Stanford U., The Cantor & Auguste Rodin mysteries

I had never visited Stanford U., and was interested in viewing one of the most beautiful campuses in the world, stopping at the Hoover Library and seeing if there were any traces of Einstein's years there  (no), plus seeing the beautiful Cantor Museum which owns more than 200 Rodin sculptures in addition to its art collection.  The Italians often say "You can't eat the scenery" and leave Italy for less pretty venues to survive.  Academically, I suppose the same is true.  But students there must enjoy the beauty of the campus.  In addition to the handsome buildings laid out in a lovely plan among many fine old trees (H. Hoover was in the first class when the U. opened, so you now know how old it is), the real surprise is a seemingly feral forest built right into the campus. Nearby it is the beautiful Cantor Museum.
It is as comfortable as an old shirt.  A kind of small building by today's standards which includes a pretty outdoor cafe among a gang of large scale Rodin's.  Inside there are far more than I ever knew he made, plus all the familiar ones.
But something didn't smell just right with me.  Bronze statues have been made in editions of 12 for a long time, although I do not know yet, when this practice began. A lot of Bronzes are marked in the manner the Cantor's "Thinker" is - viz. 10/12.  Many others there are marked just as "4" or "7" and many are not marked at all.
Why 12?  Probably it takes as many as six to break even on the huge costs of working with bronze.  Undoubtedly, many never sell enough to get to the number 12/12 as you cannot know the final number for a long time.

You may not believe it, but their Thinker is marked right in the bronze that it was forged in 1972.  The attribution also states that and says that it was authorized by the Musee Rodin  (aka The Republic of France)(meaning that the Musee collected a giant royalty for authorizing the founding which must still be done at Rodin's  supplier/foundry)..  Now you must ask as I did, How could it be that it took 103 years from the date of the 1st forged Thinker, to sell 9 of the most famous bronze in the world, in history, by the most famous and desired artist?
Then I came upon a v. large statue by Rodin of some obscure (to us) French poet.  Incredibly that one had been produced in 1992.
 Then there was The Age of bronze - the 1st photo (above) of the naked young man. I personally have seen more than 12 of these and wikipedia lists 14 known to exist and many of the ones I have seen are not on that list - I suspect there could be 30 or 40 of these - or more.
Then there are the beautiful 12", 16" and 18" ones (photo 2 et al).  Some of those were numbered and many were not. I think those are Rodin's studies for large pieces not produced in his lifetime.
Who cares?  I am just happy to have the opportunity to see these and only find it all curious.  Imagine if you bought a Age of Bronze years ago for $1 million and thought there would be only 12 in the world - and yours would be worth $40 million by now and it is instead worth maybe $150,000 because the Musee Rodin is still producing them like a Holstein cow give you-know-what or a vine in Bordeaux provides annually.  Moreover, I saw far more Rodin bronzes in California alone (there must be 400 at least) than Rodin ever authorized or produced.
I asked some museum people and they were shocked to be told that bronzes were numbered.  One chief security manager even denied it until I showed him.  So I looked hard to see which had numbers and as they are on a dark surface and often on the side of the base, they are hard to see - more so when they do not exist. Guards told me to stay 18" away from the works of art.  I finally told one I certainly did not wish any hard to works of art, but on the other hand, I was not visiting some Macy's or Walmart,.  I was in an art gallery and wanted to see the credentials of the art.  I also wanted to examine the surfaces of the non-numbered ones (they are different than the originals).  Period.  In three cases, the co-opted the guard into joining me in the hunt.
In any case, I loved my visit to Stanford in every way, well except for the girl with the big, big ass in bright orange pants who would not get away from the front of The gates of Hell (ironic eh?) so I could photo it.