2024, Magazine Feature, Tiffany and the Trans-Atlantic Telegraph Craze, Smithsonian Magazine

Smithsonian Magazine
“To Make Tiffany & Co. a Household Name, the Luxury Brand’s Founder Cashed in on the Trans-Atlantic Telegraph Craze”
By Robert Klara
February 15, 2024

George Glazer was quoted in a feature by Smithsonian Magazine historical correspondent Robert Klara that tells the story of how entrepreneur Charles Lewis Tiffany came to turn sections of the Trans-Atlantic Telegraph Cable into popular souvenirs in the mid 19th century and promote Tiffany & Co. George speaks about their ongoing status as a collector’s item today:

In recent decades, an assortment of Tiffany cable souvenirs have surfaced at estate sales and auctions, where they fetch prices in the high hundreds of dollars and up. Whether the Tiffany & Co. band is still attached makes a big difference in the objects’ salability, says Manhattan antiques dealer George Glazer.

“There are some [cable segments] that float around that don’t have the label in the middle, but people don’t want them as much, says Glazer, who estimates he’s sold 50 Tiffany’s cable souvenirs out of his eponymous gallery on New York’s Upper East Side. “They have a lower value, even though they’re unquestionably identical and unquestionably authentic. People want the Tiffany name.”