The Gregg Oehlke Music Archive brings a number of the event’s lots. The longtime Detroit-area-based radio and music promoter started gathering Beatles memorabilia on the release of the White Album, and again in earnest in the 1980s. The Oehlke collection includes a John Lennon-signed Glass Onion publishing agreement, and a George Harrison-signed, cashed check from 1972.
The event presents a group of five original Beatle album cover and sleeve art designs signed and dated “1968” by American artist Jim Dine. Commissioned to commemorate Capitol Records' five-year anniversary of its first Beatles album release in the United States (Meet the Beatles! in 1964), these designs were created for a once-planned four-LP compilation set.
The auction also features a Beatles photograph from the bands’ first photo session with Ringo Starr at The Cavern Club in August of 1962. Starr had only been an official member for a few days when the image was taken. Another extremely rare offering, a six-foot-long promotional NYC bus poster for John Lennon’s 1974 album Walls and Bridges that reads “Listen To This Bus.” The consigner says: “Back in November of '74 when a NYC bus stopped for a red light in front of my parent's apartment building on Ocean Avenue in Brooklyn, I ran over to the bus, easily slid the poster out, and have had it ever since. I kept it in a frame for just about all of the 50 years since I acquired it."
The auction's story arc of the band ends with what is one of the last known gatherings of all four Beatle signatures, an original post-break-up, hand-signed promotional contract. This is to date the last known Beatles record-promotion contract signed by all four members of the band. By 1975 the Beatles were no longer together but they still conducted business on behalf of Apple Corps Limited. This example states that Jackwill S.A. will handle the promotion of Apple Corps Limited throughout the world excluding England and Eire. Time duration for the contract is eight years for a fee of £40,000 per year beginning January 1, 1975.
