How sweet it is …
A Motown fan from Detroit got the surprise of a lifetime, when a passport belonging to legendary Hitsville singer Marvin Gaye — valued at $20,000 — dropped out of a used vinyl record he bought for just 50 cents.
The lucky guy, who works at the Motown Museum, visited the home of a recently-deceased singer to pick up items the family wanted to donate to the museum, he said.
While there, the man spotted records he wanted for his own collection, so he returned for an estate sale the next weekend and bought a few LPs for a handful of change.
“When I got home, I was going through them and out of an album fell this passport…it literally fell into my hands!” he said while appraising the document on an episode of “Antiques Roadshow,” which would only identify the passport finder as “Paul,” citing privacy concerns.
The passport was issued in 1964, the same year the singer recorded the hit tune “How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You).” It features a photo of very young-looking Gaye along with his signature.
“[The date] is great, and it is after he was signed as a solo artist with Motown and added the ‘e’ to the end of his name. It’s not a really common thing to see Marvin Gaye memorabilia and passport collecting is a really vibrant world because there’s usually only a few of them throughout your life,” said Laura Woolley, an appraiser on the show.
“I wouldn’t put less than $20,000 on the passport if you were to insure it,” she said.
“Are you kidding me?” Paul responded with a smile.
Appraisers on the show say it’s worth so much because stars’ passports from that era are hard to find.