Judy Garland's Ruby Slippers sold for $32M had been stolen & lost for 13 years

How much did the Ruby Slippers sell for?

The Ruby Slippers were auctioned off for $28 million ("hammer price") but amounted to a total of $32.5 million (after adding the "buyer's premium"), as noted by The Hollywood Reporter.

If you're not familiar with those terms: ArtPrice describes hammer price as "the price reached when an auctioneer's gavel drops." Meanwhile, buyer's premium is described as the "auction fee" or "buyer's fee" that constitutes "the main source of income for the auction operator."

How did the Ruby Slippers auction go?

The Ruby Slippers' auction page on the official Heritage Auctions website verifies that the shoes were indeed sold on Saturday, December 7 for $32.5 million.

Overall, the auction only involved 31 bids and registered phone bidders, but had an audience of 61,503 pageviews.

What was Judy Garland's shoe size?

In March 1988, Rhys Thomas wrote a feature story about the Ruby Slippers for the Los Angeles Times. After speaking with veteran Smithsonian curators and pop culture memorabilia experts, Thomas wrote that "all the Ruby Slippers are between Size 5 and 6, varying between B and D widths."

Thus, it's likely Judy Garland's shoe size was between 5 and 6.

When and how were Judy Garland's Ruby Slippers stolen?

The Ruby Slippers were stolen in August 2005 while on display at the Judy Garland Museum located in Grand Rapids, Minnesota.

The actual owner of the shoes at the time, art collector Michael Shaw, had lent the Ruby Slippers to the museum (via The New York Times). In other words: these Ruby Slippers weren't stolen from Shaw's possession — they were stolen from the Judy Garland Museum, even though the institution didn't own the shoes in the first place.

The Associated Press reported at the time that "law enforcement offered a $250,000 reward early in the case, and a fan in Arizona offered another $1 million in 2015."

When and where were the Ruby Slippers found?

The U.S. District Attorney's Office of North Dakota told CNN that the stolen Ruby Slippers were found during a "sting operation" in Minneapolis, Minnesota, which took place in July 2018. For context, this was 13 years after the shoes went missing in 2005.

For clarity, a sting operation is described by the Collins Dictionary as a "trap set up by the police to entice a person to commit a crime and thereby produce evidence."

Who stole the Ruby Slippers?

According to the Associated Press, a man named Terry J. Martin was indicted by a grand jury in May 2023 with "one count of theft of a major artwork." In addition, Smithsonian Magazine reported that Martin had an accomplice named Jerry Hal Saliterman, who was also charged with theft.

Christa Lawler wrote a detailed description about Martin for The Minnesota Star-Tribune, which read as follows:

"Terry J. Martin took a sledgehammer to the emergency exit and a plexiglass display case at the Judy Garland Museum in August 2005, believing the famed ruby slippers he was stealing were made with real gems. It wasn't until he met with his jewelry fence that he learned the so-called rubies were made of glass. Knowing that, Martin washed his hands of his renowned prize — one of several pairs worn by Judy Garland in the 1939 classic film The Wizard of Oz."

That same report described Martin as a 76-year-old man who was "in a wheelchair and using an oxygen cart" as of October 2023.

How many pairs of Ruby Slippers were made for 'The Wizard of Oz'?

The exact number of Ruby Slippers made for The Wizard of Oz in 1939 is unclear. Most publications, like NBC News, estimate that four pairs of Ruby Slippers worn by Judy Garland are still surviving in 2024.

Sarah McGonagall, a set designer, costume/prop maker, and photographer, went viral on Sunday, December 8 with an X post explaining that there are actually five pairs of Ruby Slippers in the world — and they all have individual nicknames.

When reached for comment, McGonagall tells Out that the four widely-reported pairs of Ruby Slippers are "The Traveling Shoes" (the pair that was just auctioned off), "The People's Shoes" (at the Smithsonian), "The Witch's Shoes" (at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures), "Dorothy's Shoes" (owned by Roberta Bauman, now under private ownership).

According to McGonagall, reports haven't included "The Arabian Test Pair" version of the Ruby Slippers, which were owned by Debbie Reynolds and are now under private ownership.

"I think a lot of publications leave them out because they're a completely different design from the Ruby Slippers that were eventually used in the film," she says. "[The Arabian Test Pair] were only ever pictured in early costume fittings. But I count them because they were found at the same time as all the other pairs, save for Roberta Bauman's."

McGonagall also highlights that "The Arabian Test Pair" slippers are "actually very faithful to the ones in the book, but I guess the studio wanted a more 'classic' and 'simple' style."

She adds, "They also made a pair of slippers that are almost identical to the ones in the film, just with bugle beads instead of sequins. In the photos, you can't even tell them apart."

McGonagall points to an official illustration from L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz novel that shows Dorothy Gale holding a pair of shoes with pointier ends — which looks more like "The Arabian Test Pair" than the version fans saw in the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz.

"This is what they look like in the book," McGonagall reiterates, "curled toe and all!"