Grey,
"no individual has in their possession a forged poster that came from Heritage."
That statement does not say Heritage never sold any forged posters -- it says that any
forgeries which Heritage may have sold have now been returned to Heritage and the money
paid for them refunded. Which is fine, but Heritage needs to acknowledge they were fooled
like everyone else, regardless of the fact that you were apparently the first to finally
notice something strange was going on. Such an acknowledgment is the first step towards
restoring confidence. The industry as a whole needs to man up and say "For a while
we were duped by expert forgers... by the kind of high-quality fakery previously not seen
in movie poster collecting".
I am glad you have publicly said that some kind of more formal authentication service
would be helpful, particularly in light of what you also said: "up to this time the
fakes are not difficult to detect."
Up to this time.
That has now obviously changed and so now the approach of the sellers --
particularly the high-end sellers -- must change with it. I sincerely wish all
of you the best of luck in this effort. Please keep us posted, with specific
details, as to your progress.
-- JR
Smith, Grey - 1367 wrote:
Sean and all MOPOers
I am very certain that no individual has in their possession a forged poster that came
from Heritage. As a matter of fact, I did first discover the fact of these fakes when an
attempt was made to consign a "forged" Dracula title card from a respected
horror collector and I promptly not only called the consignor but began speaking with
horror buyers throughout the country that I know, to let them know what was found. I
certainly know Sean and Jim Gresham will attest to that. I know that Jim G. then sent me
cards to look over, in which my belief was, they were forgeries.
I believe I was the first to suggest to certain collectors in Columbus that the
Frankenstein Title card in another auction may not be authentic, though I had
not seen it, but knowing that some cards were showing up that were forged.
I have sent clients to John Davis as he began to look into this and I thought
he was doing a good job, I believe, in verifying the cards.
Do I wish I had thrown up a red flare to the hobby earlier? Perhaps, but the
extent of this was not known nor was there much on who may have been behind it.
I think it was when Jim G. sent me his cards that some of us were very
surprised. No, I was not sworn to secrecy, as some claim, but have worked to
warn and help collectors with questions concerning these since first
discovering.
This is a warning to us to look closely in the future. A grading and perhaps
authentification service would be of help but I believe up to this time the
fakes are not difficult to detect. Please be assured that Heritage is perhaps
overly cautious at this stage in dealing primarily with horror and a few
examples of science fiction titles.
Grey
On Oct 7, 2009, at 1:45 PM, "Sean Linkenback"
<[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
Hi Bruce,
While I am a little busy today, if you have a list of all these items Heritage
sold that were fake, I will be happy to comb through the archives for you.
I believe that the 3-sheet of Ghost of Frankenstein mentioned in the complaint
by Jim Gresham was from Heritage, and I see it has been removed from their
archives.
I also know Heritage's policy is to not report any sales which fell through,
and while I would imagine this would include the inadvertent selling of fakes
perhaps you should address this question to Grey Smith rather than me, as I am
still not on their (or anyone else's) payroll.
Sean
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