Nashville Thrift Store Houses An Original Copy Of The Declaration Of Independence
Museum of the American RevolutionAnother rare 1823 copy of the Declaration of Independence on display at the Museum of the American Revolution.
In 2006, Michael Sparks was searching through Music City Thrift Shop in Nashville when he discovered what he believed to be a print of the Declaration of Independence. He purchased the document for $2.48, and when he got home, he started doing some research.
Sparks found that John Quincy Adams had commissioned 200 copies of the Declaration of Independence in 1820 while he was Secretary of State. He reached out to Raynors’ Historical Collectible Auctions in North Carolina, and experts determined that Sparks’ document dated to 1823 and was one of those official copies.
The thrift store artifact went up for auction with a starting bid of $125,000 — and it sold for $477,650.
After Sparks’ story made headlines, a man named Stan Caffy came forward to admit that he’d been the one to donate the document. He claimed that he’d purchased it at a yard sale around 1996 and hung it in his garage, but when he got married, his new wife urged him to get rid of some of his clutter, and he let her take it to the thrift store.
According to Snopes, Caffy stated, “If I still had it, it would still be hanging here in the garage and I still wouldn’t know it was worth all that. It is just life. So I’m not really upset.”
