Shoeless Joe Jackson Auto- Fake?

[Mark17]

The photo could've been handed to Joe and he might've said "I'll sign it later," and then had his wife sign it for him.

I've seen a couple glaring examples of "provenance" being given so much weight it was ridiculous. Two examples in the GU arena:

1. Years ago, a major AH had a GU Hank Aaron bat with great provenance. It had come directly from a guy who only played one season in the majors - 1970. He faced Aaron in a game that year, struck him out or something, and after the game, he claims he went to the Braves locker room and Hank gave him the bat. The AH pulled down that "provenance" story when I pointed out the Aaron GU bat was from the 1973-75 labeling period.

2. A former player, having been released towards the end of the season, took with him his jersey and pants, and gifted them to a well known broadcaster. They ended up in an auction earlier this year, which I won. The jersey and pants were graded MEARS 10 attributed to that player, because of that impeccable provenance, and the jersey really is nice. So are the pants, but they are quite clearly tagged as belonging to a different player - a guy who wore the same uniform number for many consecutive years with that same team, who played in almost all of the games that year, The pants have that player's number stitched into them, and the use on the pants is heavy, as would be expected for that guy, who stole bases and was a star player. The fellow they supposedly belonged to, on the other hand, was a relief pitcher who never stole a base in his decade long career. And he also had the same uniform number his entire career with several different teams, and it is not what's in those pants.

What obviously happened is that the player grabbed his shirt, easily identifiable with his big uniform number on the back, and then just grabbed a pair of pants that were the correct size out of a hamper, not caring, or not paying attention to the tagging, to make sure they were actually his. In fact, I'll bet most players never pay attention to uniform tagging to begin with.

So much for provenance. A well told story should never outweigh what an item actually is.

[Peter_Spaeth]

From other exemplars of his wife's signature it seems fairly clear it isn't hers. It's either Jackson or Smith IMO. I suppose it could also be someone who forged his signature much later.

[Mark17]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

From other exemplars of his wife's signature it seems fairly clear it isn't hers. It's either Jackson or Smith IMO. I suppose it could also be someone who forged his signature much later.

The exemplar you linked from the REA auction has a "k" unlike anything I've ever seen on a supposedly autographed Jackson item. However, his 1919 contract, which is shown in this thread, and supposedly wife - signed, is reasonably close to Joe's writing. I wonder if the REA wife signature is an outlier, because if that's how she always wrote it, then she didn't sign that 1919 contract, and Joe also must've used someone else's example as a template for drawing his name, because he sure wasn't attempting to match that "k."

[ThomasL]

Originally Posted by Mark17

The exemplar you linked from the REA auction has a "k" unlike anything I've ever seen on a supposedly autographed Jackson item. However, his 1919 contract, which is shown in this thread, and supposedly wife - signed, is reasonably close to Joe's writing. I wonder if the REA wife signature is an outlier, because if that's how she always wrote it, then she didn't sign that 1919 contract, and Joe also must've used someone else's example as a template for drawing his name, because he sure wasn't attempting to match that "k."

Katie Jackson's signature changed from 1910s to the 40s-50s...most of her examples are from the 40s and 50s filling autograph requests. She was usually present at contract signings with baseball clubs (famously wasnt for Joe's 1920 contract as the story goes and I have not seen his 1920 contact surface...if someone has that picture as an aside to this I would love to see it) That 1919 contract and the 1912 album someone posted here is her signature...

I would have to re-read Gropman's bio of Jackson (he actually interviewed people who knew Joe and his sister was one of them he talked with) but I believe Jackson learned by tracing over what Katie wrote and then copying what Katie wrote until he could do it on his own...so stands to reason there would be some similarities between the two.

As another aside...I think (I could be misremembering this and totally wrong) in the early days of collecting Mrs Jackson's signature was actually thought of as Joe's signature...I dont know when the public and collecting community learned that Katie was who was actually signing items and not Joe...maybe someone on here knows that.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by Mark17

The exemplar you linked from the REA auction has a "k" unlike anything I've ever seen on a supposedly autographed Jackson item. However, his 1919 contract, which is shown in this thread, and supposedly wife - signed, is reasonably close to Joe's writing. I wonder if the REA wife signature is an outlier, because if that's how she always wrote it, then she didn't sign that 1919 contract, and Joe also must've used someone else's example as a template for drawing his name, because he sure wasn't attempting to match that "k."

Are there examples of a signature believed to be hers with that distinctive "e"? I can't recall now.