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Michael: When Gold Was $65 an Ounce
Fifty-six years on 47th Street, from selling diamonds to buying, melting and refining gold, and the day the whole block melted its inventory.
How long have you been working on 47th Street, and how did you start?
Michael56 years! I remember when gold was $65 an ounce. I started working as a diamond seller, because gold was not a priority then.
Then someone gave my boss an idea. He had a plethora of leftover gold from orders and dealing in jewelry, so he started melting it and selling it to one of his friends. Then his friend said, "Why don't you accumulate all the gold and then send it to refine?" That's how I started!
I remember when gold was $65 an ounce.Michael, Preferred Precious Metals
As a gold refiner, how has your job changed over the years as gold has gone up?
MichaelWell, everything was old-fashioned. We had gas furnaces with gas blowers; that was the old-fashioned way to melt. When I came in, in 1970, there were three buyers and refiners. In those days people didn't buy gold like that; there were special buyers and refiners, and some people even refined it themselves. The process was normal and beautiful: buying, melting, sending to refine. That's it.
But in 1980, gold hit an all-time high, and all the stores on the block closed, ha ha. They took all their inventory and melted it. They had inventory that cost them $35 an ounce, and now their gold was worth $800 an ounce, so they melted everything!
There was a lot of gold. I bought a lot of gold! You should have seen the lines down the block of people just selling.
You should have seen the lines down the block of people just selling.Michael, 56 years on 47th Street
Lightly edited for length and clarity.
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