A case of unopened hockey cards featuring potentially dozens of Wayne Gretzky rookies sold at auction Saturday for a whopping $3.7 million.
A sealed case of 1979-1980 O-Pee-Chee hockey cards was gathering dust in a Canadian family’s home until the rare and valuable card was discovered while cleaning out a storage room.
Heritage Auctions, which sold the case, called the find “the greatest unopened find of the 21st century.”
The auction house estimated that the 48-pack case (10,752 cards) contained approximately 27 rare, unused rookie cards of Gretzky from his first season with the Edmonton Oilers.
But the new owner (whose name has not been disclosed) will likely never know exactly how many cards feature the Great One.
A spokesperson for Heritage Auctions told The Associated Press that sealed boxes and packs are even rarer than rookie cards, so winning bidders are unlikely to open them.
Regina’s family, who found the card, will earn $3.1 million from selling it.
My father is an old-school collector and originally planned to open the cases he had bought many years ago and make sets of cards to sell, but it turned out to be an incredible stroke of luck. BBC reported.
“Amazingly, our consignor had no idea he was in possession of this outrageous grail case until he went through a pile of long-forgotten boxes at his home in Saskatchewan. .There were piles of dead stock cards from the late 1970s and early 1980s, purchased directly from wholesalers,” Heritage Auctions said.
The family, who requested anonymity, held a small viewing party to see the bidding process, the company told the BBC, adding they were “thrilled” by the final bid.
