Hassan Sign on eBay - Cobb/Mathewson

[base_ball]

Somewhere I have the advertisement for the reproductions of this poster. This was about 10 years ago. They were of very high quality, came in several sizes (roughly proportional to the original 40x60), and were not cheap. Nice touch to fade/age the item to add to its "authenticity."

[GrayGhost]

As we say in autographs, a 100 pct fake, or forgery, or "reproduction" if you will.

[CarltonHendricks]

I emailed the seller to see if they had any more of the signs...turned out to be Rick from Pawn Stars...said he'd check with some guy named Kevin to see if he had any more from his grandfathers barn....

Seriously...nothing I've read here is concrete evidence one way or the other...a faded appearance doesn't necessarily mean anything. The newspaper ad Ron Price advised of is very enlightening, thanks. That seems like the only answer of where the white rectangular box that says "A Famous Play" would have originated from.

If it's fake, which I lean toward, it seems like a pretty ambitious project to make them...It's die cut so it would have had to have been made by a professional graphics outfit (China)...or someone would have to be very good with an exacto knife. Thanks also to Joseph for the info on the repros he's seen.

The seller's feedback isn't private..which would have been the kiss of death...and his 98.1% positive feedback isn't wholly incriminating...but the stuff he's been selling over the last 15 days looks a little fishy...like the Negro League broadside.

The fact it didn't get torn to shreds with conclusive evidence here is interesting in it's self...it's a jungle out there..be careful!

[drc]

It's safe to say it's a reproduction. Note that the seller never claims that it is old, vintage or original.

[ctownboy]

My take?

If it is something that old, that large and has those two players on it and it only sells for $197.50, IT IS FAKE!!!!

Look, if it is on eBay and a myriad number of people can see it, then chances are, a FEW people would take a flyer on it being real and bid it up higher IF they thought they could turn around and put it in a major auction and sell it for much more. I mean, who WOULDN'T spend $500 dollars on something if they could turn around and flip it for $5,000 dollars (or more).

That didn't happen. Plus, I have seen signs like these come up before.

David

[perezfan]

Carlton...

The lingering 1% chance that it is real definitely does eat away at us, as collectors. And to your point, most (if not all) of the cons are just circumstantial. But when you put the facts all together, you have a pretty clear answer.

Plus, the seller never pictured the back, which seems fishy. No mention of an easel-back or other mounting device. And the corners/borders do not show proper aging... one would expect more rounding of the botttom corners as well as various edge faults.

None of this is described by the seller. Normally on an authentic piece of this magnitude, there would be a dozen photos, including close-ups of the key features. The one single distant photo served as a tip-off to me, that it's a reproduction. Plus (to David's point) the seller made no claims as to its authenticity.

But still that 1% chance will drive us nuts

[drc]

When I say there's 99% chance something is fake, some people will think "So he's saying there is a chance it's real."

I would say there's 99% chance it's a fake. That's the best I will do without seeing it in person. Read into the remaining 1% as you wish.

[NYHighlanderFan]

I figured to search for an older thread with the topic I'm questioning instead of beginning a new thread altogether.

The Hassan Cigarette window display in question here looks to be identical to the ad that ran in the Philadelphia Sunday newspaper on May 20, 1912. They look identical except the window card is a larger size and the spaces between the bat handles and the Hassan banner are orange in the window ad and white in the newspaper ad. And the bottom trim was added which was not on the newspaper ad. (Whoever made this Hassan piece did a nice job on it. They just needed to put a year on it. And that's the only thing I dislike about what Helmar Beer is doing. They're making really cool new stuff look old and not putting a year on the stuff. But that's another topic.)

My question is how many original newspapers with that full color ad are known? And did it only run that one day with the Plank article below? The non-color Old Mill and Hindu T206 ads which ran in several different advertising markets and even repeated in several different papers. The ad is allegedly part of the back page of a several-page Sunday baseball suppliment.

If anyone has info on this ad, please share! Thanks and hope you all have a blessed Fourth of July!!!

One other thing...why in earlier posts in this thread is Ohio being ripped on?

[perezfan]

It's nothing against Ohio (I'm still a big Reds fan after many years removed). It is simply in reference to the fact that many reproductions and bogus items have originated there.

I haven't monitored it as much lately, but for a while it seemed that every questionable (or downright fake) piece on ebay was being sold by an Ohio-based seller.

I'm sure that others who read this can verify, and perhaps even reel off some of those sellers' names.