[slidekellyslide]

In the general sense I believe historical artifacts like this "belong" to the family and thus it may not really be a "moral quandary", but in my head it is. I have offered it to them at my cost...I kinda hope that it is more than they want to pay. If not I'll let it go.

About 5 or 6 years ago when the Matty McIntyre photos got removed from the album and sold as single photos a few of them were sold as "unknowns" and I picked them up knowing that I could eventually identify them....one of them I thought looked strikingly like Sam Thompson, I posted my thoughts about the photo on the old Net54 site and Joe G emailed me to tell me that he knows the family of Big Sam and that I should contact them to see if they think it is him...well I did and I forged a friendship with Keith Thompson (Sam's great-nephew) who told me that it was indeed Big Sam and that photos of him were very rare...He wanted to purchase it, but I didn't want to sell it...he never once pressured me and I made a really nice copy and sent it to him...well for a couple of years whenever I looked at it, it kind of ate away at me so finally I just contacted him and asked him if he wanted to purchase it for my cost and he did...it did make me feel better. I know that every time I look at the bat I will get this same feeling.