Controversial piece has a long history with our firm. The following was written by Joshua Leland Evans, our Chairman and Founding Partner. The piece will come with this letter signed by him establishing the provenance and his belief that the piece is authentic:

I first bought this piece in the early 1980s from Gene Schoor, the well-known sports author and New York personality. I bought some amazing things from Gene in his Greenwich Village apartment all those years ago.  Among his things were thousands of amazing photographs and original negatives including the legendary Nap Lajoie in a horseshoe of silver dollars by Louis Van Oeyen and a letter to Gene from JFK which became the foreword of his book on the Army-Navy Football Game. In that collection was also this image, which at the time I saw as simply a Joe Jackson vintage photo.

I resold the piece in one of our early telephone auctions. The winning bidder was a controversial figure to say the least, Peter Nash, for somewhere in the $1200-1600 range if memory serves me correctly. If you go back through our early catalogues published in Sports Collectors Digest you should see it. At the time, the photo had a signature in the white publisher’s paint which you commonly see in photographs of the era to highlight certain elements of the image. However, what I did not realize that when the white paint was removed (a fairly simple process) there was an authentic signature of “Joe Jackson” underneath! The photo was consigned by Nash to Rob Lifson of REA Auctions. It came with a letter of authenticity from Charles Hamilton one of the leading autograph authenticators.

The photo brought several thousand dollars (I don’t recall exactly), apparently purchased by well-known collector Barry Halper.

The photo was later resold by Barry Halper in his landmark 1999 Sotheby’s Auction (Lot #455). The piece bought about $18,000, selling to a well-known Midwest collector. More recently, we purchased the entire collection and this piece was in there. That is how it make its way here.

Interestingly, about 10 years ago I actually saw what this piece was created for. I saw a 1912 Cleveland Indians supplement which I unfortunately was unable to obtain. However, it should be in a collection somewhere, in an archive or on microfiche. It was a 1912 Cleveland Indians rotogravure supplement published in one of the major Cleveland newspapers, most likely the Cleveland Press. It pictured the members of the Cleveland Indians in a beautiful sepia montage picturing each of them in matching civvies. Just like Joe Jackson here. Right on there was this exact same SIGNED image of Shoeless Joe with his signature and all his teammates also in WHITE. The white paint was used for all the players to make their signatures stand out. This was the final link in the chain. Jackson was essentially forced to sign this (a rarity for him) because he had to. I have no doubts the piece is real. However, because of its storied history it may not be passed by one of the major authentication services. If that changes.

Joshua Leland Evans

Chairman & Founding Partner

Lelands Auctions

Note: The photo itself measures 5x3.5” and the piece was beautifully framed sometime after the Halper auction. It comes with the page of its listing in the Sotheby’s catalogue and its original auction tag. There is a “halo effect” around the signature when the white paint was removed.

One of only two Joe Jackson signed photos known to exist. The other sold at auction in 2015 for $179,000.