A Jimmy Spence authentication question.

[travrosty]

true, but that is not authenticating autographs, it is accepting the documentation at face value. the LOA claims they authenticated the autographs and the autographs are consistent with slant, size, formation, pen pressure, flow, not that they are consistent with documentation telling them that the autographs were signed at a show and are therefore subsequently real.

There is a big difference between the two, and I don't have a problem with them authenticating paperwork or provenance, if that is what they state on their LOA instead of flow, pen pressure, slant, size, formation, comparing to exemplars they have been exposed to in their professional careers, etc.

Because then it changes from autograph authentication to provenance or paperwork authentication. They charge money to authenticate autographs, not to pass something based on paperwork alone. It would leave the door open for people to gin up some paperwork or show fraudulent documentation to try to get something passed based on that doctored paperwork without having each autograph looked at on their own merits. Something I am not claiming happened here but once someone theoretically goes down that road, a smooth road could get bumpy in a hurry once submitters find out that an authenticator is open to doing it this way.

JSA has a service called the witnessed protection program that they use to authenticate on the spot, witnessing each autograph, that is the only way I know of that they can positively authenticate something without comparing each signature to a known exemplar like they claim on the LOA. They should do what they claim, and I take their LOA's word that they did.

I just don't know how it could make any financial sense for the submitter figuring in how very long it had to take to examine each and every one of the 150+ signatures, identify them and compare them to multiple exemplars like the LOA states, all these signatures of which they had in their exemplar files or had access to others' files. I hope JSA has an incredible Negro League exemplar file. Kudos if they do. But why don't they list all the signatures on the LOA and the exact number of signatures as a tamper-resistant measure?