Signature authentication

Signature authentication

the following is one in a series of authentication video studies presented by John reznikov and University Archives I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States John F Kennedy was America's 35th president the challenges faced and accomplishments earned during his tragically brief 1000 days in office have made authentically signed Kennedy's photos letters and other items from his life among the most sought after of all presidential collectibles there protect and defend the Constitution of the United States so help you God so while many JFK signature studies have been done this is the first video study to exhibit both authentic and non authentic examples from our vast reference collection for the benefit of public education and insight as you may be aware a genuine JFK letter or autograph can cost upwards of $2,000 but while the current marketplace is loaded with JFK material by our estimates 80% of these items are not authentic as a result collectors need to protect themselves against the unfortunate abundance of Kennedy secretarial signatures and forgeries to valuable reference books that can help you in this effort are written by Charles Hamilton and Paul Carr Hamilton was long considered the Dean of autographs he was also a friend and mentor to John Rzeznik off another useful reference is Paul Carr's notebook study series both of these resources can greatly benefit collectors of all experience levels we'll begin our study with several examples of original Kennedy letters photographs and documents having signatures that are not authentic this is an example of what maybe JFK's first secretarial signature penned as a young congressman by this time Kennedy had already authored why England slept and survived World War two as the hero of pt-109 young congressman Kennedy used secretaries to sign most of his mail and this letter is a good example in this signature the J appears similar to oval also the letter y is very tiny these two characteristics alone are definitive tells of a JFK secretarial signature this original bumper sticker from Kennedy's 1952 campaign is not even a secretarial example but an out-and-out forgery one key clue is the modern looking ink while a senator between 1953 and 1960 and E's secretary signed an even greater proportion of his mail these four letters illustrate Kennedy's most common proxy referred to as Secretary three by Charles Hamilton called the stuttering signature secretary three rights ke and n then stops and stutters and writes Edie and stops and stutters again and writes the Y notice also on three examples how the connection between the oh and the H is a soft loop not a hard angle this characteristic will be discussed later as well when we discuss authentic JFK signatures Kennedy also used printed signatures during his Senate years these often fool inexperienced collectors and inexperienced dealers a tip-off to a printed signature is signature ink that closely matches the ink of a letters text appearing as if the signature...