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Mantle, Williams and DiMaggio: Authenticating Baseball Forger Favorites

It is unquestionable that Mickey Mantle, Ted Williams, and Joe DiMaggio have been American sports icons since the mid-20th century. It comes as no surprise that these three have been favorites of autograph collectors since the advent of autograph and card shows in the 1980’s. Unfortunately it is equally unsurprising, as attested to in the FBI’s famous 1990s Operation Bullpen, that they are also the three most forged sports autographs. Although most experts believe the forgery problem in sports memorabilia has lessoned tremendously since Operation Bullpen (estimated at that time to be “between $500,000,000 and $900,000,000” by the FBI), sadly large numbers of forged material still exist.

While it would require far more than a single article to educate the autograph collector to detect Mantle, Williams and DiMaggio forgeries, there are some general as well as specific warning keys to these three autographs that may aid in detecting possible forgeries.

Genuine Mantle, Williams & DiMaggio signed photo provided by EAC Gallery.
Click to enlarge:

As a general rule, one of the first things I examine in an autograph is its feel – how it was written. When an individual signs his name there should be an easy, smooth flow to the signature. We’ve all signed our names countless times, and we don’t need to think about it. An item we offered in one of our past auctions was a sheet of paper signed several times by Joe Jackson. Jackson, who was almost completely illiterate, actually had to practice, in essence work at, writing his name prior to signing documents. Likewise, when a forger writes a signature, he or she is working at it and therefore upon close examination it’s often possible to detect such warning keys as a slowness of motion, stops and starts at inappropriate spots, and possibly even a shakiness in the writing. An invaluable aid to help detect these keys, taught to me by John Reznikoff of University Archives many years ago, is to turn the autograph upside down. When you view an autograph in an unnatural position these warning keys are often easier to detect.

In addition to such general warning keys there are specific warning keys, unique to an individual’s autograph, to keep an eye out for.

In the 1980’s and 1990’s Mickey Mantle stated on numerous occasions that he was blessed to be able to earn more money signing his name at one single weekend show than his father had earned in an entire year working as a coal miner. Because of this Mantle always felt his fans were deserving of a clear, elegant signature. In authentic Mickey Mantle autographs Mickey would always end the “y” in “Mickey” on an upswing, and because he would be quickly flowing through his signature, he therefore started the “M” in “Mantle” on a higher level or plane than he had started the “M” in “Mickey”. Most forgers, because they were “working” on writing Mantle’s signature, would pause after completing “Mickey” and begin anew in writing “Mantle”, therefore placing “Mantle” on more of a straight line with “Mickey”. If one places a ruler or sheet of paper straight across the item Mantle signed (not straight across the signature) all that appears below the ruler or paper of an authentic Mantle is the bottom portion of the “M” in “Mickey”. In the case of most forgeries the ruler or paper completely covers the entire signature. Another difficulty forgers have with Mantle’s signature was his unique way of looping the bottom portion of his “M”. Such curved lines were executed in one easy movement by Mantle, but are most often elongated by forgers who again are “working” the signature. Such slow, elongated forgeries are especially easy to recognize on baseballs as their curved surfaces only add to the forger’s difficulty.

In the case of Ted Williams autographs, with the exception of the capital “W” in Williams, Ted would consistently make the size of all the letters in his last time nearly the same exact size. Most telling is the “illia”, with the “l”s just ever so slightly taller than the “i”s, and the “a” as tall as the “l”s. Try as they may, most forgers simply can’t undo years of training and habit causing their “l”s to be significantly taller than their “i”s, and their “a” significantly shorter than their “l”s. Williams also connected the “W” in “Williams” to the “ed” in “Ted” with a swirl that gave forgers difficulty in replicating in the same, easy, flowing movement as appears in authentic examples. Also of interest, in addition to the many Williams intentional forgeries in existence, Williams revealed late in his life that during his playing days his signature on team signed balls was often a “clubhouse” example, not penned by him.

Regarding Joe DiMaggio’s autograph, problems for forgers begin with the first letter in Joe. Like the “M”s in Mantle’s autograph, the “J” in “Joe”, which appears as two loops, a larger loop on top and a smaller one below, were created by curved lines which are the hardest to duplicate without leaving telltale signs of slowness or inappropriate stops and starts. In addition, DiMaggio would pen his “J”s so that the lower loop would be written on top of (literally written over) the upper loop in two places. For some inexplicable reason, a significant percentage of DiMaggio forgeries flow in the opposite direction, with the upper loop covering the lower one. An inexpensive magnifier or jeweler’s loop will aid in viewing this detail. Finally, the general feel of an authentic DiMaggio autograph is often somewhat sloppy, in the sense that the spacing between letters is uneven, obviously much more so in his second name. Again due to the fact that forgers are working rather than simply signing, the spacing they place between each letter is far more uniform.

Finally, the age-old adage “experience is the best teacher” is indeed appropriate here. The building of as extensive a library of exemplars as possible, of both authentic and fake examples, would be of help to visualize these and additional warning keys, and tremendously assist in the detection of forgeries.

Tags: authenticate, baseball, dimaggio, fame, forgeries, forgers, genuine, hall, hof, joe, More…mantle, mickey, of, ted, williams

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Permalink Reply by Steve Zarelli on April 29, 2011 at 4:35pm

I agree with Chris. 91 and 93 may be Marino Family forgeries. Back in the 90s I bought a very similar Mantle signature from B&J Collectibles in NJ. B&J turned out to be a distributor of Marino fakes.

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Permalink Reply by Steve on May 10, 2011 at 11:25am

I actually caught the B&J family members forgeing the Mantle, Dimaggio, Williams photo's. They were at a show here in Tempe Arizona (about 14 years ago) and one of the nephews was attending ASU. They had a bunch of Dimaggio stuff and claimed they had a contract with him. I was interested in the triple signed piece and they said they had one more at home and gave me the address to come by. When I got there, they all introduced themselves to me and said one of the brother was getting the photo from the back room. They left me alone in the living room and I walked back to an open door and saw one of them signing the photo themselves. He didn't see me and brought it out as if he was looking for it. I then saw them at the National in Anaheim and they said they were sponsoring Dimaggio being there. They had a table set up and were selling Dimaggio 16x20's for $135 but he was charging $175 to sign at the show. Didn't make sense at all. If they truly had a contract with Dimaggio, then what better way to pass off your items as legit even if they are not!

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Permalink Reply by Steve Zarelli on May 10, 2011 at 11:38am

B&J used to have some signings... I recall some of the NY Yankees at the time (David Wells and a few others) did do signings with them. Of course, Stan's Sports World did the same thing. They had real signings and used that as a cover for all the fakes they sold.

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Permalink Reply by Barry Courtright on April 29, 2011 at 1:55pm

a couple more...

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IMAG0094.jpg, 1021 KB
IMAG0095.jpg, 1005 KB
IMAG0096.jpg, 1.1 MB

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Permalink Reply by Steve Zarelli on April 29, 2011 at 4:37pm

I am not familiar enough to have an opinion about the Williams and DiMaggio. The Mantle ball is a question mark in my view. There are some characteristics I like about it, but it also a bit sloppy.

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Permalink Reply by Barry Courtright on April 29, 2011 at 1:55pm

And finally...

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IMAG0096.jpg, 1.1 MB
IMAG0097.jpg, 1.1 MB

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Permalink Reply by Steve Cyrkin, Admin on April 29, 2011 at 2:40pm

Thanks, Barry. Some of these shots are a bit blurry. You'll get more reliable input with crisp images if you can provide them, but you can get an idea from these for now.

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Permalink Reply by Steve Cyrkin, Admin on April 29, 2011 at 4:41pm

Hopefully Larry will chime in on these.

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Permalink Reply by CJCollector on April 29, 2011 at 5:51pm

The Joe DiMaggio image isn't very clear but it looks very slowly drawn. I can immediately see the stop and starts in the "J." Look at the dark ink spots on the "north" and "south" of the "J." Then look at the how the top loop of the "J" overlaps the bottom loop and slows up and becomes very dark. That's my take on this Joe DiMaggio based on the image shown here.

I also don't like the inscription "HOF 55."

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Permalink Reply by Steve Cyrkin, Admin on May 2, 2011 at 9:13am

I'd like to post examples of signs of forgeries to look for. How to identify stops and starts, speed, shakiness, etc. Same with preprints, etc. These would be great to post in a reference section on the site, and it would be great to get it up ASAP.

Anyone willing to help?