LOS ANGELES, CA.- While nominees for this year’s 84th Academy Awards are preparing their acceptance speeches, Nate D. Sanders is offering the most extraordinary collection of Oscars ever to hit the auction block with final bidding happening on February 28.

Highlights of the exquisite collection estimated to sell for more than $1 million include Herman Mankiewicz’s 1941 Best Screenplay Academy Award for Citizen Kane, the 1933 Best Picture Oscar awarded to Cavalcade, groundbreaking cinematographer Gregg Toland‘s 1939 Oscar for Black & White Cinematography in Wuthering Heights, Charles Coburn’s 1943 Best Supporting Actor Oscar for The More the Merrier- the first year that Best Supporting Actors were awarded statutes - and the first Oscar awarded for Special Effects to Farciot Edouart in 1938.

”This is the most significant collection of Oscars to ever be auctioned. It contains Academy Awards from epic films such as Citizen Kane and The Best Years of Our Lives”, auction house owner Nate D. Sanders said. “Furthermore, Cavalcade is the earliest Best Picture Oscar to ever be offered in an auction.”

Long-time New Yorker film critic Pauline Kael credited Mankiewicz as having originated the idea of making a motion picture about William Randolph Hearst, which evolved into Citizen Kane. The lone Oscar awarded to Citizen Kane was for Best Screenplay, jointly to co-authors Mankiewicz and Orson Welles. In 2002, The American Film Institute recognized Citizen Kane as the greatest film of all-time. In December 2011, Nate D. Sanders sold Orson Welles’ Academy Award for Best Screenwriter in Citizen Kane for $861,000.

Citizen Kane cinematographer Gregg Toland captured his lone Academy Award in 1939 for his work in Wuthering Heights. Still recognized as one of the most influential camera operators of all-time, Toland became renowned for his usage of deep-focus and bright lighting in Citizen Kane and The Best Years of Our Lives.

Cavalcade was awarded Best Picture at the sixth Academy Awards in 1933 and was the first picture produced by Fox Film to win a Best Picture Oscar.

Charles Coburn’s Best Supporting Oscar for The More the Merrier in 1943 is significant as it was the first year that the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences awarded statuettes to supporting actors. Previously, actors in supporting roles were awarded tablets.

The auction also features Ronald Colman’s 1947 Best Actor Oscar for a Double Life.

Two Oscars from William Wyler’s 1946 masterpiece The Best Years of Our Lives, one of the most popular box-office films of all-time are included in the auction. Daniel Mandell won an Academy Award for Film Editing and Hugo Friedhofer earned a statuette for Best Musical Score.

The 1946 MGM Technicolor film The Yearling won two Academy Awards. This film, based on Marjorie Kinnan Rawling’s sentimental novel starred Gregory Peck and Jane Wyman. Two Oscars are up for auction, which were awarded to Paul Groesse for Color Art Direction and Leonard Smith for Best Color Cinematography.

Additionally, Nate D. Sanders is auctioning off Grosse’s statuette for Color Art Direction in the 1949 Technicolor film Little Women, which featured a young Elizabeth Taylor.

The oldest Academy Award in the lot is Norman Taurog’s 1931 Oscar for Best Directing for Skippy. Taurog still holds the distinction of being the youngest person to win the Academy Award for Best Director. Taurog’s 9-year old nephew Jackie Cooper starred in Skippy.

The sale features a bronze tablet “Award of Merit for Outstanding Achievement” Oscar awarded to innovator Farciot Edouart for the development of the Paramount dual-screen transparency camera setup. Also featured is the first Special Effects Oscar, which Edouart won in 1938 for Spawn of the North as well as Edouart’s Oscar for Outstanding Transparency Special Effects in Reap the Wild Wind. Edouart accumulated 10 Academy Awards over his distinguished career.

Sanders proclaimed, “This collection is a tribute to the movies that Hollywood has produced for nearly 100 years - in both its artistic genius to tell compelling stories and technological ingenuity through special effects. Hollywood films are loved throughout the world, and these awards are a testament to that fondness people have for them."

The auction ends Tuesday, February 28, 2012 at 5 pm Pacific Standard Time. Bids can be placed online at a href="http://www.NateDSanders.com" target="_blank">www.NateDSanders.com or by phone at 310-440-2982.