President Trump loves to cause a stir.
And one of the biggest fusses caused by his early announcements related to events many decades ago.
“Declassifying the assassination papers” is the headline.
What does that mean though, and how do collectors relate to this series of events in the 1960s?
Let's have a look.
Demonstrators against the war in Vietnam are faced by a line of military police. America was a very divided country in the 1960s.
The very violent decade of Love and Peace
1967 was called the Summer of Love.
But take a look at the history of that year and you'll see that the US was actually wracked by violence.
Universal personhood, peace, love and flowers were on the agenda at the Monterey Pop Festival that kicked off the so-called "Summer of Love".
But 1967 was also the "long hot summer" of riots usually sparked by racist policing.
Meanwhile "peace marches" reflected the fact that in Vietnam more than 10,000 US troops died that year.
The Vietnamese death toll for the same period was in the hundreds of thousands.
That's some Summer of Love.
In popular history the framing events of this period in American history are often three assassinations.
John F Kennedy, Doctor Martin Luther King, and Robert Kennedy, John F Kennedy's younger brother.
JFK had an aura of youth, but he also made concrete progress, like signing this test ban treaty with the Soviet Union, which you can buy today.
These killings have enormous emotional significance.
Great leaders cut down
There's no doubt that President Kennedy's legacy is coloured by his murder.
The disastrous Vietnam War was seeded under his leadership. He gave the world its biggest ever sigh of relief by helping to defuse the Cuban Missile Crisis, but the bungled Bay of Pigs invasion of the island he had allowed had pushed it decisively into the Soviet orbit.
But, feellings do matter - more than facts maybe - and Kennedy was young, vibrant, exciting and optimistic in a way that was new and unusual.
His talk of space exploration and foundation of the Peace Corps seemed to promise something new for the huge cohort of young people created by the post-World War II Baby Boom.
His murder felt like an attack on that. Many cultural historians argue that the United States' complete capitulation to the upbeat and different Beatles just a few months later is no coincidence.
America went mad for the Beatles, who were the tonic the nation needed.
Kennedy was a president. He came from an already politically powerful family (with skeletons in their closets). And, he moved in young, fast company. He is a significant political figure and therefore collectible.
And then we have his private life.
Did he have an affair with Marilyn Monroe? What exactly was his family's relationship to the Mafia? What did he and Frank Sinatra get up to?
And who really killed him?
Polling since he was gunned down on November 22, 1963 has consistently shown that the majority of Americans do not believe the official story of the Kennedy murder - that he was shot by Lee Harvey Oswald, acting alone.
Lee Harvey Oswald, the apparent lone killer of President Kennedy. But many Americans have never believed that official version of the murder.
All of this comes together to make Kennedy among the most collectible of US presidents.
Collecting Kennedy
Kennedy, and his so-called Camelot Court, still has a glow to it.
Our PFC index of autograph values currently values a Kennedy signed photo at £10,500, a 250% increase on its 2000 value.
Any new interest in the man will no doubt increase the value of items from his life.
The most valuable Kennedy artefact thus far is a Louis XVI mahogany desk that sold for $1.4 million in 1996. On it, the President had signed a nuclear test ban treaty.
There is an enormous amount of political memorabilia for collectors to enjoy too. Good quality posters can be worth hundreds or thousands of dollars and are an attractive memento for your home. Signed ones are exponentially more valuable.
Yes, you can even buy strands of President Kennedy's hair. He was a rare political figure who had the appeal of a celebrity - and loved their company.
Last year a short film clip of the Kennedy Assassination sold for $137,500. People are still fascinated.
Many Kennedy papers are in permanent institutional collections and shouldn’t be on the market, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a very good supply of interesting, signed documents for collectors to consider.
The man of peace gunned down
Martin Luther King at a press conference. He was a controversial figure while he lived, now, he is almost universally revered.
Martin Luther King is perhaps the most loved figure in American history.
Now.
When he died he was one of the most disliked, with polling showing a 75% disapproval rating.
King was a churchman from Atlanta Georgia. He lived with racism all his life, from the moment his white playfriends went to different, better schools he was not allowed to attend because of his race.
King's father ran a successful church and stood up for himself and his family. His son followed in his footsteps, becoming the most famous of the leaders of the civil rights struggle from 1955.
He was an extraordinary writer and speaker, and many of his phrases are still quoted every day: "I have a dream", "judge a man not by the colour of his skin but by the content of his character".
His dedication to non-violence was not shared by all of his opponents and he was himself locked up several times, while civil rights campaigners were routinely assaulted and murdered.
King, with his wife Coretta at his side, marching to Montgomery in 1965. The march was attacked in Selma by police on Bloody Sunday and the images of violence helped raise international outrage at racism in America.
The FBI surveilled him, and went as far as sending him anonymous threats.
By 1968 his campaigning had expanded from a demand for equality before the law for all Americans to include poverty and opposition to the war in Vietnam.
On April 4 that year, as he planned a massive demonstration in Washington, he was shot dead in Memphis by James Earl Ray.
Dr King's own family have been among those who don't accept that Ray acted alone.
Collecting Martin Luther King Jr
Our autograph index, the PFC 40, records MLK’s autograph (on a signed photo) going from £795 in 2000 to a very healthy £8,000 last year. That’s a 906% increase with an average yearly rise of 38%.
A sign from Martin Luther King Jr Boulevard in Los Angeles for sale. King has been perhaps been more honoured in street, school, building, and event names than any other American.
Other papers from Doctor King’s life will also be valuable. This might include letters and notes from speeches.
You should remember that the majority of Dr King’s personal papers were sold to the city of Atlanta (probably for $32 million) in 2006. The papers are now in his alma mater, Morehouse College, and off the market. A major collection is also held at Boston University, other papers are held by Stanford University.
Collections like these take papers out of the private market.
If you are offered what look like significant items then it’s worth checking why they aren’t in these collections.
And, if you’re lucky enough to have genuine, significant items then it’s these institutions may well be in the market to buy them from you.
MLK's signature on a biography adds enormous value to the book.
Papers do come to market though. In 2021 the letter President Lyndon B Johnson wrote to Dr King’s widow Coretta the day after he was assassinated was auctioned for $175,000.
Notes used to prepare the famous We Shall Overcome Speech given in Chicago in 1965 realised $382,000 in 2017.
Dr King published a number of books, and these are collectible.
A signed, inscribed first edition copy of his 1967 book, Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community is listen online with an asking price of $25,000.
Some of his speeches and sermons were recorded and sold as records. These too can have value, particularly if signed, like the issue of the March on Washington speech that made $17,490.
Robert Kennedy
Robert Kennedy on the campaign trail. He tried to follow his brother to the Oval Office, but ended up sharing only his terrible fate.
Robert Kennedy is best known as Jack Kennedy’s younger brother.
But he was a substantial political figure in his own right:
Like so many others, his route into politics was through the law.
He worked for senate committees (he was quite heavily involved around the McCarthy hearings) and when his brother became President he was his attorney general.
His most high-profile work was in tackling organised crime, and particularly the Mafia, and Teamsters union leader Jimmy Hoffa.
He also supported to a degree efforts to end segregation in the United States.
He certainly made powerful enemies, and his relationship with organised crime and with FBI director J Edgar Hoover is at the heart of many conspiracy theories around the murder of his brother.
Robert was also to die violently.
JFK’s successor, Lyndon Johnson, didn’t get on with his younger brother. RFK (his F stood for Francis) resigned as attorney general and ran a successful bid for a New York seat in the Senate.
Kennedy celebrating a great night at the polls in Los Angeles just before he was killed.
That was to become the base for a run for the White House in 1970.
He was celebrating victories in the 1969 California and South Dakota primaries in Los Angeles when he was gunned down as he took a shortcut through the Ambassador Hotel kitchens.
Sirhan Sirhan was the man who shot him, and he was immediately detained.
RFK died on June 6.
Sirhan Sirhan is still in prison, aged 80.
He has been denied parole in part because he doesn’t accept responsibility for the killing.
And others agree, including Kennedy's son, Robert Kennedy Jr, who is the current health secretary in the US. One of Sirhan’s other victims agrees too.
A mugshot of Sirhan Sirhan, who now claims to have no memory of Kennedy killing for which he was convicted.
There are well-developed conspiracy theories around the killing, most of which boil down to “the government (or some branch of the secret state) did it”.
Collecting Robert F Kennedy
RFK is the least well known of these three men.
And the least valuable.
Just this week, a signed letter sold for $270.
Back in 2013, a rather nice (and extensive, with 51 pieces) collection of RFK For President campaign material made $325.
The 60s in US politics
What if anything we learn from the Assassination Papers shouldn’t have too much of an effect on the values in this article.
Any boost is likely to come from the fact of the proposed declassification and increased focus on these events.
The Kennedys offer a huge field for collectors. They are a multigenerational political powerhouse, still in government today.
The two Kennedy murders have generated endless material that collectors might invest in.
I don't think the interest and controversy will ever end.
And anyone inspired by Martin Luther King could easily start to build a collection that celebrates the Civil Rights movement more generally.
Fred Hampton, chairman of the Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party, whose life and death inspired the 2021 film, Judas and the Black Messiah.
Many discussions of the 60s assassinations in America include Malcolm X, who was murdered in 1965. What of Fred Hampton?
Last year, the sale of items from Tony Bennett’s collection included a letter from Martin Luther King thanking the singer for his support.
There's so much to explore.
Collecting political memorabilia
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