relics and artifacts

[Jim Garrett]

In the thread, Laurie touched on the issue of autographs, signature and AL's glasses in the RR Auction. Several years ago, Rich and I were fortunate enough to see those glasses. At the time, the owner, had recently acquired them. Indeed, the provenance was not the best. If I remember, they were found in a trunk at Hildene, Robert Todd Lincoln's palacial New England home, by Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith. Beckwith wrote that they belonged to his great grandfather. About two years ago I was again fortunate enough to have a private viewing of the contents of Lincoln's pockets at the Library of Congress. Clark Evans, the now retired rare books curator arranged for me to tag along with Dr. David Fleischman. David and an unbelieveable website, http://www.antiquespectacles.com. He examined the glasses and in his opinion, the glasses belonged to Robert Todd Lincoln. The earliest example of the bridge of the glasses in question appeared around 1880, 15 years after AL's death.

I'm not surprised with errors made in authentications. It has becomwe such a defined area that it's easy for people, who are experts in one area, to cross into another area and make a mistake, (an expert in political autographs making a mistake in authenticating a sports figure's signature).

Anyone has sories of relics that aren't relics?