The dress once worn by Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O'Hara in the 1939 classic film Gone With the Wind sold for $137,000 at a Beverly Hills auction.
The two-piece dress made its appearance in a total of four scenes throughout the groundbreaking romance film, including the attack scene in which O'Hara and Rhett Butler (Clark Gable) meet. With age comes wear and tear, as the dress isn't in top-notch condition, but it's pretty close. Once a blue-grey dress, it is now a faded light gray. A straw hat and a suit worn by Gable sold for $52,500 and $55,000 while the black bonnet worn by Leigh and Olivia De Havilland took in $30,000.
Outfit worn by Vivien Leigh in Gone with the Wind sells for $137,000 at California auction https://t.co/dthoBpm9Sf pic.twitter.com/e9zuvZkCzM
— BBC News US (@BBCNewsUS) April 19, 2015
In the early 1906s, James Tumblin purchased the dress for a mere $20 while working at the Universal Studios hair and makeup department, reports BBC. "I saw this dress on the floor and a docent told me not to bother to pick it up, because they were throwing it away," said Tumblin, according to CNN. "I asked if he would sell it to me," he said. "I had noticed there was a printed label saying Selznick International Pictures and 'Scarlett production dress' was written in ink."
Tumblin has been a collectible owner of more than 300,000 Gone With the Wind-related items, garments and props including posters, letters and various works of art. The North Carolina Museum of History displayed some of the extensive collection in a 2012 exhibit.
Along with the costly dress, 150 other items were available for purchase at Sunday's Beverly Hills auction such as a Confederate Army uniform once worn by Leslie Howard.
The book-to-movie adaptation of Margaret Mitchell's 1936 novel accumulated ten Oscars and is seen as iconic in popular culture today, hence the costly prices for the movie-related items.
