Dorothy’s Ruby Slippers From ‘The Wizard of Oz’ Sell for $32.5 Million at Heritage Auctions to Become World’s Most Valuable Movie Memorabilia

The Wicked Witch’s hat realizes $2.93 million during $38.6 million event that shatters record for a Hollywood and entertainment auction DOWNLOAD DIGITAL PRESS KIT DALLAS, Texas (Dec. 7, 2024) — Dorothy’s Ruby Slippers sold Saturday at Heritage Auctions for a price somewhere over the rainbow, way up high: $32.5 million. One of four surviving pairs worn by Judy Garland in 1939’s The Wizard of Oz, the slippers that sold Saturday are now the most famous — and, by far, the most valuable movie memorabilia ever sold at auction. That single pair of shoes also helped Heritage’s December 7 Hollywood/Entertainment Signature® Auction set the record for an entertainment auction: $38,615,188. That shatters the $22.8 million realized during the 2011 Debbie Reynolds auction held by Heritage Auctions Executive Vice President Joe Maddalena. “There is simply no comparison between Judy Garland’s Ruby Slippers and any other piece of Hollywood memorabilia,” Maddalena says. “The breathtaking result reflects just how important movies and movie memorabilia are to our culture and to collectors. It’s been a privilege for all of us at Heritage to be a part of the slippers’ epic journey over the rainbow and off to a new home.” There were numerous star attractions spanning cinema’s rich history throughout this event, but none stood taller or shined brighter than the Technicolor treasures from The Wizard of Oz, which sparked a bidding war that lasted nearly as long as a walk down The Yellow Brick Road. Live bidding opened at $1.55 million. Several thrilling minutes later, as bidding hit million-dollar increments, the slippers hit their final price, and the auction room erupted with applause. The pre-auction estimate for the slippers was $3 million and up. They surpassed that within seconds. No other pair had ever come close to that final number. One pair of Ruby Slippers sold at auction in 2000 for $666,000. A dozen years later, Steven Spielberg and Leonardo DiCaprio spent $2 million on the pair donated to the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles. DiCaprio led the group of donors that allowed for the 2012 sale, which was brokered by Profiles in History, the auction house founded by Maddalena. The pair that sold Saturday at Heritage was famously stolen from the Judy Garland Museum in Grand Rapids, Minn., in the summer of 2005; recovered 13 years later by the FBI; and returned to owner Michael Shaw earlier this year before he handed them over to Heritage for inclusion in the December 7 Hollywood/Entertainment Signature® Auction, which drew more than 1,800 bidders worldwide. Upon their recovery in 2018, the FBI took the slippers to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, where, the museum once noted, “smudges on the heavy glass vitrine must be routinely cleaned” because of the millions who “stand transfixed before them” each year. There, conservators compared them to the museum’s pair donated in 1979. The FBI later said, “Examination of the recovered shoes showed that their construction, materials, and wear are consistent with the pair in the museum’s collection.” Dorothy’s slippers were designed by Gilbert Adrian, MGM’s chief costume designer and made by Western Costume Company using white silk pumps from the Innes Shoe Company in Los Angeles. Shaw’s slippers were once known as “The Traveling Shoes” because of their long, storied exhibition history. The pair has since been renamed “The Stolen Pair” given the backstory that involved an elderly thief in ill health, 77-year-old Terry Jon Martin, who confessed in court documents last year to stealing the ruby slippers because he wanted to pull off “one last score.” Like the Ruby Slippers, the Wicked Witch’s hat in this auction was part of Shaw’s Hollywood on Tour during the 1980s and ’90s. Shaw obtained it from legendary collector Kent Warner, who discovered the Ruby Slippers at the historic David Weisz Co. MGM Auction in 1970. Says Maddalena, who has handled more Wizard of Oz memorabilia and props than any other auctioneer, including Dorothy’s blue dress and the Witch’s hourglass: “This is the finest example of the Wicked Witch’s hat known to exist.” That explains why on Saturday it realized $2,930,000 after yet another lengthy bidding war. It’s also the only one to feature inside its brim, “M. Hamilton 4461-164” — referring to, of course, Margaret Hamilton, the former kindergarten teacher who loved children yet became the source of so many nightmares. Like the slippers, the legendary Adrian designed this iconic piece of Hollywood history during his historic tenure at MGM; the hat is also featured in the book The Wizardry of Oz. Before Saturday, the Wicked Witch’s hat had changed hands only once in more than half a century. The slippers and hat were joined by numerous other treasures from Oz, including producer Mervyn LeRoy’s copy of the script from the MGM art department, which sold for $50,000; the screen door from Dorothy’s Kansas home, which sold for $37,500; Judy Garland’s “Dorothy Gale” wig from the first week of shooting, which realized $30,000; and the MGM contract signed by “Over the Rainbow” songwriters Harold Arlen and E.Y. Harburg, which dared to dream a final price of $23,125. The Wizard of Oz Museum in Cape Canaveral, Florida, announced over the weekend that it won two items from this historic event: LeRoy’s script and the original gloves worn by actor Burt Lahr as the Cowardly Lion, which realized $20,625. In this auction, collectors and cinephiles rolled the dice over the screen-matched primary hero Jumanji game board — the very game “for those who seek to find a way to leave their world behind,” complete with four tokens and a pair of dice. The catalog hailed this mahogany-wood wonder as a “supreme example of studio craftsmanship [that] is arguably the most beautifully made film prop we’ve ever encountered.” And collectors responded appropriately: It opened live bidding Saturday afternoon at $100,000. But after several minutes, it finally sold for $275,000. Another centerpiece in this auction soaring to new heights — and its first new home in decades — was the sole screen-used hero “flying” wooden hoverboard from Back to the Future Part II, signed by Michael J. Fox and writer-producer Bob Gale and accompanied by its safety harness. The “Mattel” hoverboard has impeccable provenance, as it came from the only other man to use it during production: Fox’s stunt double Charlie Croughwell, who will donate at least 50 percent of the proceeds to The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research. The hoverboard sold Saturday for $237,500. The auction covered Hollywood history and sparked numerous bidding wars, including a lengthy tussle over the screen-matched “Concentration No. 3 Gas Bombs” container from 1933’s King Kong, complete with one prop gas bomb. The wooden container is the only prop from Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack’s masterpiece that Heritage has been able to screen-match — and the first to appear at auction, having been consigned by the family of Desilu Productions Inc. executive Nino Di Gregorio. Live bidding opened at $15,000. A few minutes later, it exploded to its final price of $187,500. A number of bidders got into the Christmas spirit as they tussled over the knit cap, scarf, coat and mittens Macaulay Culkin wore as Kevin McCallister in 1990’s Home Alone. Live bidding on the iconic ensemble opened at $32,000. But in the end, one determined collector made sure that while you can mess with a lot of things, you can’t mess with kids on Christmas, as the costume sold for $162,500. Tom Hanks’ iconic “co-star” from Robert Zemeckis’ 2000 film Cast Away – a screen-matched “Wilson” — found its way to a new home for $162,500. And several bidders driven by pure imagination fought over one of the rare surviving golden tickets from 1971’s Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory. A gold-foil, screen-used ticket gaining its lucky recipient admittance to Wonka's candy factory realized $118,750. So many items offered in this event were matchless and mythical, among them author Mario Puzo’s copy of Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather Notebook, which realized $100,000. This three-ring binder overflows with character studies and scene synopses and Coppola’s page-by-page, line-by-line breakdown of the best-seller, and is such an essential piece of film history it was finally published to great acclaim in 2016. The copy in this auction hailed from the collection of Puzo’s assistant, Janet Snow, through whom the author would relay his changes to Coppola. Click here to see all the results from Heritage’s December 7 Hollywood/Entertainment Signature® Auction. Heritage Auctions is the largest fine art and collectibles auction house founded in the United States, and the world's largest collectibles auctioneer. Heritage maintains offices in New York, Dallas, Beverly Hills, Chicago, Palm Beach, London, Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels, Hong Kong and Tokyo. Heritage also enjoys the highest Online traffic and dollar volume of any auction house on earth (source: SimilarWeb and Hiscox Report). The Internet's most popular auction-house website, HA.com, has more than 1,750,000 registered bidder-members and searchable free archives of 6,000,000 past auction records with prices realized, descriptions and enlargeable photos. Reproduction rights routinely granted to media for photo credit. For breaking stories, follow us: HA.com/Facebook and HA.com/Twitter . Link to this release or view prior press releases . 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