Shoeless Joe Jackson Auto- Fake?

[jason.1969]

Originally Posted by SteveS

So here's a question I have for everybody. If you paid $1.4 million for this photograph, would you want to then pay for an ink analysis to find out for sure whether the writing was done in 1911 and the signature and place/date are in the same ink? Or would you rather not do that, to avoid the chance of finding out that you just spent a lot of money on something written in 2011?

I’d normally expect such a thing was already baked into the authentication process…but of course it was not.

Still wouldn’t establish Joe vs Katie vs someone else back then, but obviously would at least rule out a modern forgery.

Have read different descriptions as to whether auto is in pencil or pen. Can anyone clarify?

[SteveS]

Originally Posted by jason.1969

I’d normally expect such a thing was already baked into the authentication process…but of course it was not.

Still wouldn’t establish Joe vs Katie vs someone else back then, but obviously would at least rule out a modern forgery.

Have read different descriptions as to whether auto is in pencil or pen. Can anyone clarify?

I posted screenshots above. Heritage said pencil, Christie's said fountain pen ink. Which seems pretty odd to me. As for an analysis, while I am straddling the fence right now, if it were shown that the ink has been on the paper since 1911, I'd be more inclined to go with legit. The signature is not in the style of Katie's, and who knows what exemplar existed in 1911 for the photographer to copy.