BUYER’S GUIDE TO THE WORLD’S TOP TROPHIES

They may be the trophies that every scientist, actor or athlete dreams of winning, but sometimes even the world’s top awards are just clutter. That at least is the message from the retired experimental physicist Leon Lederman, who is flogging his Nobel prize medal.

In a high-brow equivalent of cash in the attic, the 92-year-old says he is selling the medal because it is just taking up space in his log cabin. Lederman used his original prize money to buy his holiday home and now wants to get rid of the 1988 trophy. “The prize has been sitting on a shelf somewhere for the last 20 years,” he says. “It seems like a logical thing to do.”

But Lederman is not the first Nobel winner to clear out his cabinet. Last year, James Watson, who helped to discover the double-helix structure of DNA, put his own medal up for auction, only for the new owner, billionaire Alisher Usmanov, to return it to the biologist – despite shelling out £2.6m.

In fact, just about every one of the world’s most coveted awards has found its way on to the market at some point. Here’s a buyer’s guide ...

Grammys
For guitarist Dave Burgess, his Grammy was a much-needed nest egg when a family member became ill. He won the top music award for his jukebox classic Tequila, recorded in 1958 with other session musicians. But last month the 80-year-old musician decided to sell it to pay for medical bills, putting it up for auction with a $30,000 reserve price, despite objections from the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, which hands out the awards.

Olympic medals
While winning an Olympic medal may take blood, tears and years of training, buying one at auction won’t make you break out into a sweat. Athletes sell them because of financial hardship (Cuban athletes are apparently often quick to sell theirs), or for medical bills (ice hockey player Mark Wells sold his gold medal after a rare genetic condition affected his spinal cord). Some athletes cash-in on their hardware to help good causes. Heavyweight boxer Wladimir Klitschko, who won a gold medal in 1996, sold his for $1m to raise money for a charitable foundation he set up for Ukrainian children.

To read the complete article, see:
How much for your Nobel prize? A buyer’s guide to the world’s top trophies (www.theguardian.com/science/shortcuts/2015/may/27/nobel-prize-buyers-guide-to-worlds-top-trophies-leon-lederman)

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