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Beatles and Cassius Clay autographed glove

The story is that the Beatles and Cassius Clay signed two boxing gloves, February 18th, 1964, when they met. One glove was auctioned some time ago. The other is with a memorabilia store I visited a few days ago. I had never heard of this item, and have a picture. The signatures of the Beatles look very good! Of course, signing on a boxing glove has got to pose some problems for an authenticator. Has anyone heard of these gloves? What is the opinion of our experts? I asked for provenance. Owner will only say it was obtained in a "collection" and the store (which is well known) will give COA and guarantee. They will not say who obtained the autographs or the circumstances. The glove is being sold, authenticated by a "well known" authenticator we all know. What I find interesting, is that the signatures look very good, and seem to compare very well with the Beatles autographs from around 1964.

Tags: art of music, beatles-cassius, boxing, clay, glove, signed

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Permalink Reply by Sidney Fields on January 10, 2014 at 11:02am

There are at least three known gloves like this.

Another one is below.

At least one top authority believes they are not authentic.

Permalink Reply by Carlos on January 10, 2014 at 6:42pm
For some reason this image isn't loading. What is it of?
Permalink Reply by Steve Cyrkin, Admin on January 15, 2014 at 9:50pm

The photo you linked to is now gone. Do you have a copy?

Permalink Reply by Carlos on January 10, 2014 at 6:44pm
I'm not familiar with Beatles autos but the Cassius auto looks very good.
I have emailed a Ali expert asking for his opinion so we will wait and see.
I think that any third party would dismiss this straight away because it seems so rare but if you sent in pics of one auto at a time we may get a different result
Permalink Reply by Carlos on January 15, 2014 at 11:23am
I cropped the Clay autograph and sent it to Shawn at ali autos.net. While it's not the clearest pic and he didn't have it on hand he said it looks legit.
Shawn wrote the book on Ali autographs....literally.
Permalink Reply by Carlos on January 15, 2014 at 6:18pm
Anyone else still think its fake? How are The Beatles autos?
Permalink Reply by Ben M on January 15, 2014 at 8:31pm
No one here says the Beatle autographs look fake. In fact, they look very good. The doubts are based on the medium and the seller.
Permalink Reply by Carlos on January 15, 2014 at 10:21pm
I think the medium is fine. So that would leave just the seller
It's sad that someone's reputation could ruin a historic and great piece
Permalink Reply by Sidney Fields on January 16, 2014 at 4:59am

Let me clarify my previous post on these gloves.

I was not commenting on the Clay signature. Only the Beatles. Although it strikes me that if the Beatles signatures are not good, the Clay signature seems unlikely to be legitimate.

A top authority...someone respected universally by board regulars...believes the Beatles signatures are NOT authentic.  I'm not using the person's name because I don't have the authority to do so.  This person's archives include both gloves pictured here, as well as a third. All 3 deemed NOT authentic.

In no way do I intend to cast aspersions on anyone else. People are entitled to their honest opinions. Also, please note the assessment I'm citing has nothing to do with who owns he gloves or who is selling them.  

 

Permalink Reply by Carlos on January 16, 2014 at 9:56am
People often disregard items because they are "too good to be true".
Maybe that person did that to this glove
Permalink Reply by Steve Cyrkin, Admin on January 17, 2014 at 9:19am

I am saying they look fake, and gave several valid reasons why. I think they were printed on the glove in some way.

Permalink Reply by Steve Cyrkin, Admin on January 16, 2014 at 11:56am

These are my concerns about the glove:

1) The 'P' of Paul is formed with two open vertical strokes and there's a stroke from the P to the 'a'. Paul wrote his P more stick-like back then, generally with one vertical stroke and a second one for the loop, and the 'a' generally wasn't joined until the later 1960s.

2) The 'J' of John has the wrong curve to the vertical stroke, and the stroke to the left leading to the cross bar at top is just as thick as the rest of the letter. When John started with that stroke, it was wispy. 

3) The autographs are all about the same thickness and there are no skips or light strokes. Those are warning signs for autographs signed on a piece of paper under perfect conditions. These are signed on the uneven surface of a boxing glove.

4) The glove is well worn and broken in, with a lot of surface finish missing. It looks like a 50 year-old boxing glove, easily. Yet the autographs miraculously survive bold and skip-free even where the finish is missing. Even if the glove was already that well worn, more finish would have likely chipped off from aging over time. It doesn't seem likely they'd all sign such a beaten up glove though, does it?

5) Heritage is auctioning a pair of gloves they say that Clay wore in his February 1964 Liston fight, and this signed glove is not the same kind. You can tell from the color and the stitching. Here are pics of the pair they're selling:

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