Editing Vinland Map (section)

==="VMTR 95"===
The expanded 30th anniversary edition of the 1965 official book, ''The Vinland Map and the Tartar Relation'', was notable for its exclusion of most of the evidence against the map's authenticity, concentrating instead on vindications by George Painter, and Thomas Cahill with colleague Bruce Kusko (in which they claimed specifically that they had not analyzed the loose particles they took from the map at the time of their PIXE research), but it did reprint an essay written in 1989 by the original book dealer Laurence Witten. He stated that, when the McCrone investigation concluded the map to be a forgery in 1974, he was asked by Yale to reveal its provenance as a matter of urgency, and to discuss the possible return of Mr Mellon's money. He replied that he had no idea where the map came from, beyond Ferrajoli (who was convicted of theft shortly after the sale, and died shortly after release from prison). On the subject of the money, he said he could not pay it all back because he had paid agreed shares of his profit to Ferrajoli and to another dealer who had introduced him. For his part, Mellon did not ask for the return of any money. The essay also revealed that Witten had, on Ferrajoli's recommendation, met with Irving Davis after buying the map volume in 1957.<ref>Skelton et al. (1995) pages lvi-lvii</ref>

Regardless of the controversy, the map, which had been valued for insurance purposes at over $750,000 in the 1960s, was claimed in 1996 to be worth $25,000,000.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1996/02/13/science/disputed-medieval-map-called-genuine-after-all.html|title=Disputed Medieval Map Called Genuine After All|first=John Noble|last=Wilford|newspaper=The New York Times|date=Feb 13, 1996|access-date=May 13, 2020}}</ref>