Autographs

The April autographs auction will present items signed by the same hands that helped shape American history, including a small archive of letters by John F. Kennedy, a portrait of Hillary Clinton by Chuck Close—signed by both; and a leaf from the Bolivian patent for the light bulb signed and filed by Thomas Edison in 1881 showing a schematic of the electronic components.

From figures around the rest of the world, we find autographs related to the breathtaking accomplishments of the laureates of the Nobel Prize in Physics; the sale includes a significant collection of autographs by these figures, including: Richard Feynman, Wolfgang Pauli, Enrico Fermi, Paul Dirac, Werner Heisenberg, Louis de Broglie, Max Planck, Wilhelm Röntgen, and others. Additionally, a letter signed by Charles Darwin in 1876, praising the recipient’s photographs of a child’s facial expressions (accompanied by the photographs); a decorative print featuring a young woman and child (after a painting by Girolamo Francesco Maria Mazzola) owned by Herman Melville and signed by him on verso; as well as business leaders, musicians, and artists—among them a small archive of 1960s letters by M.C. Escher to a relative.