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Author
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Topic: Alan Shepard autograph: authenticity and value?
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stevemw
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posted 08-31-2012 05:15 PM
   
Can anyone confirm if this autograph is authentic (which it looks like it is to me comparing it to other ones I've seen) and what they think the approximate value is? Thanks so much.  |
ilbasso
Member Posts: 1522
From: Greensboro, NC USA
Registered: Feb 2006
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posted 08-31-2012 06:55 PM
Hard to tell without a close-up of the signature.I would be more than a little surprised if Shepard had signed that fake "photo" of his golf shot. It was a poorly-done fake that circulated for a while, but I hadn't seen it lately. |
JasonB
Member Posts: 1091
From:
Registered: Sep 2003
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posted 08-31-2012 07:52 PM
I believe that photo is from Shepard's book Moon Shot, so he probably wouldn't have had a problem signing it.That being said, the autograph, to me, looks a lot like a secretarial. It's very neatly written out and has the fish hook at the end of Shepard. He only would have had four years to sign this so I doubt his signature would have been this neatly in that book signing time period but there's a chance I could be wrong. I stay away from buying Shepards that look like this but his authentic signature does have a fish hook at the end from time to time, so that doesn't necessarily disqualify it. I remember my Dad getting very nicely written authentic Shepards back in the mail, but I think that was before his book release in 1994. |
SpaceSteve
Member Posts: 428
From: San Antonio TX, USA
Registered: Apr 2004
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posted 08-31-2012 10:29 PM
I'm definitely not an expert, but I'd be wary of that Shepard. It appears to have a "loopless h" in "Shepard", which is one of the telltale signs of a secretarial signature. |
mjanovec
Member Posts: 3811
From: Midwest, USA
Registered: Jul 2005
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posted 09-01-2012 02:53 PM
This Shepard is perfectly fine as far as I'm concerned. Sometimes you get the "fishtail," sometimes you don't. Sometimes his pen lifts during the "h," sometimes it doesn't. |
stsmithva
Member Posts: 1933
From: Fairfax, VA, USA
Registered: Feb 2007
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posted 09-01-2012 05:36 PM
Just thought I'd mention that I have a copy of "Moonshot" that Shepard inscribed on the usual title page, then signed on that photo within. |
stevemw
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posted 09-01-2012 05:45 PM
Thanks guys. Any idea how much it's worth? |
Spacefest
Member Posts: 1168
From: Tucson, AZ
Registered: Jan 2009
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posted 09-01-2012 09:01 PM
I think that photo is a still from a 16mm movie.The hooked 'd' is authentic. All Shepard's sigs on all the "Moonwalkers" prints have
'em |
stsmithva
Member Posts: 1933
From: Fairfax, VA, USA
Registered: Feb 2007
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posted 09-01-2012 09:38 PM
quote:
Originally posted by Spacefest:
I think that photo is a still from a 16mm movie.
This website has a good write-up of the photo: Not only was the picture a combination of several Hasselblad shots, but the golf club, ball, the S-Band legs and some shadows were drawn in. The publishers of the book created the image because the existing real video images were too grainy to present in a book’s picture section. |
Steve Zarelli
Member Posts: 731
From: Upstate New York, USA
Registered: Mar 2001
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posted 09-02-2012 08:23 AM
In my experience, the secretarial "tells" in Shepard are shortcuts and guidelines only that can't be relied upon all the time. If you put a secretary side by side with a real Shepard, you can clearly see they were done by two different hands without even having to look for the shortcuts. The tail after the d is very unreliable and I suggest disregarding it.(That said, the spiked p is about 100% reliable, Shepard never did that.) Regarding the loopless h, you need to look for the INTENT of a loop. In the example above, you can tell the hand went in the motion of a loop, but it just skipped on the right side. In a secretarial, the motion goes from the S directly up into the stem of the h... no intent to make a loop. |
Tykeanaut
Member Posts: 2212
From: Worcestershire, England, UK.
Registered: Apr 2008
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posted 09-02-2012 08:57 AM
I'd put it in the $200-$300 range. |
mjanovec
Member Posts: 3811
From: Midwest, USA
Registered: Jul 2005
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posted 09-03-2012 02:12 PM
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Zarelli:
That said, the spiked p is about 100% reliable, Shepard never did that.
Not 100% true. Looking at examples of Shepard's signature from his childhood and early adulthood, there was a pronounced spiked "p." (Unless Shepard had a secretary do his homework for him.  ) It seems to have disappeared sometime between 1940 and 1944, where a signed check from that year does not show the spiked p.  Of course, if the signed item has anything to do with the space program, then one should expect there to be no spiked "p" at all. |
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