A Masters Golf Tournament “Green Jacket” sold for $139,348 at Green Jacket Auctions in April 2017. The green jacket is given to the winner of the Masters, held each April at Augusta National Golf Club. The winner can wear the jacket anywhere for the first year, then it is returned to the golf club and stored in a coat room. It was thought that only one jacket, the one that was auctioned in April, had ever been sold. It was bought at a thrift store in 1994 for $5. Research verified that it was a jacket from the early 1950s with all the original labels except the one with the owner’s name. But a few other green jackets that belonged to winners were sold, according to auctioneer Ryan Carey. In 2010, Doug Ford’s 1957 jacket sold for just under $63,000. And in 2013, a 1934 jacket won by Horton Smith brought $682,000, claimed to be the highest price ever paid for a piece of golf memorabilia.
I’m surprised they can’t trace the jacket to a specific player. If the maker’s label tells them it’s from the 1950’s that’s only 10 people. The size of the jacket should eliminate at least half of those. then they can either try to contact player’s relatives or Augusta National.
The big question is to find out if they only make one jacket for a winner. If so, there should be missing jackets. Also, since Augusta has no way of knowing who the winner will be, they must have a rack of “ceremony jackets” for the post tourney ceremony, then the winner is fitted for a custom jacket. Perhaps this jacket, since it has no name tag, is from the rack.
I don’t know if I’d pay that kind of money for a jacket with no name tag. It could have come from an employee at the manufacturer.