Interesting story relating to this item:
We were aware that this was a strange looking Ruth. We’re not autograph experts, but I don’t think one has to be to look at this signature with skepticism. At best, we thought, it’s not the most beautiful Ruth signature, and is uncharacteristically sloppy; at worst, we thought, it’s not authentic. When it came in by mail we immediately contacted the consignor and expressed concern it might not be accepted even though it had apparently been authenticated by UDA’s authentication process.
The consignor then told us an interesting story: He told us that he originally had a different Upper Deck card with a Ruth signature but that the Ruth signature was not authentic. It was a stamped signature. So he went to Upper Deck with his complaint and they agreed that an error had been made and arranged for his problem Ruth signature card to be replaced. This is what it was replaced with. (I don’t know if his original card had only a Ruth signature, or if all they did was replace the Ruth signature in this card, I just can’t remember.)
On September 3, 2010, even before being evaluated in person, we sent an image of the card (front and back) to JSA with this message just in case it could be eliminated without even seeing it in person (we thought that might be the case), and if so, we could send it right back to the consignor. The text of our message read: “Is this good? It has such a strange look. It has an unusual history too – The guy that is sending this to us originally had a different Ruth-cut Upper Deck card that had a printed Ruth signature (it was a stamped sig) so they replaced it with this. Is this good?” JSA immediately responded in the affirmative that they do believe they remember certing this item. We later arranged for in-person review of this item again by JSA (as we do with all signed items, even those that have already been authenticated), and JSA confirmed in person that they had no issues with the authenticity, and formally reaffirmed their opinion. Sometimes we’ve had signatures rejected as forgeries by JSA that have been very surprising (we thought they were going to be fine). Sometimes we see signatures that for some reason we have our antennae up and we expect that there might be a problem, and in the opinion of the authenticators there isn’t. That was the case with this item. So, that’s the story of the Upper Deck Authenticated Ruth-Gehrig card.
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