As with all art, not many daguerreotypes reached the pinnacle of greatness. There they were, at the very bottom of the basement at 353 Atlantic Avenue, Marblehead, Massachusetts, in a house stuffed to the gills with trash, occasional treasures, and the leftover contents of the Boston camera shop founded almost a century ago by Mr. Feigenbaum's father, Abraham. But the niece, a California lawyer, lucked out in her own family. Her husband, now in the film business, had studied art history in college at Vassar and knew a daguerreotype when he saw one. Ultimately the heirs called in Cotuit, Massachusetts, antiques dealer John Cira, who sorted out the house, rescued assorted pockets of value, researched the daguerreotypes, and the rest you know.
Nobody knows for sure.
Sotheby's suggests he was a collector with a superb eye. There were no accompanying bills, documentation, notes, or letters, according to John Cira. Feigenbaum's niece said that in his teens her uncle had first-day stamp collections, and he also wrote elaborate descriptions of some of his other things. She had little light to shed on him, having seldom seen him as she grew up. He was very sweet.