Collection of Adventurer Steve Fossett and Peggy Fossett to be Offered at Auction in Two Single-Owner Sales this October at Lesl

Leslie Hindman Auctioneers announces the sale of property from the estate of Steve and Peggy Fossett. This landmark collection will be sold at auction October 30 and 31 and will be on view in Chicago October 26 - 29.

Lot 18, Circle of Raphael, (16th Century), The Conversion of Saint Paul, c. 1520; Estimate $120,000-$180,000

Steve Fossett was a record-setting adventurer and explorer. He was friends with Richard Branson, whose Virgin Group sponsored a number of Fossett’s sailing and aviation attempts. This included the “ultimate flight” when in February 2006 Fossett flew the Virgin GlobalFlyer for the longest uninterrupted and unrefueled aircraft flight in history, covering 25,766 miles. He was the first person to complete a solo circumnavigation of the Earth in a hot air balloon. He broke records of speed and distance as a sailor and was one of the sport’s most prolific distance record holders. He participated in races across many disciplines, including the Iditarod, Ironman and Paris to Dakar Rally. He also swam the English Channel and climbed some of the highest mountains on Earth. Fossett was a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and a member of the Explorers Club.

Steve and Peggy Fossett met in 1969 while they were attending Washington University in St. Louis. Their second date took place in a Cessna 172 with Steve as pilot as he participated in an air show. At the time, Peggy didn’t know her future husband would cross the globe in pursuit of adventure but later joked she should have seen it coming. Peggy filled their homes in Carmel, Beaver Creek and Chicago with worldly objects that spoke to their passions. While Steve’s adventures carried him around the world, Peggy, his strongest advocate and supporter, made certain their homes were stylish places of refuge.

The first auction, “Worldly Pursuits: An Adventurer’s Collection. The Estate of Steve and Peggy Fossett,” to be held October 30, will include the Fossett’s collection of antiquities, fine art and Asian works of art. Among the objects being offered, the sale will include a Roman marble figure of Diana, circa the 2nd century A.D. and significant Old Master paintings: Circle of Raphael, The Conversion of Saint Paul; Circle of Sandro Botticelli, The Madonna and Child with Infant Saint John the Baptist; and Michelangelo Anselmi, Saint Jerome Kneeling in a Landscape with an Angel. The sale also encompasses furniture and decorative works from their homes.

Lot 62, Sir Francis Drake, Who is or may be a Pattern to stirre up all Heroicke and active Spirits of these Times…; Estimate $10,000-$15,000

On October 31, Leslie Hindman Auctioneers will present Part I of the sale: “The Adventure & Exploration Library of Steve Fossett.” The sale will offer significant works in the fields of aeronautics, Arctic and Antarctic exploration, circumnavigation and mountaineering. It will feature works relating to some of the most notable figures in the field of exploration, including Captain James Cook, Charles Darwin, Sir Francis Drake, Alexander von Humboldt, Lewis and Clark, William Schouten and Ernest Shackleton. Highlights include a copy of Barthelemi Faujas de Saint-Fond’s Description des Experiences de la Machine Aerostatique de MM. de Montgolfier, which describes the first manned flight, and a copy of Aurora Australis, the first book printed in Antarctica by Shackleton and his team. Part II of the library will be sold in March 2019.