MINNEAPOLIS— A pair of iconic ruby slippers worn by Judy Garland in “The Wizard of Oz” and stolen from a museum nearly two decades ago sold at auction Saturday for a winning bid of $28 million.
Heritage Auctions had estimated they would fetch $3 million or more, but the rapid bidding far exceeded that amount and tripled it within minutes. A pair of telephone bidders flew back and forth for fifteen minutes as the price rose to the final, eye-watering amount.
Including the fee from the Dallas auction house, the unknown buyer will ultimately pay $32.5 million.
Online bidding, which started last month, totaled $1.55 million before live bidding began late Saturday afternoon.
The sparkling red heels were on display at the Judy Garland Museum in her hometown of Grand Rapids, Minnesota, in 2005, when Terry Jon Martin used a hammer to smash the glass of the museum’s door and display case.
Their whereabouts remained a mystery until the FBI found them in 2018. Martin, now 77, who lives near Grand Rapids in northern Minnesota, was not publicly exposed as the thief until he was indicted in May 2023. He pleaded guilty in October 2023. He was in a wheelchair and on supplemental oxygen when he was sentenced to prison last January due to his ill health.
His attorney, Dane DeKrey, explained before sentencing that Martin, who had a long history of burglaries and receiving stolen property, tried to get “one last score” after a longtime associate with connections to the mafia told him that the shoes had to be sold. be adorned with real jewels to justify their $1 million insured value. But a fence — someone who buys stolen goods — later told him the rubies were just glass, DeKrey said. So Martin got rid of the slippers. The lawyer did not clarify how.
The alleged fence, Jerry Hal Saliterman, 77, of the Minneapolis suburb of Crystal, was charged in March. He was also in a wheelchair and on oxygen when he first appeared in court. He is due to appear in court in January and has not yet entered a plea, although his lawyer has said he is not guilty.
The shoes were returned in February to memorabilia collector Michael Shaw, who had loaned them to the museum. They were one of many pairs worn by Garland during the filming, but only four pairs are known to have survived. In the film, to return from Oz to Kansas, Dorothy had to click her heels three times and repeat, “There’s no place like home.”
As Rhys Thomas, author of “The Ruby Slippers of Oz,” put it, the sequined shoes from the beloved 1939 musical have “taken more twists and turns than the Yellow Brick Road.”
More than 800 people had followed the slippers, and the company’s Web page for the auction had been viewed nearly 43,000 times as of Thursday, said Robert Wilonsky, vice president of the auction house.
Among those bidding to take the slippers home was the Judy Garland Museum, which shortly afterward posted on Facebook that it was not making a winning bid. The museum had been campaigning for donations to supplement the money raised by the city of Grand Rapids during the annual Judy Garland Festival and the $100,000 set aside this year by Minnesota lawmakers to help the museum purchase the slippers.
After the slippers were sold, the auctioneer told bidders and spectators in the audience and those watching online that the previous record for an entertainment piece of memorabilia was $5.52 million, for the white dress worn by Marilyn Monroe atop a windswept subway grate.
The auction also included other memorabilia from “The Wizard of Oz,” such as a hat worn by Margaret Hamilton, who played the original Wicked Witch of the West. That item cost $2.4 million, or a total final cost to the buyer of $2.93 million.
The story of “The Wizard of Oz” has gained new attention in recent weeks with the release of the film “Wicked,” an adaptation of the megahit Broadway musical, a prequel of sorts that reimagines the character of the Wicked Witch of the West .
Note: The above video originally aired on December 5
