It was clear that I had begun to get a bit cocky with my autograph collecting habits as 1985 drew to a close. I had had some great success stories during my first year of solid ‘by-mail-request’ autograph collecting. I was being led down the primrose path that most stars, no matter how big, would respond to autograph requests. But as the results of my final Christmas break push of eight autographs requests would prove, it wasn’t always so easy.
At the time, I was thrilled with a high return rate, but it was only later that I would come to realize that some of these were not so exciting after all. In the order that I listed them on my notecard that detailed: when I sent the request, when it was returned, and what I received, here are the requests of December 30, 1985…
1) Dean Martin: I was ecstatic that he signed my Martin and Lewis photos on 3/1/1986, as well as sent along an additional photo, until I later came to realize that these were secretarials.
2) Gale Storm: The biggest blow of all. I sent her the photo from My Little Margie that Charles F*rrell had signed for me during one of my first requests of the year. It was never returned. I have no doubt that it was lost in the mail, as I later had a my friend Steve Randisi ask Gale if she had ever received this item, and she said that if she had, she most certainly would have returned it. Such is the high stakes of autograph collecting.
3) Jane Russell: She signed a great lobby card reproduction of Son of Paleface that had been signed by Bob hope and would later be signed by Roy Rogers. This was returned to me on 3/17/1986. Unfortunately the Bob Hope signature was a secretarial. Not a complete failure, but certainly a tainted piece in my collection.
4) Fred Astaire: It took until February 1, 1986, before I received a small notecard in my huge self-addressed-stamped-envelope telling me the Fred Astaire was unavailable for autographs.
5) Frank Sinatra: I received a nice color, signed photo on January 4, 1986. Yeah right! It was as phony the special effects in Plan 9 from Outer Space.
6) Barbara Stanwyck: A complete success. I received the photo at the top of the posting on January 6, 1986, along with two signed notecards.
7) Bette Davis: Another great piece from the bug-eyed queen arrived on March 3, 1986 – as seen below…
8 ) Ted Knight: My Grandpa had told me that he had ready how much Ted Knight liked to make his fans happy, which put the bee in my bonnet to send a request to him. That may have been true, but I wasn’t all that happy with the preprint photo that I received on February 27, 1986. Oh, it came with a typewritten note that stated that he did read each and every letter from his fans. There was a possibly legitimate “Ted” scrawled at the bottom, although it really didn’t even quite resemble the preprint.
So that was that for 1985’s autograph spree.
Continue with the autographs of 1986 here…
Up next: 1986 as I continue my teenage geek years…
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