TV history exhibit hits auction block

AUBURN, Ind. (WANE) - Everything onced housed in the Philo T. Farnsworth museum in Auburn hit the auction block Saturday morning.

For more than five years people could walk through television history at the National Military History Center . But by Friday,  all the items had stickers and were ready for the auction block on Saturday.

Hundreds of items like old TV's and posters went on sale inside the Victory Museum and  online .

"Farnsworth history is a big deal for Fort Wayne," said Victory Museum curator Josh Conrad. "A lot of the pieces are going to stay in Fort Wayne. There's the Fort Wayne Historical Society, and they're getting key pieces they'd like to add to their collection."

Some items sold for as little as $5.00 dollars while others garnered more than $1,000 dollars.

The auctioneers at Littlejohn Auctions expect most of the exhibit to sell, thanks to the internet. There's already been interest from as far away as Australia.

"We're expecting it to go very well. We've had a lot of response from around the U.S., from the east coast to the west coast," Littlejohn said. "[The internet] allows many people to bid that wouldn't even know about it."

There are about 700 different auctions. Some are individual items, like old TVs or radios, and other auctions are for collections of memorabilia.

The auction started Saturday at 9:30 a.m. and is expected to last until around 4 p.m.

Once the television exhibit is no longer in the museum, the room will be used for the new American Heritage Exhibit. It will have items from the Revolutionary War up until World War I.

"[There will be] uniforms, ammunition, mini-dioramas, and materials soldiers would have carried and used in the military," Emily Disbro, Education Director at the National Military History Center, said.

A door will lead out of the American Heritage room into the current World War I room.