When this woman appeared on Antiques Roadshow, she had no idea how much her book was worth. Then an expert’s estimation floored her.

Ken Sanders has been an appraiser on popular daytime TV show Antiques Roadshow for a decade. According to the Deseret News, to him the meaning of a rare book is “a book I have and you don’t.” But then a woman from Salt Lake City showed him something astounding.

Sanders is a significant figure in the world of antiques. Best known for his appearances on Antiques Roadshow, he’s a true fountain of knowledge, particularly when it comes to rare books. Indeed, he’s been passionate about books ever since he was a teenager.

By the time that Sanders was 17, he had already started his impressive book collection. And from there he continued to grow his portfolio of rare books even further. However, he also spent his time chasing book thieves – and even playing a part in some high-profile sting operations.

So, there’s no doubt that he knows his stuff when it comes to books. And that’s why Sanders is such an important part of Antiques Roadshow. People turn up specifically to seek out his expertise when they think they might have found something valuable.

And in one particular episode, which aired in April 2017, Sanders was presented with something very special indeed. The item was brought to him by a woman who had no idea of its value. Straight away, though, Sanders could see that she was in possession of something remarkable.

The woman appeared on the Salt Lake City episode of the show and told Sanders that she had found a book in the basement. It belonged to her great-grandmother, whom the lady described as having been religious. Looking more closely at the book, it was clear that it was extremely old.

The pages of the tiny book were discolored and a little tattered, but an inscription at the front was nonetheless clear to see. It turned out that the message had been written by her great-grandmother, when the book itself was already 104 years old.

The antique book had obviously been passed down for a few generations before it finally appeared on Antiques Roadshow. And Sanders was very surprised to see it. “I was quite shocked when [the lady] brought it up to the table,” he told the Deseret News in April 2017.

The reason that Sanders was so surprised was the rarity of the type of book in front of him. He could immediately tell that it was a selection of hymns; and looking at the front of the book, Sanders noted that it had been published way back in 1844.

Then, having studied the book more closely, Sanders began to tell the woman a little more about it. He started by stating that it was a hymn book for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (LDS). Then, he went on to reveal how rare it was to see one of them these days.

Sanders said that there was one main reason why book experts didn’t often see hymnals dating as far back as 1844. He explained how the members of the LDS church didn’t tend to keep their hymn books in circulation after they’d become a little tattered from general usage.

Instead, they would usually throw the old hymnals away when they didn’t look quite so pristine anymore and then print new ones. As a result, the very first LDS hymn books have become hard to get hold of all these years later.

And, of course, the way that the world of antiques generally works is that rare items tend to be worth a lot. Still, few people could have expected Sanders to give the woman in possession of the LDS hymn book quite such an astounding figure at the end of his evaluation.

Given that only a few hymnals from the 1830s and 1840s have survived, Sanders was bound to give the woman a generous estimation for the value of her hymn book. Moreover, it was printed in Bellow Falls, Vermont, which made it even more valuable.

But when the book expert revealed the hymn book’s true worth, the woman was totally overwhelmed. Sanders told her that the LDS hymnal was likely to fetch between $40,000 and $50,000 if she sold it. He was able to estimate the figure based upon the sale of a similar hymnal only a few years earlier.

When the woman heard how much her antique was likely to be worth, she covered her mouth with her hands and let out a gasp. She clearly never expected it to be quite so valuable. “Really?!” she asked the expert.

“Oh my gosh!” she exclaimed, taking a moment to come to terms with the news. After all, the book had just been sitting in the basement for years. She even looked as though she might cry at one point, before she composed herself enough to ask Sanders an important question.

“What do I do with it?” she asked, still seemingly on the verge of losing control of her emotions. The expert’s advice was to keep it somewhere very secure, perhaps in a safety deposit box. But people who watched the Antiques Roadshow segment on YouTube had other suggestions for her.

“Sell! Sell! Sell!” one viewer commented, while others were touched by the woman’s reaction. “How sweet! I teared up watching this,” wrote another YouTube user. Someone else described the way that the woman took the news as “heartwarming” to watch.

Whether she ended up selling the hymnal or not remains to be seen. However, at the end of the segment she asked Sanders to whom she should “hand it down,” suggesting that she planned to keep it within the family for generations to come. After all, it may well become even more valuable after another few decades sitting idly in the basement.