some pewter, sterling, plastic, etc.  They range from places to advertising to just plain cute.  I believe there were several mechanical ones also.  We considered selling on ebay, but that would be very time consuming and frankly, none of us have the ambition and know how to deal with that many.  Since these ladies are interested in purchasing the entire collection, how would we go about placing a monetary value on it?  I have been looking around locally and cannot find anyone in the mid Michigan area who has any expertise on thimbles.  I would appreciate any input you may have.  Thank you.

Answer
Hello Dolores.  The best advice I can offer in this situation is to ask the potential buyers to make their best offers.  The majority of the thimbles you mention are contemporary.  They usually do not bring the price of investment, since they were mass produced.  You do not say what state you live in, but you may find thimble collectors in your area by visiting www.thimblecollectors.com.  They have a listing of clubs by state.  You could contact the one closest to you to see if anyone would be willing to look at your collection to give you an approximate value.  If there are no antiques dealers in your area who appraise collections (for a fee) you may want to watch ebay for selling prices of similiar items in your collection.  Barbara