Gooding & Company has announced its top results from the company's first-ever two-night Pebble Beach Auction event this weekend, held annually following the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance. A high-energy atmosphere set the tone for a full-room of bidding guests at both Saturday and Sunday's auctions that garnered more than US$60 million in sales. Of multiple record-breaking sales over the weekend, the coveted 1931 Blower Bentley from the E. Ann Klein Estate finished first with the highest sale of the weekend for US$4.51 million. In the second-highest sale of the weekend, a 1959 Ferrari 250 GT LWB California Spyder sold for US$4,455,000.

The gavel first sounded on Saturday with a revered Ferrari collection once owned by television producer Greg Garrison. Of Garrison's nine cars, seven of which are one-of-a-kind Ferraris, the highly anticipated 1973 Ferrari 365 GTS/4 Daytona Spyder broke a world-record by selling for US$2,035,000 million and the 1957 Ferrari 410 Superamerica Coupe finished with the collection's second-highest sale of US$1.32 million. Other top-selling Saturday auction results include a 1962 Maserati 5000 GT at US$1.1 million, a 1971 Lamborghini Miura SV at US$869,000 and a 1935 Voisin C25 Clairiere Berline that sold for US$330,000.

Sunday, August 19 Auction. As Gooding & Company's most successful, well-attended auction event to date, tonight's offerings included numerous other internationally renowned cars. With sales breaking records across the board, Gooding & Company sold the 1884 De Dion Bouton et Trepardoux steamer, known as the oldest running car in the world, for US$3.52 million. As the largest donation of its kind in the world, all fifteen of Richard J. Solove's Rolls-Royces collectively generated US$14.3 million for the Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute at Ohio State University, allowing the hospital to continue its direct funding of cancer research.
 

Solove's Rolls-Royces included the only-known complete collection of first-series Silver Ghosts, with models from 1907-1915, one of which -- the 1912 Rolls-Royce SG Limousine by Barker, nicknamed "The Corgi" -- sold for US$2.97 million as the highest sale of the collection.

As part of this year's Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance, Gooding & Company's auction doors opened to the public on Thursday, August 16, from 9 am - 5 pm, revealing 130 highly anticipated cars and items of automobilia to the public for the first time. Thursday and Friday previews kicked-off auction excitement, which continued with Gooding & Company's VIP Preview Cocktail Party on Friday evening, two live auctions over the weekend and a continuous flow of daily public previews.

Gooding & Company, the Santa Monica based auction house, provides unparalleled service for those in the close-knit world of classic car collecting and offers a wide range of services including private and estate sales, appraisals, collection management, estate and tax planning assistance. The company has set numerous world records for sales at auction and by private treaty, including for a Ferrari road car -- the 1967 Ferrari 275 GTS/4 alloy NART Spyder for US$3,960,000; a 1938 Talbot Lago T150 C SS Teardrop Coupe for US$3,905,000; and for a Duesenberg at auction with the 1935 Duesenberg SJ Speedster -- the Mormon Meteor for US$4,455,000. Gooding & Company conducts the official Pebble Beach Auction at the annual Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance.