Da Vinci’s Battle of Anghiari.
The original patent for the Wright Brothers’ Flyer.
My sanity. Not famous, but locating it would constitute the find of the century.
It’s not missing right now, but there was a particular Colt Model 1889 revolver that happened to go down with the USS Maine when it exploded in Havana Harbor. This pistol was recovered, and was given to the Secretary of the Navy, who at that time was this dude named Theodore Roosevelt (you may have heard of him - he got a bit more famous later). Teddy brandished this particular pistol as he rallied his Rough Riders during the famed charge on San Juan Hill.
After Roosevelt’s term as President, the pistol was put on display in the Sagamore Hill Museum, where it was stolen in 1963. It was recovered. However, in 1990, it was stolen again, and this time was not recovered until 2006. The pistol is now back at Sagamore Hill.
If you had asked this question a few years ago, this pistol would have been on your list. It doesn’t qualify now, but the fact that this pistol nearly spent eternity at the bottom of Havana Harbor only to end up in the hands of a future president, and then has been stolen twice made me think that it at least deserved an honorable mention.
The Amber Room
William Shatner’s wig(s) from the set of Star Trek.
See Post #8.
Post #8.
The original trailer to Hitchcock’s Rope.
The gun Sgt. Boston Corbett used to kill John Wilkes Booth.
Along the same lines, Raphael’s Portrait of a Young Man.
If you’re a Hemingway fan, you might like Joe Haldeman’s mind-bending sf novel The Hemingway Hoax, which has a very interesting explanation for the stories’ disappearance.
An estimated one-third of J.S. Bach’s compositions were lost or given away over the years by his disorganized son, to whom he left his papers.
Many, many Civil War dageurreotypes were lost after the war; many of the glass plates are thought to have been cleaned and reused as window panes.
USS Cyclops, a Navy collier: USS Cyclops - Wikipedia
The tramp steamer SS Cotopaxi, shown in the Close Encounters of the Third Kind special edition: SS Cotopaxi - Wikipedia
Flight 19, a Navy training flight of five torpedo bombers (also shown in Close Encounters), and the Mariner flying boat sent out to look for them: Flight 19 - Wikipedia
Not an object, but Theodosia Burr, Aaron Burr’s lovely daughter, was lost somewhere at sea: Theodosia Burr Alston - Wikipedia
engineer_comp_geek, I hadn’t heard that story, but T.R. was Assistant Secretary of the Navy, not the Secretary.
I’ve always wondered about that - you can’t hang it in your foyer, and presumably you can’t insure it, you can’t let any non-criminal acquaintances you have see it… what can you do with it, other than sell it on the black market? But I read a little while ago that these expensive stolen paintings are sometimes used as collateral in drug deals, which I thought was fascinating, if true.
The True Cross.
What do I win?
Actually we have it, we just don’t have the original medium it was recored on which could not be played now a days anyway
As far as I understand, what we have is a copy of a copy, and is of poor quality.
The Gun that killed Hutler
My wife is a medievalist and she’s told me of parchment manuscripts scraped clean and used for file folders. There are actually some lost musical compositions that have been recovered by analyzing the file folders for traces of iron left behind where the notes used to be.
Many, many Civil War photographs may have been converted into windows, but they weren’t daguerreotypes, which are on copper sheets coated with silver. Likely they were ambrotypes which were on glass and cheaper to boot. Ambrotypes were in turn, replaced by tintypes where we’re back to metal plates – iron this time.
He’s dead? Did he at least get to kill off all the Jows?
Also, I suspect that the gun that killed Hitler might be missing, but I don’t know.
Damnit! :smack: