Photo of Wild West outlaw Billy the Kid, which one collector paid $2 in the junk shop is now worth several million dollars. This is the second photo of Henry McCarthy, known as Billy the Kid, whose authenticity has been confirmed. The photo shows how Billy the Kid and his gang Regulators in 1878 somewhere in New Mexico play croquet, British sports game which became popular in the United States in the second half of the 19th century.
In 2010 collector Randy Giharo found a faded photo among a bunch of other photos in a cardboard box in a junk shop in the Californian city of Fresno. He paid $2 for it, and is estimated that it is now worth millions of dollars, because the only previously confirmed photo of Billy the Kid from 1880, sold for $ 2.3 million.
Photo of Wild West outlaw Billy the Kid
The authenticity of the photo is confirmed by Kagin, a company, specializing for the items from American history, which identified Billy the Kid along with several members of the Regulators, as well as friends and family members.
The photo was taken at a wedding in the summer of 1878, just one month after the end of the Lincoln County War which is the theme of many movies including “Left Handed Gun” in which Paul Newman plays Billy the Kid.
A research team spent a year studying photography, and they even found the location where it was taken in Chaves County, where they found the remains of the building from the photo.
The discovery of this photo will be the subject of a two-hour documentary on the National Geographic Channel airing Sunday, October 18th at 9 p.m.
Photo of Wild West outlaw Billy the Kid
