A guest on Antiques Roadshow was astounded to learn the worth of an incredibly rare piece.
After a guest presented a sheep’s fleece for appraisal, expert Cristian Beadman was astounded.
It wasn’t just any fleece, either, for it belonged to Dolly, the cloned sheep.
Dolly made history in 1996 when she became the first mammal to be cloned from an adult cell, indicating that non-reproductive cells could be utilised to create an identical replica of the donor animal.
Dolly died in 2003, but four identical clones of her are still alive, and her fleece appeared on Antiques Roadshow while her corpse is on exhibit at the National Museum of Scotland.
Cristian attempted to appraise the object, but initially joked that his schooling ‘did not best equip me’ for estimating the value of a very valuable sheep.
‘Her fleece is important now but in the future will be seminally important to science,’ he said, adding he hopes it ends up in a museum.
After some thought, Cristian calculated the value of the fleece and claimed that it may fetch up to £30,000 at auction, or ‘well be into five figures.’
Dolly was born in July 1996 to a surrogate mother, and her birth was revealed in February 1997, sending shockwaves across the scientific community.
One ewe supplied her DNA, another the egg, and the third carried the embryo.
She lived her entire life at the Roslin Institute in Scotland, where she bred with David, a Welsh mountain ram, and gave birth to six lambs.
Aside from the odd media appearance, he had a regular existence at the Institute with the other sheep.
Dolly was part of a series of trials at The Roslin Institute to find a better way to produce genetically modified cattle.
Given the significance of the sheep, it’s hardly surprise that Dolly’s fleece commanded a premium price – but a recent guest on the show was absolutely astounded when she discovered her shattered watch was quite valuable.
Expert Richard Price concurred that the watch was most certainly worn by a pilot during WWII, most likely a member of the Nazi Luftwaffe.
Richard discovered its genuine worth was far greater after the visitor said she got it for £20 from a store in Weymouth, Dorset in the 1970s.
He described it as a ‘rarest item,’ and disclosed that it was a ‘good buy’ from the guest, since it might bring between £8,000 and £10,000.
It comes only weeks after a visitor on Antiques Roadshow discovered that a Hollywood movie score he purchased for £5 was actually worth up to £1,000.
Earlier this year, a lady discovered a 1915 ring in her mother’s sock drawer; after chatting with specialists, she realised it would cost £20,000 at auction.
Watch Antique Roadshow on BBC Two. and BBC iPlayer.
