Antiques Roadshow guest ‘needs to sit down’ as expert reveals value of ‘holy grail’ item never seen on show before – leaving crowd gasping

An Antiques Roadshow guest was left speechless after she discovered the true value of her ‘holy grail’ item that’s never been seen on the BBC programme before.

The episode saw expert Jon Bradley travel to the Scottish National Gallery Of Modern Art to meet with visitors who were hoping to flog their prized possessions for cash.

Among them was a woman who brought along a vintage children’s American coasting bank – an item the expert admitted he’d never seen in person before.

Inspecting the item, Jon gushed: ‘One of the most remarkable things about the Antiques Roadshow is after many, many years working on it, time after time, I see things I’ve never ever seen before – and this is one of them.

‘It is, as it says on it, the Coasting Bank. It’s an American-made money bank and they were made as novelties because obviously, you wanted your child to save money.

The episode saw expert Jon Bradley travel to the Scottish National Gallery Of Modern Art to meet with visitors who were hoping to flog their prized possessions for cash

‘It’s made from cast iron and often on the base you would get the patent date on it but unfortunately this doesn’t have it, and the brass slider.’

He demonstrated how the contraption worked – a coin would be placed in the arms of the child figure, which would then be pushed down the brass slide to deposit the money at the bottom.

The guest revealed she found the unique item in an old vanity case while spring cleaning.

She explained: ‘So it must have belonged to my husband when he was younger but more than that I don’t know.’

When asked if there was any way to know how many of the banks were made, the expert responded: ‘It’s impossible to say.

‘I know it appeared in the catalogue but they often produce them as a catalogue illustration, and then if they got an order, they would produce them.

‘What makes it so rare is that although it appears in this 1884 catalogue and it cost less than a dollar, an example, in my experience, and in all the records, have never appeared anywhere, in a museum or at auction.

‘So from a collectors’ point of view, this is the holy grail in bank collecting. My problem is coming up with a valuation.’

He demonstrated how the contraption worked – a coin would be placed in the arms of the child figure, which would then be pushed down the brass slide to deposit the money at the bottom

The guest revealed she found the unique item in an old vanity case while spring cleaning

As he built up to revealing the whopping sum, he explained: ‘Now the condition isn’t brilliant, obviously it’s been sliding up and down it for years but actually this is all the original paintwork on the base here, this could all be cleaned.

‘So it’s an eight out of 10 from a condition point of view. Now the world record price for a bank ever sold is in America and the price was $426,000 which equates to about £285,000.

‘Should you ever decide to part with it, America is where you’re going to find the market.’

‘I don’t think this is going to make that but if you decided to go into auction, I would strongly suggest you went in on a figure between £20,000 and £25,000.’

Once the jaw-dropping figure was revealed, the guest threw her hands to her mouth in shock, earning a gasp from the crowd.