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An Antiques Roadshow expert got a nasty shock after discovering he was allergic to one guest’s rare item, leaving him exclaiming, ‘I’m going to have to keep this at arm’s length!’
During a vintage episode filmed at Liverpool’s Sefton Park Palm House, hopefuls queued up to have their prized possessions examined by show regulars including Marc Allum, Ronnie Archer Morgan and Wayne Colquhoun.
The installment featured a medal awarded to one of the first men to land on D-Day, a stately stool used at Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation and ticket stubs from the iconic 1966 World Cup final.
But expert Matthew Haley was stunned when a guest unveiled one of the earliest vials of penicillin ever produced, dating back to Christmas Eve in 1945.
The penicillin, made at a factory in Speke, Liverpool, was thought to be one of the very first batches of the antibiotic.
As Matthew noticed the label, he backed off and said: ‘I’m going to have to keep this at arm’s length as I am actually allergic to penicillin.
‘So, I’ll keep that safely away from me. But it’s not just any bottle of penicillin, is it?’
The guest then explained how the item came to be in his possession, revealing he had prevented it from going into a skip at the instruction of his manager.
The guest rescued it when he himself worked for the factory in which it was created.
‘I worked at that factory. I was in the human resources department, and the department had a small archive of articles from back when the factory first started,’ he remembered.
‘A new manager came along into the HR department and said “We’re not running a museum, we’re running a pharmaceutical business. Arrange for a skip and have them disposed of.”
‘And I said to him, “Can I keep some of those items for my own because I really don’t think they should go in a skip.”‘
The guest managed to rescue the vial along with an old visitors’ book, which even recorded a visit from Alexander Fleming, the scientist who discovered penicillin.
The guest had no idea just how much the find was worth, admitting he thought it might fetch only around £200.
But he was taken aback when Matthew delivered a far higher valuation.
‘We’ve got your story. You were there, you rescued it. But for me it just lacks that little letter or that little certificate from the time that would really have said “This was the very first.”
‘I think it’s an absolutely fantastic story. Because of the interest in healthcare, I do think if you put this into auction, I would expect it to make probably between £2,000 and £4,000,’ he told him.
‘Wow, I thought it’d be worth about £200,’ the guest replied.
‘It’s fantastic,’ said Matthew. ‘I’m keeping it at arm’s length, but I love it.’
Antiques Roadshow is available to watch on BBC One and to stream on iPlayer.
