Appraisal: 1972 Bobby Fischer-signed Postcard

GUEST: Back in 1972, in the summer, for reasons I don't remember, I was really into chess.

The 1972 chess championship with Bobby Fischer and Boris Spassky, I was really into it, and I wanted to let Bobby Fischer know that he had some guy in the States pulling for him.

APPRAISER: Yeah.

GUEST: I wrote a letter, uh, just saying, uh, big fan, you know, good luck.

I addressed the letter, "Bobby Fischer, Reykjavík, Iceland."

(laughs) That's it-- put a stamp on it.

A few weeks later, I get a, a manila envelope in the mail.

I pull it out and this was in it.

APPRAISER: And it came from Reykjavík.

GUEST: Came from R, came from Reykjavík.

APPRAISER: We don't do a lot of chess memorabilia on the show.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: But, uh, if we were, it's going to be, you know, something like this.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: And, uh, what's just wonderful about this is the fact that this was signed during the Match of the Century.

And this was huge news at the time.

Of course, uh, Fischer won.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: And he was the first American to do so.

It was a huge deal.

Now, Bobby Fischer is an exceedingly rare signature.

To get him prime time-- this is the most important match...

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: ...one of the most important matches in the history of chess-- on this official postcard from the event is amazing.

If I were to put this in an auction, I wouldn't be surprised if it sold for somewhere in between $1,000 to $1,500.

GUEST: Oh, cool.

APPRAISER: Yeah.

He's a...

GUEST: Cool.

APPRAISER: He's a really tough autograph, so, uh...

GUEST: Yeah, more than I thought.

I've never had anybody look at it in the 50 years I've had it.

APPRAISER: Oh, wow.