While it makes for a good dinner party story, imagine being in a situation of having a valuable treasure and not knowing about it. These individuals came face to face with a fortune and threw it away by mistake.
Picasso's Dove: As a young teenager, actor Brian Blessed met world-renowned artist Pablo Picasso at the 1950 World Peace Conference in Sheffield. Brian asked Picasso to draw something for him and the legendary artist sketched the outline of a dove. The deceptively simple artwork did not impress Brian, who unknowingly threw £50M worth of virtuosity away. Someone else saved the art, which is now displayed in a gallery in Sheffield.
Million Bitcoins: IT man James Howells spilled a drink, which wrecked his computer. He decided to salvage the sellable pieces and later on threw the rest. What he forgot was the 7,500 bitcoins in his binned drive. He tried to recover the bitcoins by recovering the drive after realising his mistake but his computer parts had been buried deep beneath the landfill. Without certain funds at the end, James could not afford a search. By 2013, James' bitcoins came to be valued at £613 each effectively costing him a loss of £4.6million.
Golden Apple: A California widow took a box of wires and boards to the local recycling centre. She left no contact details when she made the drop. Unknown to her, the box contained one of the 200 extremely rare hand-made first generation Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) computer by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Ron Wayne. The centre staff had the Apple computer verified and confirmed that the treasure was worth £136,000. Although a search was launched to find the widow, she was never found.
Hirst's Art: Damien Hirst's modern art exhibit at the London gallery was mistaken for rubbish by cleaner Emmanuel Asare. The work of the artist, whose single piece could range as much as £10million, was created out of full ashtrays, used coffee cups, bottles and papers. The cleaner thought the art was a party left-over and so threw it away. The work was later rescued and recovered.
Mattress Mishap: Because of the world bank crisis in 2009 a woman decided to keep her savings safe inside her mattress. Her well-meaning daughter, however, thought to surprise her with a new mattress while she was away. The old mattress was thrown away. When the mother found out about what happened, she asked the police's assistance to recover the mattress and the money. The money was never more found. Despite the loss the mother determined to take it in stride: "People have to take everything in proportion, and thank God for the good and the bad."
