12THMAN License Plate Sells for $115,000 in Auction by MyPlates.com and Texas A&M University

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Auctioned for $115,000 to Houston attorney and Aggie Tony Buzbee. Proceeds benefit Texas A&M University and the Texas General Revenue Fund.

'I intend to give the 12THMAN plate to someone I think very highly of and who deserves it more than I do.' - Tony Buzbee, 12THMAN Auction Winner.

College Station, TX (PRWEB) September 12, 2013

Howdy, Whoop, Gig ’em! There aren’t enough Aggie sayings to express our excitement over the record set today in the MyPlates.com 12THMAN Auction. http://www.myplates.com/12THMAN

The $115,000 paid for the exclusive 12THMAN plate by Houston attorney Tony Buzbee will go to Texas A&M University and the General Revenue Fund of Texas.

Mr. Buzbee says, “I intend to give the 12THMAN plate to someone I think very highly of and who deserves it more than I do.”

Buzbee plans to give the the license plates to a decorated war veteran who graduated from Texas A&M.

"I'm not saying who it is yet, but I see him as a 12th Man to our country," said Buzbee, who said he was a former officer in the U.S. Marine Corps. "He did a lot more than pay a hundred thousand dollars for a license plate."

Texas A&M Senior Athletics Director Jason Cook says, “We are so grateful for the generosity of Mr. Buzbee and know, given his history of commitment to the University, that the privilege of displaying the 12THMAN plates, and the 91-year tradition they represent, will be placed in very deserving Aggie hands.”

As a special honor, Texas A&M will present the 12THMAN license plate to Buzbee this Saturday in front of 88,000 fans at the Aggies’ SEC showdown with defending national champion Alabama at Kyle Field.

The next highest bidder to Buzbee was Frosty Gilliam, Jr. of Odessa, Texas. Mr. Gilliam is a 12THMAN Foundation board member and President of Aghorn Energy, Inc. He says, “I am proud to have been part of driving the 12THMAN auction to such great success and am satisfied that Texas A&M University will benefit and that all Aggies can share in the national attention given to our 12THMAN tradition."

Like Buzbee, Gilliam says his intention was to give the plates away. “Our intentions were similar, we were going back and forth trying to decide if we would raffle it to a different A&M student each year or perhaps give it to the oldest living Aggie.”

As soon as the 12THMAN Auction ended, My Plates launched the CLASS Auction. This time, there are 100 plates up for bids, rather than one. The 100 messages are the series of CLASS 00 to CLASS 99. http://www.myplates.com/auction

Whereas 12THMAN targeted Aggies, the CLASS Auction plates could be significant to graduates of all kinds, high school, college, culinary school, boot camp, law enforcement academy--you get the idea. The CLASS messages can be purchased on any of My Plates’ 35 designs that hold 7 characters.

Since November 2009, Texans have purchased more than 160,000 My Plates, putting more than $18.8M in the general revenue fund, which helps pay for services for all Texans. Texas A&M-related proceeds from My Plates have supported championship opportunities for Aggie student-athletes, both in the classroom and in competition, as well as funding for the Corps of Cadets and the Bonfire Memorial.

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Contact Kim Miller Drummond at (512) 423-4237 or kim(at)myplates(dot)com.

Texas A&M University Athletics is committed to "Building Champions" through academic achievement, athletic excellence and national recognition of student-athletes, teams and programs. Texas A&M's almost 650 student-athletes compete at the NCAA Division 1-A level in 20 varsity sports. The university officially became a member of the storied Southeastern Conference on July 1, 2012. Opened in 1876 as Texas' first public institution of higher learning, Texas A&M University is a research-intensive flagship university with more than 50,000 students — including 10,000 graduate students — studying in more than 120 undergraduate and 240 graduate degree programs in ten colleges. http://www.aggieathletics.com

My Plates designs and markets new specialty license plates as a vendor for the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles. Texans have bought more than 160,000 My Plates since November 2009, putting more than $18.8M in the state general revenue fund. My Plates’ goal is to create a long-term, mutually beneficial relationship designed to maximize revenues for the state through the sale of My Plates specialty plates. My Plates is a joint venture of Etech, Inc. of Nacogdoches and Pinnacle Technical Resources of Dallas. http://www.myplates.com

The Texas Department of Motor Vehicles (TxDMV) is charged with overseeing the state’s motor vehicle services that provide consumer protection, assist motor vehicle-related businesses and raise revenue for the state. For every $1 it spends, the TxDMV returns $10 to build and maintain highways, roads and bridges and provide needed services to Texans. Each year the agency registers more than 22 million vehicles; regulates vehicle dealers; credentials buses and big trucks for intrastate and interstate commerce; issues oversize and overweight permits; and awards grants to law enforcement agencies to reduce vehicle burglaries and thefts. Learn more at http://www.TxDMV.gov.

TERMINOLOGY

-“Specialty” plate refers to any official license plate other than the state’s general issue plate.

-Specialty plates can be “personalized” plates, but they don’t have to be.

-My Plates and TxDMV use only “specialty” and “personalized” to refer to these plates, not “vanity,” which is pejorative and lacks accuracy.

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