15
Well, At Least One Lucky Thing Happened Between 1945 and 1949
"The family of a Long Island Holocaust survivor can keep a $10 million ancient Assyrian gold tablet he received in exchange for a few packs of smokes on the streets of post-war Berlin, a judge has ruled."
-Well at least something good came out of the Holocaust?
Nice try.
Also, if I had a dollar for every…
Wait, that actually comes pretty close.
in related news, it was totally worth it to get those smokes
Right, so much for getting people to quit by making them too expensive.
I think I traded baseball cards with this guy in the mid eighties.
did you also live next to that asshole kid who took advantage of your belief that baseball cards were just for fun, and obviously all worth the same? all my good 1985 rookies were gone by the time I knew what that meant! Grrrrr….
I had the problem of immediately thinking any old card was automatically better. My '87 Topps McGwire, the one with the wood border? Gone for a '78 Bob Horner.
Quit complaining about he price of smokes in New York.
The idea for an Inconsistent Pleadings vertical was born?
I'm pretty sure this was the plot of an Ian Fleming 007 short story.
Except that dude got killed by an octopus.
So, um, no mention of giving it back to the Iraqis?
I have some knowledge of this stuff, and here goes: I think the story is false, carefully fabricated to create a backstory that is impossible to check. Russian soldiers who were caught by their superiors with looted art were shot; they were not known for handing what was obvs.gold for cigs. Flamembaum also returned stateside with 'coins', which further suggests looting–it was rampant among American troops. The 10 million dollar figure is interesting, as it puts the piece in play for international prosecution–where there is no statute of limitations. I expect there will be a settlement in the 2-3 million range, it will return to Germany and Iraq will immediately petition for its repatriation. I suppose we'll have to keep reading the NYPost (really, Choire?) to see if I'm right.
I suppose you're not buying my story that during the 2003 blackout I traded a flashlight for this lovely Vermeer.
One flashlight? No. Two flashlights, a cigarette lighter (Ronson, circa 1968) and a case of Mallomars, maybe. Call me, we'll talk provenance.