Who has the most valuable autograph in history?

A Shakespeare would be pretty valuable, if you could find one. There are six known Shakespeare signatures in existence. It’s hard to know the true value of this or any other scarce signature without recent auction or sale records.

http://home.att.net/~tleary/sigs.htm

Jesus would be pretty cool.

Interesting that there are only 6 Shakespeare signatures since he was such a great playwrite.

Jesus’ signature would be AWESOME if one existed. I’m thinking back to my bible school days over 40 years ago and am wondering if he was supposed to have ever written anything. I wonder if he was literate.

Here’s a list I’d love to have:
Copernicus
Newton
Michaelangelo
da Vinci
Einstein
Lenin
Marx
John Stuart Mill
Zinaida Gippius (Зинаида Николаевна Гиппиус)
Paul Revere
Ben Franklin

Is that eclectic enough?

Wow, I don’t even recognize 2 of those names. (Mill and Gippius). Back to school for me ;-)

Gippius is probably understandable. Obscure early 20th century Russian poets are not extremely popular (except to me). I loved her poetry so much, I wanted to name my daughter after her. If I’d had my way, Zinaida would have been her name. For better or for worse, my wife didn’t think it was appropriate.

With respect to Mill, I really hope you have just temporarily misplaced your memory of the progenitor of utilitarianism!

@daloon, Hmmmm. I read about John Stuart Mill on wikipedia, and it didn’t ring a bell (Not even Alexander’s). From what I read, and as I look at your list more, it really seems that you have a very broad spectrum. I would contrast Franklin and Revere to Lenin and Marx.

By the way, I believe that Franklin is probably one of the best men ever born, and I often ask myself “self… what would Franklin do in this situation?”

I also like your choices for Copernicus, Michaelangelo, da Vinci, and Einstein (I’m not discounting Newton, but I think he’s a bit overhyped by western civilization’s grade school teachings, as well as Paul Revere).

I can agree that Lenin and Marx had great impact on the world, although I don’t follow their beliefs and methods.

And yes, your list IS eclectic enough!

Ah, well, Revere has personal meaning to me: I lived in Lexington when I was a kid. Newton—well, I like Neal Stephenson’s fictionalized version of him.

Marx follows Mills, in my mind, in his ideal of a perfectable world where we all take care of each other. Lenin…. well, I wouldn’t say I admire him, although I do have a Soviet-era (yeah, what other kind could there be?) poster of him hanging on my wall. I’d just like to have his autograph, even though I don’t approve of the totalitarian regime he initiated. I think his heart was in the right place before the revolution; but after? I think power corrupted him. But I’d still like his autograph.

I think power corrupts most of the idealists who force themselves on the world. Castro, Hitler, Amin, etc….

They all get people to help them into power by spouting rhetoric about helping the working class, which is were the power of the masses is to help them takeover, then they ALWAYS turn on them and oppress them.

Hmmmm, I’m thinking I should be the next ruler :-)

Anyways, strange how the Fluther went from valuable autographs to world dictators!

Sorry. Somehow discussions seem to have a way of getting hijacked. We now return you to your regularly scheduled program.

Button Gwinnett is the most expensive obtainable autograph ranging from $200,000 on up

William Shakespeare has the most valuable signature in the world. There are only six of them in existence, and each is valued at (estimated) $5 million. Other mega-valuable one are John Lennon and Jimi Hendrix. The most valuable signature of a living person is Neil Armstrong, estimated at $6,500. Neil quit signing for fans in 1995.