Shoeless Joe Jackson Auto- Fake?

[BobC]

Originally Posted by swarmee

There is not. PSA makes the same money if they deem it fake. The difference is they might lose customers down the line if they fail too many.

I've already pointed out some obvious autograph fakes that PSA authenticated, and I'm not really a hand-writing analyst or anything. The signatures were spelled wrong. I figure that's a solid giveaway.

True story, friend went to some show/event where Dimaggio was signing to get an autographed baseball. He misspelled his last name.

[BillyCoxDodgers3B]

Originally Posted by BobC

True story, friend went to some show/event where Dimaggio was signing to get an autographed baseball. He misspelled his last name.

Not the only time this happened with Joe. There's a 1941 Play Ball card out there where he misspelled his name. It was sold at auction several years ago.

[packs]

No disrespect to any one company but there really is no reason to authenticate or give your opinion on a Joe Jackson autograph unless it appears on a legal document. His inability to write his name is well known to the extent that it is mentioned in auction descriptions. There is no possible way, in my opinion, for anyone to authenticate his signature unless it is known conclusively that he wrote it, i.e. drivers licenses and other legally binding or official capacity items.

No matter what anyone says I do not believe that it is possible to differentiate between something that might be signed by an illiterate man from something that definitely was, other than you know for certain the circumstances surrounding the definitive example.

In all other cases, like with a supposedly signed photo, no opinion should be rendered and the item should not be accepted for examination. I doubt very strongly that any TPA has a wealth of experience authenticating the signatures of illiterate people.

[SteveS]

Packs, I agree with you totally, and that's why I've said that it doesn't seem appropriate for either side to say that they are 100% certain. However, I also agree with drcy that an ink analysis would be huge here. Not necessarily the age of the ink, as old ink is available. But if there's a way to show conclusively how long the ink has been on the paper (without damaging the signature), that would go a heck of a long way to show that Joe signed it. I doubt anybody in 1911 was thinking of forging his signature on a photo.

[packs]

The earliest example I see on PSA's site is from 1916, 5 full years after this photo. Unless there is anything to suggest another signature from 1911 exists on a legal document, I don't know how you even know Jackson could write at all in 1911.

[Fred]

"Say it aint so.... Joe"

[Fred]

What seems weird to me is that the signature of Joe Jackson looks very labored, but the "Alexandria Mar 1911" looks pretty clean.

If someone else wrote the other information then they must have used the same pen because it sure looks like the same ink that was used for the signature.

I'm no expert but I can see people calling BS on this. What kind of "provenance" is supposed to be associated with this?

[drcy]

Originally Posted by SteveS

Packs, I agree with you totally, and that's why I've said that it doesn't seem appropriate for either side to say that they are 100% certain. However, I also agree with drcy that an ink analysis would be huge here. Not necessarily the age of the ink, as old ink is available. But if there's a way to show conclusively how long the ink has been on the paper (without damaging the signature), that would go a heck of a long way to show that Joe signed it. I doubt anybody in 1911 was thinking of forging his signature on a photo.

The dryness test I mentioned judges how long the ink has been on the paper. It's a standard test.

[SteveS]

Originally Posted by drcy

The dryness test I mentioned judges how long the ink has been on the paper. It's a standard test.

OK. That's the one in which you said that a "small bit" of the ink has to be removed. How much is a "small bit," and how would it affect the signature? And how specific can it nail down the range of time that the ink was on the paper? Because I'm thinking that if it can give a definite range within a few years give or take of 1911, it would go a very long way to authenticate the signature. Other than his wife, who had a distinctive way of signing his name, who else would be putting his autograph on a photo? Who else even knew what his signature looked like? Assuming that the test doesn't do any visible damage to the signature, it would definitely be a worthwhile venture.

[chadeast]

Originally Posted by SteveS

OK. That's the one in which you said that a "small bit" of the ink has to be removed. How much is a "small bit," and how would it affect the signature? And how specific can it nail down the range of time that the ink was on the paper? Because I'm thinking that if it can give a definite range within a few years give or take of 1911, it would go a very long way to authenticate the signature. Other than his wife, who had a distinctive way of signing his name, who else would be putting his autograph on a photo? Who else even knew what his signature looked like? Assuming that the test doesn't do any visible damage to the signature, it would definitely be a worthwhile venture.

https://sports.ha.com/itm/autographs...a/7130-80051.s

This link was posted earlier in the thread, but I am going to post it again. If you have any faith in Heritage and their analysis of the photograph when they sold it in 2015, the answer to that question may very well be Frank W. Smith.

[drcy]

There may be new non-invasive ways to do it.

Determining age is a very significant test, because a forgery would be modern.

[swarmee]

Originally Posted by packs

No disrespect to any one company but there really is no reason to authenticate or give your opinion on a Joe Jackson autograph unless it appears on a legal document.

If they are not capable of determining autographs without witnessing the signature, and did not certify autographs because of it, PSA would also stop grading cards since that requires them to be "authentic" and "unaltered", two additional things they cannot accomplish. Then what would their millions of customers do?

[packs]

I didn’t say anything about any other persons autograph. I was speaking specifically about the signature of an illiterate person and my reason was pretty specific.