Horrible forgeries not limited to baseball
 

I don't collect baseball autographs, but I do enjoy looking at the various signature threads. It is actually enjoyable to see when Chris W., Steve Z, Shelly, Chuck, Brendan opine about a Mantle, Mays, Ruth, Jeter and others. I don't get it right when I try to guess, but fun none the less. That being said, there are clowns and a-holes who forge not just the 4 major sports. I have not seen many, but I just ran across a blatantly horrible Jesse Owens on ebay. Even though his signature changed over the years, there was a consistency to them. If you know his signature, you can get a feel for when it was signed. Many of the ones I see, I feel are overpriced, but as with any signature, people will try to get what they can. There are enough real ones on ebay that I don't get why someone would bid on this. It has quite a few bids with a few days left. I suspect that this seller has a few other forgeries and would be interest to see if you baseball people can confirm that. Is his Mantle baseball a 'banana' Mantle. I was also suspicious about his Hornsby. Take a look, the forgery on top and two legitimate Owens, from 1969 and 1975.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/JESSE-OWENS...19.m1438.l2649

Below are links to threads I have posted on Ebay seller Jfried504.


https://live.autographmagazine.com/f...trong-baseball


https://live.autographmagazine.com/f...ntle-roger-mar

The Mantle bat looks okay?

Chris,

Thank you for posting those links. I don't go to AML that often. Even I could tell that multi-signed baseball was horrible. Who in their right mind would use an ultra thin Sharpie on a baseball? A regular one is bad enough.

There is this seller who is supposedly from Italy, though they have set up another account that is from the Netherlands, I believe, who lists these very desirable and rare Olympic autographs. All are forgeries. The clue for them is that they use pencil and colored pencil. If you look hard enough at some of the listings you can see erasure marks. I find very few pre-WWII Olympic signatures in pencil, most are in fountain pen. They slip in some possibly legitimate signatures which could lead people to believe all of their listings are real. They purchase MOH recipients and some other military types and triple the listing price. They also slip in some forged military, especially WWII Germans.

Not authentic, Chris.

Thanks Chris! I envy your ability and skill when it comes to autographs--I am good with very obvious forgeries but don't have the skill when it comes to them generally.

Thank you, Chris, but it's just a matter of time before you gain that same eye.