Shoeless Joe’s biggest payday
Why a rare signed photo of a scandal-plagued baseball legend sold for US$1.47M Andrew Golden
Finding a photo of “Shoeless” Joe Jackson is pretty difficult. Jackson played Major League Baseball from 1908 to 1920, during an era when photographs were hard to come by because of the emerging technology and the lack of access to processing materials.
It’s even harder to find an authentic signature by Jackson, because the baseball legend grew up on a farm in South Carolina and was illiterate, meaning he didn’t sign many autographs. There are a handful of surviving documents from the Jackson family with his signature on them, and a few signed baseballs as well.
So how hard is it to find a photo of Jackson signed by the man himself? Nearly impossible. But there actually is one in the world — and it was just sold Thursday for US$1.47 million, the highest amount ever paid for a signed sports photograph.
“We sort of thought that if it brought somewhere between $500,000 and a million, that would be a wild success and record-setting in and of itself,” Dave Hunt, president of Hunt Auctions, said in an interview. “But when it got to this level, I’m not going to say I’m shocked. That’s not the right word. But, like, it is pretty stunning.
“I mean that is a very, very significant record price that is going to be extraordinarily challenging to top, for sure.”
The photograph was part of the live auction “Extra Innings: A Private Collection of Important Baseball Memorabilia,” put on by Christie’s and Hunt Auctions in New York. The collector who sold the items has been gathering pieces for around 30 years. In addition to the live auction Thursday, there is an online auction that started Sept. 24 and ends Friday.
Included in the live auction were bats from Babe Ruth and Honus Wagner, an autographed rookie card by Lou Gehrig and letters between Marilyn Monroe and Joe Dimaggio. But none of the 246 items sold Thursday went for more than the signed Jackson photo.
Jackson was a member of the infamous 1919 Chicago White Sox team that fixed games during the World Series against the Cincinnati Reds. Despite having 12 hits in the World Series himself, Jackson was one of eight players who received a lifetime ban from Major League Baseball after the 1920 season.
The photo was taken by Frank Smith, a photographer for the Cleveland Plain-dealer. Smith was taking pictures of the whole team, and he had players sign their photos on the front so they could be used for publication. Hunt hypothesizes that because Smith had access to the field and the players, he was able to corner Jackson and get him to sign.
“It’s so rare that you can say there’s only one, and honestly [I] probably believe that there really, truly is only one,” Hunt said. “I mean, we’re 100 years removed now, and the odds of another one popping up — the Jackson family doesn’t have one. The Hall of Fame doesn’t have one. Nobody’s ever seen one. They’re pretty slim.”
Thursday’s auction was held at the Christie’s sale room in Manhattan, and Hunt said it was one of the first since the coronavirus pandemic in which live bidders were actually in the room, as well as participating over the phone and via the Internet.
Hunt said the auction brought in a total of US$9,390,125 across the 246 items sold. There were several items in the sale that either set records or approached them.
So are there other photos that could top the record-breaking Jackson photo and sell for more? Hunt isn’t so sure.
For perspective, Hunt said he worked with Ruth’s family on selling a photo of him in 2019 that was in near-perfect condition out of Ruth’s personal album and was signed by Lou Gehrig to Ruth. That piece sold for $555,000.
“This is almost three times as much as that, so I wouldn’t even be able to venture a guess of what could possibly top this,” Hunt said. “I don’t know. I don’t see it. I don’t see anything more significant or scarce than the Jackson photograph, which truly is unique.”