Even Abraham Lincoln had his off days. Perhaps Sept. 14, 1863 was one of them. Penning a letter in his simple, unadorned script, the man oft-considered the nation’s greatest, most tested president spelled his own name wrong. He’d attempted to write “A. Lincoln”–his signature style in unofficial correspondence–but slipped up along the way and left out the “o” in his name.
But with a few strokes of his steel pen, Lincoln crossed out the botched signature and re-signed it correctly below.
“It reminds me that he was a human being like all of us,” says Dan Weinberg, owner of Chicago’s Abraham Lincoln Book Shop, who has hung the signature framed together with a photograph of the Great Emancipator on his office wall. “I’ve misspelled my name too.”
Though Lincoln certainly had a lot on his mind during his presidency, Weinberg determined after checking the history books that nothing particularly stressful or significant happened that day to the nation’s 16th president.
Getting so close to someone who has shaped history has a powerful allure, one that has drawn a growing number of history buffs in recent years to collect presidential signatures and letters. From the highly personal style of the presidents’ handwriting to the content of the pieces, presidential autographs (the term used by collectors to describe anything in a person’s handwriting with or without a signature) offer a personal connection to history.
Think of it as the calligraphic counterpart to the famous claim of “Washington slept here.”
“Unless you have a soul made of solid lead, your pulse quickens and your eyes brighten when you look upon something that a great man actually held and into which he put his personal thoughts,” says Charles Hamilton, a New York-based dealer, author and the dean of historical autograph-collecting and handwriting.
The colorful documents bring towering historical figures like George Washington to life. “In history books, he always seems kind of wooden and distant,” says Philadelphia dealer Catherine Barnes, “but if you start reading letters where he’s talking about Mt. Vernon and about the crops or ordering some supplies for the house, you get a sense of this man . . . and what his life (was) like.
“Even in his official correspondence, being a little testy with someone, gives you more of a real person. It’s not just someone who’s like a statue.”
You might also find Thomas Jefferson soliciting information about a watch for a granddaughter or Dwight D. Eisenhower discussing whether to run for a second term after suffering a heart attack.
Content aside, presidential letters certainly show the evolution of penmanship. Washington gets top marks for his gracious, flowing hand, while John F. Kennedy flunks with his impossibly unreadable scrawl.
“God forbid somebody should throw a Kennedy at you,” says Hamilton, who discovered after the president’s death that he’d often employed both an Autopen signing device and a bevy of secretaries to answer his correspondence. “It would scare the wits out of you.”
Hamilton estimates there are close to 100,000 presidential philographers (collectors of historical letters and documents) and many millions more autograph-seekers. While the field offers a solid investment opportunity with materials appreciating steadily over the years, most collectors seem to be attracted to it for its intellectual rewards.
“For Americans, the presidents have always served as symbols of the country and its trials and tribulations, its triumphs at any given period,” says Chris Coover, vice president and specialist in manuscripts at Christie’s, “and of course, their historical accomplishments are of great interest and affecting us today.”
Rick Holzrichter, a sales representative with the Chicago-based violin brokerage Bein & Fushi, had a childhood interest in Jefferson that has blossomed into a full-blown passion. About a decade ago he stumbled across Weinberg’s River North shop, which specializes in Lincolnia and Civil War-era materials. “I was amazed to see these incredible documents and letters that were framed on the walls,” Holzrichter says.
In fact, like many people, he was surprised to learn that presidential letters and documents aren’t the exclusive domain of museums and historical libraries. Plenty of collectors have Abe Lincolns and Teddy Roosevelts hanging on their library walls.
The materials available have a tremendous range. Collectors can choose among handwritten letters and notes, signed photographs, military commissions and discharges, postmasters’ appointments, ships’ papers, land grants, signed Executive Mansion and White House cards–even signed golf balls.
From time to time, official government documents that had been leaked out are available in the collectibles market. But most of the items now collected are documents that had been directed to individuals or are one of multiple handwritten copies.
Holzrichter started with a Jefferson letter and eventually built up to a complete set of presidential letters from Washington to Bill Clinton–a common goal among many collectors and one that can set you back tens of thousands of dollars.
“When you get the bug, it happens pretty rapidly,” says Holzrichter, who also has a vast library of presidential books. But if you’ve got the money to spend, assembling a complete set of letters by sitting presidents easily can be achieved (save for William Henry Harrison, who died after only a month in office) with the help of dealers.
Others put together their own idiosyncratic collections, sticking to signed photographs, the early founding presidents, or letters all related to family issues, medical matters or Native Americans. One collector focused on Harry S. Truman and has picked up 150 samples of his writing.
Bob Erickson, an accountant who lives seven blocks from the White House and president of the Universal Autograph Collectors Club, has specialized in personal bank checks of the presidents. His prized possession is check No. 1 signed by George Washington in 1797. The doctor’s bill was made out for $762.50; two centuries later Erickson paid $22,000 for it. “I think it’s just fascinating,” he says. “Owning something that George Washington personally sat down and hand-wrote.”
Values depend on several factors: condition of the documents, its content and, of course, the author. Not surprisingly, Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson and Kennedy enjoy the strongest demand, while lesser lights like Franklin Pierce (who?), Martin Van Buren and Grover Cleveland are less popular and more accessible to new collectors.
Of course, things change as historians can judge presidents from a greater distance. Dealers report that interest has picked up in Franklin Roosevelt, Truman, Richard Nixon (since his death), and the Civil War-era presidents.
While Lincoln’s signature is common and second to the rare Washington, the bearded guy on the penny tops the list in interest and value for documents with significant historical content. A single, unsigned page of his famous “Housed Divided” speech, given a couple of years before he ran for president, sold at Sotheby’s in 1992 for $1.54 million.
No matter who the author is, any presidential letter with significant content gets top dollar. A letter from President Carter to his brother Billy– the first important Carter letter to reach the market since he left the presidency– could fetch nearly $20,000 when it’s auctioned at Christie’s in October, Coover says.
But not everything is priced so steep. Collectors can pick up signatures and more day-to-day correspondence for several hundred dollars.
In modern times, presidents have signed fewer and fewer documents in contrast with early presidents who personally signed every ship list and military commission.
Lincoln alone signed 30,000 military commissions. His successor, the once-illiterate Andrew Johnson, learned a lesson and created a woodcut stamp to do the job.
Today, some dealers say a handwritten Clinton letter could outsell one by Washington simply because the current president’s writings are so rare. A four-page letter Clinton wrote to a young woman when he was 22 sold for $9,900 at an auction earlier this month at Empire Autograph Auctions in Rockville Centre, N.Y.
For intellectually curious collectors, acquiring a piece isn’t enough. Each autograph opens a door to new revelations.
“Each document is unique and gives you an opportunity to learn something more about the person who wrote it,” Barnes says. “What you can be learning from this is part of the fascination.”
HOW TO MAKE IT TO THE TOP
Popularity or historical import of the presidentS alone don’t determine the asking price of their autographs. Supply and demand explain why a blip on the presidential roster like William Henry Harrison shows up high on the list (only a handful of documents from his short-lived tenure exist). And signatures obtained while in office always are more valuable than those written before or after their term.
The following are recent average retail prices for a pristine signature, written either in or out of office, estimated by George Sanders, who along with his wife, Helen, will publish next month a fourth edition of “Sanders Price Guide to Autographs” (Alexander Books, $24.95).
— George Washington, $4,200
— Abraham Lincoln, $2,900
— Thomas Jefferson, $2,500
— John Adams, $1,950
— Ulysses S. Grant, $745
— Zachary Taylor, $730
— William Henry Harrison, $670
— James K. Polk, $475
— Andrew Johnson, $450
— Andrew Jackson, $450
— John Quincy Adams, $400
— James Madison, $400
— James Monroe, $400
— John Tyler, $400
— Franklin D. Roosevelt, $360
— Benjamin Harrison, $345
— Chester A. Arthur, $325
— James Buchanan, $325
— Martin Van Buren, $325
— James A. Garfield, $300
— Franklin Pierce, $300
— Millard Fillmore, $295
— William McKinley, $290
— Dwight D. Eisenhower, $285
— Grover Cleveland, $250
— Ronald Reagan, $250
— Warren G. Harding, $225
— Rutherford B. Hayes, $210
— Calvin Coolidge, $200
— Harry S. Truman, $200
— Woodrow Wilson, $200
— William H. Taft, $185
— George Bush, $160
— Lyndon B. Johnson, $150
— Richard M. Nixon, $150
— Herbert C. Hoover, $95
— Gerald R. Ford, $75
— Jimmy Carter, $70
— Bill Clinton, $50
