Authenticity is Everything
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.
Regards,
Steve Zarelli
Tags: Charlton, Forgery, Heston, Secretary, authenticating, autograph, secretarial
- Attachments: No photo uploads here
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Figure 1.jpg, 60 KB -
Secretary 1.jpg, 37 KB
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Steve Cyrkin, Admin on
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Mr. Zipper,
What about writing it up as a formal study for our editorial site, autographmagazine.com? It could be up in days.
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Permalink Reply by Brick Hunter on
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I think it breaks down to the point where honest sellers concerned with authenticity have made the right decision and pulled the "Chall's"/given the refunds on them and the ones that haven't aren't all that honest and aren't all that concerned with authenticity.
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Permalink Reply by DB on
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while I was trying to sort the mess into an organized mess I came across a copy of the AM Magaine of July 2008 and there he was on the front page - Charlton Heston. The evidence in the article was right in front of us all the time but if anyone questioned a dealer or "opinionator" back then it would have been "no this is authentic" or "no based on his known exemplars this is genuine". Even though, in my opinion, many knew otherwise....
which brings up the point I noted in the "autograph hell" book that I have harped on as well ~ who says these exemplars are legit or in the case of the book, "something has gone terribly wrong - when a non authentic exemplar becomes the accepted authentic one". There are several parts I don't concur with and a major point missed but that is for the other thread but this point of exemplars and how it was accepted s/b a warning to all of us...
The good news is that the next three examples from larry grobel are authentic chars but perhaps someone should let Pauline Kael know that if this is her picture it's a secretarial;
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DB,
I mentioned this when I first found out about the secretarial...I think I uploaded it to the discussion. The "Chall" was from our stock, and all of the other pieces were signed by Heston in front of Larry Grobel.
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Permalink Reply by Steve Zarelli on
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Wise dealers and collectors take the approach that they begin with the presumption that it is fake, and the burden is to prove it is real. In the Heston case, it seems the opposite view took hold many moons ago.
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same reasons as you started with. but, when the news broke appearing reasonable and with some very decent empirical evidence they stopped and pulled thier complete inventory while others did exactly what you stated and just kept selling while others claimed "what study". They then started offering refunds and I know that personally.
Now did anyone go out and do a "real" recall or publish that if you bought one of these from us... Haven't seen anyone do that yet, have you?
that's what makes the studies so important. people need to educate others and leave their "credentials" at the door as that is part and parcel to this "one upmanship" nonsense. If I had a bunch of in-person ones or "authentic" ones and I was going to sell them, I'd have points from this study front & center as part of the offering before the forgers regroup and start churning them out again.
What is more troubling though Mike is this secretarial exemplar became the standard and most likely got life from "through the mail" as you say.
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it never ends it appears. tried to locate darren's on a search and only yours is coming up or I need more coffee. Either way, rather than detour this thread let's open one up for AW Music items and present the case(s) and supporting evidence. The 'boys" at aw are/have been pretty reasonable to date.
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I did...I got snookered back in 2008 when I ran it. To think, if I didn't want a cool image of Heston, I wouldn't have used it and all the autographs in the article would have been A-OK.
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At that time, we were ALL getting snookered. The important thing to note is, you are among those who can look at it objectively and process new information that runs contrary to old beliefs. Some in the community cannot do that.
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Beware the fakes on the market, not just the secretarials. Some have small r's.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/CHARLTON-HESTON-SIGNED-8X10-PHOTO-STAR-TEN-...
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Brick it appears so from the naked eye but it's an L albeit a small L. This seller has been noted several times and several removed however he seems to be persistent. I'm sure thought that it is just a matter of time until the forgeries start showing up then we will need to key in on other areas. Of course in this case $19.95 s/b a dead giveaway
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