Giant early tech trove auctioned

By Jason Palmer
Science and technology reporter, BBC News

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Vintage gadgets under the hammer

A vast and eclectic collection of early technology is on sale at Bonhams auction house.

The 758 lots comprise half a million individual items, of which many are "world firsts". It has all been amassed by antiques dealer Michael Bennett-Levy.

At the heart of the auction are 24 pre-war televisions - the largest collection ever assembled for sale - with the oldest dating back to 1930. He has one of John Logie Baird's "Televisors" from that year, along with the window display model used to market it.

There's even a do-it-yourself kit to build a similar, mechanical TV from 1934 - available to Daily Express readers at the time for a little over £5.

All of it will be sold, along with 102 post-war models that together make up a complete history of TV.

"The first of everything in every field of technology is by definition important and it suddenly occurred to me in 1991 that no-one seemed to be collecting the world's first televisions," Mr Bennett-Levy said.

"The rest of this collection I thought I ought to do something with television design. But I had no idea, so I just collected everything and what you see is what I think is the best of what I found."

Notes of the first BBC transmission's running orders, cues and speech texts

That includes an array of collectibles around the television industry - including a massive TV camera from the early 1950s, and the producer's notes from the first-ever BBC television transmission in 1936 from Alexandra Palace.

Although it is the evident pride of the collection, the auction doesn't stop at television history.

It also comprises a vast and unfeasibly diverse collection of scientific instruments, gramophones, early looms, computers - even a medieval set of thumbscrews.

Aside from what he calls "curio pieces" that range from the simply incongruous to the bizarre, what has driven Mr Bennett-Levy to amass the collection is an unabashed passion for early technology.

"In a nutshell they're boys' toys," he said. "It's great fun getting musical boxes, mechanical antiques of every sort, early scientific instruments, pulling them apart and getting them working again. I like to see how people did things in earlier times.

"I just bought them and sold them and that's how the business grew. I buy things I couldn't possibly afford to have because I don't own them - they're stock."

One byte of memory from the world's first commercial computer

Laurence Fisher, a specialist at Bonhams in mechanical music and early technology, said the collection is rife with the firsts that Mr Bennett-Levy so highly values.

"The collection is very interesting in that it covers centuries, everything from the medieval all the way up to yesterday.

"There are all the important pieces that are firsts: you have one of the first bedwarmers, one of the first food processors, one of the world's first microscopes and one of the first light bulbs - seeing it all together gives a general impression of awe."

Bonhams has been called in to auction off Mr Bennett-Levy's collection because he is moving to France.

"I probably will start dealing again, but it'll be French stuff - French technology," he said.