What Do Lionel Hampton, Dick Cavett and a Famous Australian Artist Have in Common?

A Fire Loss is Devastating…Without an Appraiser, it could be catastrophic!

by Heidi G. Cuppari

Within days of the Lionel Hampton fire, Bartlett & Picarella as on the scene. When they arrived, the only thing left standing was a charred piano.

The appraisal team at Bartlett & Picarella has donned many sets of rubber gloves and fire masks on the sites of numerous fire losses. After a fire causes one to loose their precious possessions, how does one pull the threads of their life back together? A good start is to get a professional appraisal to ensure swift claim settlement.

Several days after jazz musician Lionel Hampton’s well-publicized fire spread to other tenants’ apartments, Bartlett & Picarella was on the scene, apprising the millions of dollars in damaged goods for the various insurance company adjusters presented with claims. Bartlett & Picarella helped the insurance companies give their insured’s fair and timely settlements.

Dick Cavett also suffered a fire loss. His home, deluxe furnishings and collection of Native American Indian art were totally destroyed. Unfortunately, the Cavett’s collection was never professionally catalogued or appraised. The task of documenting and appraising the collection for insurance claim purposes was an arduous and time-consuming process…and costly. A pre-existing professional appraisal would have resulted in timelier claim settlement.

An appraisal was also needed for another fire that occurred in the SoHo studio and loft of the well-known Australian artist, David Rankin. Rankin had been painting for over 20 years; thousands of paintings were destroyed.

In an unheated building, without electricity, covered in smoke and soot and armed with coats, masks and rubber gloves, the Bartlett & Picarella team sifted through the ruined works of abstract art, sighing and moaning along with the artist as each canvas was retrieved by workers. Documenting thousands of works, Bartlett & Picarella helped both the insurance company adjuster and the insured make sense of the piles of rubble before them.

The artist could never replace what was lost, but with a timely settlement, he could get on with his life. Who knows? He could possibly be inspired by his frustration to paint a new series about an all-consuming fire which devoured the past and may have opened the door to the future.

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