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Originally Posted by tazdmb
Agreed, while I hate the unsubstantiated accusations made by Peter Nash, I would be lying if I did not admit I have learned a great deal from his website in terms of stole autographs/artifacts. Without his help, I think my collection would be littered with stolen goods that would make me feel very uncomfortable.
On I side note, I have gotten to know Bill Hasse, former Senior VP of the Hall of Fame, and flat out asked him why the HOF has not taken more steps to return some of the stolen artifacts. He told me that, unfortunately, much of the stuff that was stolen was never properly archived so that they had 100% proof, which is what the FBI wanted, to get the items returned. While other items, like the Johnson Presidential balls, was a pretty open and shut case.
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That's pretty much true for a lot of archives and museums. Many aren't well funded or have ups and downs. So a large collection gets "archived" which basically means boxed up hopefully in something more archival than a cardboard box, and labeled with a general idea of what's there. Like "famous person X collection, box 5 miscellaneous correspondence 1920-35" And there is sits awaiting a better cataloging, which may never happen.
I don't know how detailed they are about stuff that gets deaccessioned these days, hopefully they make a detailed record. But years ago if you had something the current director wanted and asked to swap for something from "one of those boxes in the basement" you might just get what you wanted. One of the people running the national stamp collection at one time would have stuff specially printed to trade for items they needed. Not exactly on the up and up, but at the time it was accepted. And there weren't many records kept at all.
It's not a good situation, and makes stuff prone to theft.
Steve B