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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 Robert Zarrillo on March 10, 2011 at 3:31pm

Commenting on Mike - Give people time to digest this will you! I have a Heston on eBay right now that is clearly secretarial based on this study but I just read all this yestersday and started pulling items from stock and I'll remove my Heston from ebay today. The good news is a third of what I had was OK. My ebay item is not the one you cited but Steve is right - this is for education not to crucify people that don't know any better (me included).

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Permalink Reply by DB on March 11, 2011 at 2:00am

and then we have ebay which is a phenomena in and of itself.

Steve C - maybe you should alert Gonsales to this revelation as there are 324 of them from rps to silverscreensignature ones touting authentic and everything in between.

RZ which one are you? Then the big "ya gotta be kidding me factor" where some have mulitple signatures that presume for the moment are authentic e.g. Linda Harrison that are now alongside a "dbl L" version.

I suspect that we will hear from ebay as fast as we hear from psa/dna. The latter of course has never gone public espiecally on these blogs and this time perhaps they deserve the heat in this specific case should they continue that trend.

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Permalink Reply by Rolf Ramseier on March 11, 2011 at 2:18am

ebay does not really have anything to do with this, they do not have autograph experts on their salary list. I know for sure they work with several experts (I once saw the list of consultants and believe me you would be impressed about the WHO is WHO on this list) within the autograph field and maybe this will stop the sales of Heston secreatrial's a bit in the future.

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Permalink Reply by DB on March 11, 2011 at 2:24am

Rolf, we will disagree as anyplace that panders the false ones is just ripping off the "fan" and ebay's reaction is typically horrible. I know of some on this list but they are way too slow to react. e.g. here is a current one claiming inPerson and even posting pictures of the alleged signing but it has our "dbl L" - a coincidence?

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Permalink Reply by Rolf Ramseier on March 11, 2011 at 2:40am

believe me, THEY DO A LOT MORE than the autograph community is aware about, because it goes in the background !!!!!

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Permalink Reply by DB on March 11, 2011 at 2:45am

again, the one above aside from the PSA/DNA, GAI ones who seem to missed the boat on the "dbl L"s - we have this seller who claims it was obtained in-person, lists dates, claims to be a UACC member and in fact witnessed the signing.

based on all the empirical evidence presented about how he signs in person - what would you say about this offering?

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Permalink Reply by DB on March 11, 2011 at 4:19am

Rolf - enjoyed the dialogue, observations and opinion. I am sure others will as well so do post.

Do we have any UACC members to send an email to their Ethics or if not post some emails here and I'll be happy to accomodate what apparently is a charlaton :with an "R"

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Permalink Reply by Rolf Ramseier on March 11, 2011 at 5:06am

as far as I am aware Charlton Heston only attended once the Hollywood Collectors Show in Burbank in the early 90's. I've been told he asked then 20$ for a signature. I am not aware of any other public signings he has attended (except book signings and a free signing he has done in 1998 in Hannover Germany at the möma store)

IMHO the Heston signature on the above presented listing is a secreatry. Also I do not believe that the photograph which shows Heston sitting at a table signing autographs, which is used as provenance, shows Heston in 2002, for me he looks yonger on this pic and maybe they use a pic from the signing of the early 90's.

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Permalink Reply by Rolf Ramseier on March 11, 2011 at 5:38am

here are a two links which don't have to do direct with Heston, but with secreatrial signatures in general :

Which Authors Are Faking Their Autographs?

Marketing lessons from Esther Williams

Permalink Reply by DB on March 11, 2011 at 6:00am

Rolf - just amazing how widespread it really is. In this specific case it goes far beyond the "un"knowing or "I don't buy the Theory" even though it is beyond plausible at this point. This appears to be out and out deceit & fraud.

However, it does say the the "auction owner" or his "employee" (and there we go again with that mysterious 3rd party 5 times removed from reality) witnessed the signing or they wouldn't sign it. THUS, we might get to the bottom of who is this "signing secretarial">

It also says the actual signing/event location will be revealed to the winning bidder!. Just amazing Rolf, just amazing.

Permalink Reply by Steve Cyrkin, Admin on March 11, 2011 at 6:02am

Steve is the UACC's ethics chairman! He's not part of the RD program, but Rolf and I are members of it. Rolf, why don't you, Steve and I send a joint email to RD members? I have the list.

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Permalink Reply by DB on March 11, 2011 at 6:16am

excellent idea steve and happy to kabits on the above one in emails if you'd like to use as an example.

btw here is one that seems more "authentic" than the "dbl L" brand but having enough insight to be dangerous is one thing but I doubt I would invest in another one until a "green light" from Rolf & the Zipper. Although, I think we might be able to use Judah's spear in a very meaningfull way.