We all want to make a sweet thrift store score. It doesn't happen often. But hoo boy, when it does:
A Delaware woman who thought she had bought an old painting for $4 at a thrift shop is expected to sell it for hundreds of thousands of dollars after it turned out to be a work by American master N.C. Wyeth.
We should point here out that this lucky lady did, in fact, "buy an old painting for $4 at a thrift shop." It just turned out to be super valuable!
She didn't know that for a while, though — like for a long time. She bought the painting in 2017 and hung it in her home thinking it was just a reproduction.
Yet she posted it on a Facebook group this spring — one titled "Things found in Walls," probably the most exciting-sounding group on the Internet — and folks began urging her to get the painting checked out.
She did, and lo and behold, the sucker was genuine: It was indeed painted by N.C. Wyeth, the great New England painter and illustrator. The painting is expected to fetch at least $150,000 and perhaps as high as $250,000 at auction next month.
The scene depicted in the painting "shows a merciless foster mother, Senora Gonzaga Moreno, and an orphan, Ramona."
The bargain-hunter found the painting at the Savers thrift store in New Hampshire, although I wouldn't go there looking for another miracle find — I imagine they'll be looking over their painting stock with a little more discernment in the future.
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