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Sleepy Biddeford, Maine is a very long way from the rollicking Sunset Strip. The quaint former mill town is home to 21,277 people, miles of rugged shoreline, Maine's oldest dining car and a storage unit that, for the past few years, was quietly housing a serious piece of Los Angeles history.
(Photo courtesy of Saco River Auction Co.)
On Wednesday night, a 13-foot-long historic neon sign from L.A.'s legendary Whisky A Go Go club sold at auction in Biddeford for $48,300, according to KPCC.Troy Thibodeau, auctioneer at Biddeford's Saco River Auction Co., told LAist that the weathered pink marquee had been found in a storage unit in the Biddeford area. "Whoever bought it originally put it in storage with the intent of using it and never did, and then never paid their storage fees for a couple of years, or some time frame, and lost it," Thibodeau explained. According to KPCC, the sign adorned the club during the 1980s and '90s before being replaced in 2004.
Thibodeau said that his auction house sold the sign on consignment after being contacted by the storage company.
The auctioneer said that he was able to determine the provenance of the sign because it had previously been sold at an auction in New York City in 2012. "The photos matched, and it would be pretty hard to fake. It's 1980s neon," Thibodeau said.
"We're in the business of selling stuff and some stuff is exciting and some stuff not so much. This was extremely exciting because it's a piece of rock 'n' roll history," Thibodeau told LAist.
The buyer, who placed his bid by phone, asked to remain anonymous. "The only thing he wanted me to release is that he's a multi-generation Los Angeles guy who has spent a lot of time at the Whisky," Thibodeau said.
