Humphrey the Hamster Helps Raise $89K at Osborn School Carnival

Last year, it was a baseball signed by Seattle Mariner Ichiro Suzuki. This year it was Humphrey the Hamster. This furry rodent, whose ancestors hail from Eastern Europe, Siberia, Mongolia, China and Korea, is now living large in our suburban bedroom community thanks to the pet trade, donors Maeve and Deirdre Potter and the Osborn School Carnival.

While more sedated bidding was taking place for collections of wine and time at weekend ski homes, yesterday the Osborn Carnival silent auction was besieged by rampant bidding on Humphrey the Hamster. As if people mistook this little furry beast for Rye’s own free agent A-Rod, bidding opened at $150 (that’s US dollars folks) and went up from there.

Soon, Osborn students and their siblings were banned from the bidding and an "Adults Only" warning was posted on the bid sheet. After eight bids at 3pm, it looked like Humphrey was headed home with the one Rye family for a bid of $260 US dollars, perhaps the most expensive and exclusive hamster–or maybe even rodent of any stripe–in Rye city history.

Next Year, Maybe a Hamster Festival Instead?

Early indications are the Osborn school raised $89,000 for after school activities, a new carnival record.

A common hamster goes for $10 or less. At $260, that’s a 96% margin and some truly awesome fund raising to benefit the Osborn School.

Think about it. Instead of a carnival (or for the truly ambitious, in addition to) in 2009, we could raise the same amount of money by selling 342 hamsters. In fact, if we can talk the winning family into getting Humphrey a hamster girlfriend soon, we may be able to completely eliminate our cost basis by producing our own hamsters by next October.

Now that would be a true act of charity by Humphrey’s new family ;)-

Something to think about.

(BELOW) Illegal bidding by children for Humphrey the Hamster.