The Connection

It was just about three weeks ago when Gary Eyler got a call on Tuesday to be in the White House briefing room on Wednesday for the unveiling of a replica of the original White House Correspondents Charter. The original had disappeared in 2007. Eyler had been asked to recreate it.

"They only had one picture of the original charter from 1914 to go by with no indication of the size and wanted an EXACT replica," he said. He found the original engravings that had framed the charter. He was tehn able to figure out they were about 3 inches in size and by laying them out, Eyler was able to find the interior size of the document itself. Calligraphers recreated the words "and the White House forgers added the exact signatures." Eyler said his job is often like being a detective.

Down the brick steps and through the door of Old Colony Shop on S. Washington Street is a history lesson. A document signed by James Madison and James Monroe sits on a table inside the door with a newspaper printed by Ben Franklin propped up on the floor. Across the floor is a framed picture of the first 16 presidents. "What do you notice at the bottom?" It is President Lincoln without his beard and in the middle oval stands red, white, and blue Lady Liberty "with her chest covered."

Today a couple has brought in a document given to then Lt. Steven E Crime when he crossed the equator though the Panama Canal in 1980, going from a polywog to a shellback in the Navy tradition. Eyler has grabbed several choices from what he thought could be appropriate for the framing. He has picked out celadon for part of the matting, "trying not to make it overly bright and cartoonish. It should look correct 10 years from now. Remember those ‘60's orange mats," he said wrinkling up his face. Eyler will use archival non-fading material and will authenticate the back.

In the other room he has a watercolor painting by a child in the 1950s. "I try to stay conservative because it is bright enough, so that you don't see the picture framing but the work inside." Eyler frames things that are worth millions of dollars with museum quality framing. But he said, "You have to be comfortable with everything, not nervous, like a doctor would approach a patient. People trust me."

Eyler said he was a self-made non-college man by 20. When he was 13 living in Hawaii, his parents told him to get a hobby to keep him out of trouble. He started collecting stamps and then worked in a stamp store. Then he apprenticed under a rare manuscript dealer. Today he is a rare manuscript expert and can tell the age of a document by feeling the paper. "Look at this. There is laid paper made from rags with a half-life of about 1,000 years and in the 1800s someone invented wove paper made of wood pulp and sulfur. This," he said, "is a letter that looks pretty fresh, right? It is from 1570. If you hold it up to the light, you can see the grilled lines and this unusual unicorn watermark, an emblem of the paper maker."

Around the corner on the workbench is a small-framed version of a faded 1779 dinner invitation from George Washington that reads "request the favor of your company at 3:00 pm tomorrow. Please reply."

In the mornings Eyler does appraisals. "I appraise for lots of different organizations including Mt. Vernon. Last year I appraised the Washington papers and discovered Martha Washington's diary in a folder marked 1836 with no name. "My knowledge of her writing led me to recognize it."

Eyler says he was asked to appraise the papers of Supreme Court Justice Harlan Stone. I would be sitting there reading his papers and go "oh my God; I'm reading his personal thoughts. It was such a privilege and gave me a deep appreciation of the Supreme Court."

He talks about a letter written about the French Revolution two weeks before Ben Franklin died. It was being sold at auction as a forgery for $100-200. Eyler recognized it and sold it three days later for multiple thousands of dollars.

Eyler worries about the future and who will care about the importance of these things. “Kids are on the ….” and he pushes imaginary buttons with his fingers. A loud ping from the phone (“my quiet phone”) and he talks to a customer who wants to come in and get an evaluation, having purchased a folder of unknown pictures. It turned out the customer had a lithograph that Eyler had originally sold to someone else in 1980 and is estimated to be worth about $200. "This is perfect," Eyler said. “A young referral who is interested in keeping this alive."