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Charlton Heston Secretarial Signature Study

Hi:

At Steve Cyrkin's invitation, I'd like to call your attention to a signature study I've posted on my blog, Charlton Heston signature study by Steve Zarelli.

I believe I have identified the "tell" in Charlton Heston secretarial signatures, and if I am correct, the news is not good for most collectors. It appears that most Heston signed photos are secretarially signed.

Here is a synopsis:

The Theory
Photographs and other memorabilia sent to Mr. Heston's office were signed by a secretary. However, Mr. Heston did authentically sign books through-the-mail.

Real vs. Secretary
In authentic signatures, the R in "Charlton" is distinctly a lowercase "r" and less than half the height of the L. The first four letters are clearly "Char."

In secretarial signatures, the R looks much more like a lowercase "l" and is about the same height as the L. So, the first four letters appear to be "Chall."

I have attached two images to give you a small sampling.

For more details and images, please visit my blog at the link below.

I'd love to hear your feedback and thoughts on this. I fully anticipate some resistance to the theory, because denial is always the first step. In fact, I would love to be proved wrong, because that would mean I wasn't sitting on a bunch of secretary signed photos!

By way of introduction, I have been collecting since the early 90s and I am the UACC Ethics Director.

I look forward to the discussion.

The Collecting Obsession

Regards,

Steve Zarelli

Tags: Charlton, Forgery, Heston, Secretary, authenticating, autograph, secretarial

2 members like this

Attachments: No photo uploads here

Figure 1.jpg, 60 KB
Secretary 1.jpg, 37 KB

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Steve Zarelli on May 8, 2011 at 7:21am

Where are they?

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Permalink Reply by David H. Downs on May 9, 2011 at 2:30pm

In my photos

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Permalink Reply by Mike Sibley on May 9, 2011 at 2:28pm

David - They are both clearly 'chall' secreterials signatures I'm afraid.

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Permalink Reply by David H. Downs on May 9, 2011 at 2:30pm

LOL I never knew. I wrote him around 98.

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Permalink Reply by Marty L. Gardner on May 14, 2011 at 8:37am

I am replying to your article about Charlton Heston's signatures being signed by his secretaries. What can I really say except that I sent artwork to an art institute in NYC yrs. ago for evaluation. Obviously they forwarded them to Charlton,since there were drawings of him and other subjects. Charlton Heston wrote me, instead of the institute, then as he was a young man and wasn't that certain of what to do in the situation that the drawings were not sent to him by me. He had a secretary and she was a delightful, sweet person. I doubt she sat there forging his signature for him. Now, we must bear in mind that was a long time ago. Mr. Heston had no reason to out of the blue write to me, return the art yet ask, when I had time, to send him a drawing, which he would appreciate. The day came when I finally did and surprisingly he hung it in his home. Later he had other secretaries since the one I was very familiar with retired to N. CA. Today I live in Hollywood and anyone could have a signature from him on the street. He was very gracious to fans and people. In fact I lost many of his photos and letters in relocation but I am building an archive of his again. And still have a letter from 2002, he wrote while ill. If these were forged as you say, then why only are there 2 versions of forgery? I know he was a unique talent and gracious , kind man, person . I had a literary agency and know this kind of thing occurs every time a good, talented human passes away. I do have a forged photo in my list so no one would pick it up. Mr. Heston spent hrs. signing, in fact, on sets.

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Permalink Reply by DB on May 14, 2011 at 1:16pm

Marty great story. This finding in no way diminishes the individual and especially to us NRA members. The information would have come out, in my opinion, whether he was still here with us or not.

There are always going to be some items in the grey zone ~ there always are. However this can be a common practice and noted especially where there are thousands upon thousands of requests. When it went to places selling there wares to make a profit - and became a business it appears the ground rules changed for many a hollywood star.

I also don't think that they consider "secretarials" as forgeries especially where that individual is usually authorized to sign for them.

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Permalink Reply by Brick Hunter on July 19, 2011 at 6:21pm

Fast forward a few months and as many (if not more) Charlton Heston secretarial signatures are on eBay. Sellers that were honored in this thread earlier are back to selling the fake Heston's, such as Dee's Signed Treasures and pjcollectiblesplus. All the PSA/DNA Charlton Heston signatures with the "Chall" signature are still on eBay and still being sold.

Also, James Stewart signed items are selling. Like the Harvey drawings and It's A Wonderful Life pictures. Does anyone know what signing these are from?

Here's a JSA authenticated James Stewart signed photo which did not sell the other day.

http://cgi.ebay.com/JAMES-STEWART-AUTO-WONDERFUL-LIFE-CAST-PHOTO-JS...

It's very crowded and there isn't even a space between his first and last name. That isn't an anomaly either. A quick google images search shows many more examples of the same photo signed in the same place with very little to no room between James and Stewart. So PSA has been authenticating fake Heston's for years and JSA has been authenticating these fake Stewart's for years (unless the JSA sticker has been tampered with or these are genuine somehow). And they're all on eBay.

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Permalink Reply by Steve Zarelli on July 20, 2011 at 5:37am

If I thought this Wonderful Life signed pic was good, it'd buy it in 2 seconds for $39.

I pointed out this fake Stewart style some time ago on this forum. There are a ton of them out there, all signed in blue Sharpie. I believe the same forger also did a boatload of Harvey pics, all signed in blue as well.

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Permalink Reply by Brick Hunter on August 3, 2011 at 2:30pm

I would too. A lot of the Harvey drawings all have the same form as well and it's unique to them alone and not legitimate Stewart signatures. I wonder when and why JSA authenticated all this junk. I've seen some other evidence that they just aren't very good with Classic Hollywood in the intermediate or lower price ranges. I think PSA is the same way much of the time.

Most of the Charlton Heston's on eBay are still fakes and people are still selling them as real. People with thousands of feedback guaranteeing them as real when they know better. I'm sure Charlton Heston never meant any harm when he said he signed what actually turned out to be secretarials and I bet the "Chall" wasn't malicious either. If Charlton Heston had run in '96 instead of Bob Dole, Bill Clinton would have been a one termer. Not that I agree with Heston on all his conservative principles but Moses in the White House would have been interesting. All three major religions recognize Moses and have a reverence for The Ten Commandments. There's your foreign policy right there.

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Permalink Reply by Steve Zarelli on August 3, 2011 at 5:29am

You are the Chall terminator!! LOL

I suspect it will take many years to flush the Challs out of the system. Even then, there will be private collectors selling off their collections and more will continue to enter the marketplace.

I've wondered if the secretarial is really supposed to be an R or an L. Just a crazy theory, but I can't help but suspect it may have been an inside joke with whomever was signing the Challs. You can hear someone with a southern accent pronouncing his name "Challton." Was this a play on something like that?

I guess we'll never know, but interesting to speculate why the R is so malformed. Almost seems like it must have been intentional.