Clark Gable’s Oscar Leads Hot Hollywood Bidding

Clark Gable’s Academy Award sold for $607,500 and the sleigh “Rosebud” from the classic film “Citizen Kane” went for $233,500 during an auction Sunday of Hollywood memorabilia.

Gable’s best actor Oscar for the 1934 movie “It Happened One Night” was purchased by an anonymous buyer, said Vredy Lytsman, a spokeswoman for Christie’s, a New York-based auction house.

“He is still the leading man for many people,” she said.

Also selling Sunday was “Rosebud,” the child’s sled that the dying Charles Foster Kane longed for in Orson Welles’ 1941 film. Christie’s offered the only pine wood sled of the four used in production; the other three were of balsa wood.

The buyer, identified only as being from Los Angeles, paid $233,500. The sled was expected to sell for $50,000 to $70,000, Lytsman said.

Christie’s said the sled was given away in 1942 as a prize in a publicity campaign. The winner was a 12-year-old boy, Arthur Bauer.

Other items for sale included Gable’s “Gone With The Wind” script, signed by producer David Selznick; Audrey Meadows’ 1954 Emmy Award for “The Honeymooners” and the wristwatch she wore on the show; and a prop from the original “Star Trek” series.