RM Sotheby's Hershey Returns October 7 With a $1.2M Duesenberg

RM Sotheby's opens its 20th Hershey auction on Wednesday, 7 October, at the Hershey Lodge in Hershey, Pennsylvania, running two days through 8 October. Lot 226 on the first day is a 1935 Auburn 851 Supercharged Speedster, the first 851 Speedster produced, estimated at $850,000 to $950,000. Lot 389 on the second day is a 1934 Duesenberg Model J Convertible Berline by Murphy, one of roughly five survivors with that coachwork, estimated at $900,000 to $1,200,000.

The sale is the official auction of the AACA Eastern Division Fall Meet, which runs 6 to 9 October on the grounds around Hersheypark and the Giant Center. The catalogue leans where Hershey has always leaned: veteran, Brass Era and early American cars, with a run of automobilia between the motor cars.

That mix is why Hershey is the hardest sale of the year to ship out of.

The transport angle

A Monterey or Scottsdale consignment is mostly cars a driver can start, idle and drive onto a ramp. Hershey is not. A pre-war chassis has no subframe, no factory tie-down points and, on the older cars, wooden artillery wheels carrying narrow high-pressure tires. There is nothing on the underside a chain should ever touch. Loading is over-the-tire soft straps or nothing, which is the same soft strap versus chain rule that applies to a modern carbon car, for entirely different reasons.

Braking is the second problem. Cars of this period run mechanical brakes on the rear axle only, or on all four in the later ones, and a parking brake nobody should trust on a 10-degree ramp. A car that cannot hold itself on an incline is a winch load whether or not the engine runs, which usually decides liftgate versus ramp loading before anything else does.

Read the lot descriptions literally. RM says the Duesenberg has been "mechanically recommissioned in preparation for sale" and describes it as a basis for further sorting. That is the trade's careful phrasing for a car that runs under supervision, after two decades of light use. Book a car described that way as non-running. The surcharge for a winch load is small. Discovering on the loading dock that the booked trailer has ramps and no winch costs a day and sometimes the slot.

Height is the quiet one. Town car and limousine bodies from the teens and twenties stand far taller than anything the interior height of a standard enclosed trailer was specified around. Confirm the number in writing against the lot's measurements rather than assuming a lift-gate trailer swallows it.

Two timing pressures land on the same week. Hotel-ballroom sales give a short post-sale removal window, and the Hershey grounds are congested with the swap meet and show field from Tuesday on. Meanwhile the southbound snowbird flow is starting, which is what tightens Northeast enclosed capacity every October. Carriers in our broker network price the second week of October accordingly.

What to do about it

Book before the hammer, not after. A contingent booking on a lot you intend to bid costs nothing to release and secures a slot in a week where slots go early. Our auction transport prep checklist covers the sequence, and the RM Sotheby's page covers how this house handles releases.

Ask a broker three specific questions before you commit:

1. What is the per-vehicle cargo limit on the certificate? A $1.2 million hammer plus premium clears the standard limit on a lot of enclosed equipment. Cargo coverage is a number on a document, not a promise on a phone call.
2. Does the assigned trailer carry a winch and a flat deck, or ramps only?
3. What is the usable interior height, and will the car be top-loaded or bottom-loaded?

Then get a name and a mobile number for someone who will be physically at Hershey on release day. Pre-war cars get pushed, and the push wants people who know where to put their hands.

Figures quoted here are reported estimates from the auction house, not quotes. Transport ranges for this corridor live on our cost page.