Big cat conservation benefits greatly from sale of Spitfire

A restored Vickers Supermarine Spitfire plane belonging to the family of Panthera’s Founder and Chairman Dr Thomas S Kaplan and his wife Daphne Recanati Kaplan was sold through Christie’s London to benefit Panthera, the global wild cat conservation organization, and the Royal Air Force Benevolent Fund.

The famous aeroplane was purchased through Christie’s The Exceptional Sale by a private buyer for $4,784,010 (equivalent to £3,106,500 or €4,302,503) – setting a new world record at auction for any Spitfire.

A significant amount from the Spitfire sale will now be donated to Panthera, a charity founded by Dr Kaplan and Daphne in 2006 to change the course of cat conservation by converting scientific data into conservation solutions.

These are designed to mitigate the most pressing threats facing big cats, including poaching, retaliatory killing for livestock predation, habitat loss and fragmentation and overhunting of prey by local people.

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Rare Spitfire to be auctioned to support wild cat conservation

One of only two remaining World War Two Spitfire Mk 1 models restored to the original specification and still flying, is to be auctioned in July to raise money for the leading wild cat conservation organisation, Panthera, as well as the RAF Benevolent Fund.

The carefully restored Spitfire Mk1 that 

could make up to £2.5 million

Both iconic aeroplanes currently belong to Thomas S Kaplan, American entrepreneur, natural resource investor, philanthropist and art collector, and founder of Panthera with his wife, Daphne.

As part of a hugely generous gift, Spitfire P9374 will be sold at Christie’s, while the only other Mk 1 Spitfire, N3200, will be going to the Imperial War Museum Duxford.

One of the most instantly recognisable silhouettes in the air, the Spitfire is not just a thing of beauty but a war machine that helped save Britain in 1940 and ultimately to win the war. 

Of his restoration project and the auction Kaplan says: “When my great childhood friend, Simon Marsh, and I embarked upon this project, it was to pay homage to those who Churchill called "the Few", the pilots who were all that stood between Hitler's darkness and what was left of civilisation.

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