(AP) – A Colt .45 revolver once owned by General George S. Patton sold for
$75,000 at auction in Los Angeles Thursday.

Profiles in History, which conducted the auction, had expected the working
firearm to fetch over $60,000. The Colt .45 Model 1873 single-action revolver
with distinctive stag horn grip was acquired by the famous World War II general
around 1928 and remained in his possession until his death in 1945. 

George Smith Patton, Jr.
(November 11, 1885 – December 21, 1945)

George Harrison‘s Maton Mastersound guitar, used during the Beatles’ live performances in the summer of 1963, sold for $485,000 at Julien’s Auctions 
Friday. The auction, which focused entirely on unique items from throughout
music history, also featured a black sequined glove worn by Michael Jackson,
a stage-worn tank top donned by Madonna and Elvis Presley’s marriage
certificate and tour bus, but it was Harrison’s used guitar that sold for the
highest bid at the auction, which took place at New York’s Hard Rock Café.

George Harrison

Guernsey’s Auctions President Arlan Ettinger holds the ‘Black Beauty’, a
prototype made by Guitarist Les Paul.

The Les Paul prototype guitar that came to be known as ‘Black Beauty’ will be on
the auction block at Arader Galleries on Madison Avenue on Thursday, February
19, and could fetch over $2 million.

 
A lock of Abraham Lincoln’s hair (above) was among the items auctioned
Saturday at a Historical Americana auction in Dallas, Texas.

(AP) – A lock of Lincoln’s hair sold for $25,000. It was taken by Surgeon General
Joseph K. Barnes shortly after the president was assassinated by John Wilkes
Booth.

The Donald P. Dow collection brought top bids totaling more than $800,000,
doubling expectations.

A 1861 letter written by Booth to a friend boasting about his career and value 
as an actor sold for $30,000.

A piece of linen from Lincoln’s death bed and stained with his blood (below) sold
for $6,000 while an 1864 letter signed by Lincoln authorizing a prisoner swap 
involving Gen. Robert E. Lee’s son from a Union POW camp sold for $27,500
and Booth’s military arrest warrant also went for $21,250.

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) –  Elvis Presley was born 80 years ago today and
eighteen years after his birth, in 1953, Presley walked into Sun Records
in Memphis and recorded the song "My Happiness” for $4. The 78 RPM 
acetate record was his first recording, a gift for his mother Gladys. 

But, as the story goes, Presley stopped by a friend’s house to listen to the
recording and left it there. The Presley family did not have a record player,
according to Elvis Presley Enterprises, which operates Graceland.

The record has remained in his friend’s safe for decades and today, it will
be auctioned off at Graceland, the late singer’s longtime Memphis home,
along with other Presley-related memorabilia on what would have been
‘the King’s’ 80th birthday. The acetate is in original condition and it is
playable.

                           
                             Elvis Presley at eighteen

.