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  • Hey, how's it going?

  • Pretty good.

  • I have a an interesting old rare book I'd like to sell.

  • Okay, This is the Treaty of Amity, Commerce and Navigation, otherwise known as Jay's Treaty.

  • But what's special about this is this is Thomas Jefferson's personal copy.

  • Oh, um, this is absolutely amazing.

  • Anything out of Jefferson's library is really where?

  • Because his original library, he's sold to the Library of Congress, and then he went home.

  • One dances.

  • I can't no books.

  • Where in the heck did you get this?

  • Uh, my great great grandfather worked in the senate, and he did at the estate auction of Jefferson's retirement library.

  • He bought that along with a number of other books.

  • This all the books he bother.

  • These are all books he bought.

  • This is the only one that's still left in the family.

  • And you can see that he paid 15 cents for it.

  • Really?

  • I'm gonna ask a little bit more than that.

  • Okay.

  • That is pretty damn amazing.

  • I mean, you got the receipt.

  • You can't really get better proof than this right here.

  • Jay's treaty was a very unpopular piece of legislation, but it was really significant because It was our first major treaty with another country.

  • So if this book actually belonged to Thomas Jefferson, we're talking a lot of money.

  • And there's actually something else very interesting about this book.

  • I believe that this written in here by John Bakley is in Thomas Jefferson's handwriting.

  • This is super exciting.

  • I'm assuming you want to sell it.

  • Is that why you're here?

  • Yes.

  • Okay.

  • And how much were you looking to get it?

  • I'm looking for 75,000.

  • Okay, um, I'm gonna call a friend of mine.

  • I think he actually pee himself over this thing.

  • Hey.

  • Hey.

  • Got a few minutes.

  • I'm gonna give him a call.

  • That's all right.

  • That's fine.

  • Hopefully we can make a deal.

  • Good.

  • Okay.

  • Thank you.

  • I'm maybe a little concerned that the expert might not know exactly what this book is on.

  • If he expresses an opinion with which I disagree, I won't hesitate to set him straight.

  • Oh, it is what he said it is.

  • I'm gonna be very excited.

  • Person.

  • Well, no, this is the great that he's got the receipt.

  • That's pretty amazing.

  • After the British burned Washington during the War of 18 12 all the books went up in smoke to Jefferson sold his private library.

  • Library of Congress.

  • If this is truly from Jefferson's library, it really could be an American treasure.

  • So let me get this straight.

  • So after he sold all his books, the Library of Congress, he started buying up new books to fill his library.

  • Yes, he really hated the idea of Monticello being empty, and that was called the Retirement Library, which was sold in 18 29.

  • After he died, I was in debt.

  • If I could just flip through the book a little bit more.

  • Jefferson had a secret way of marking his books.

  • He would go and he'd find the eye page and put a T his first initial T in front of the eye page.

  • So, uh, that is what they should look like.

  • They're Thomas Jefferson was one of most important founding fathers and their very few of his authentically own books out there.

  • So when one comes up really is a special time, there's also a name written right here.

  • We don't know if it's in Jefferson's hand or not.

  • John Beckley is actually important in Jefferson's life.

  • He was one of the early campaign managers and a friend of Jefferson and early Ally.

  • I've sold a lot of Jefferson materials and seeing a lot.

  • And that looks like Jefferson's delegate handwriting.

  • Okay, so good to know.

  • Yeah, that's kind of neat.

  • That is an awesome piece of American history.

  • Okay, Now, the big question is, what do you think this would go for?

  • Jefferson to this day remains very popular among autograph collectors.

  • Book collectors.

  • If I were offering this to one of my good clients, I'd probably put a price the $75,000 on it.

  • Okay, Which best price?

  • Well, 75,000 years.

  • My asking price.

  • Okay, I'm a pirate.

  • $40,000.

  • I know that seems a big stretch from 75 but I have to make some money off.

  • It's I don't know if I'm gonna sit on it for a week.

  • I don't know if I'm gonna sit on for five years.

  • Okay?

  • I could, uh, take it down to 60,000.

  • I couldn't do that.

  • I will go 47 I'm I'm skittish at that because there's so few people in this world that have that kind of money to spend on a book.

  • And there's so few books in the world like this.

  • 50,000.

  • That's it.

  • 50.

  • You can have it for 50,000.

  • All walk out of here.

  • Let me have it for 48.

  • I know.

  • I've got a B 50.

  • It's got home.

  • Once I go, I can't go Feel sold.

  • All right.

  • Um, I own a really expensive book.

  • You D'oh!

  • Congratulations.

  • All right, let's go do some paperwork.

  • Okay.

  • All right.

  • All right.

  • Cool.

  • It's hard to see how my great great grandfather could be anything but please, I'm very pleased with.

  • Got $50,000 for it.

  • I would have sold it for less than 50 grand.

Hey, how's it going?

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