The coolest piece of currency in my collection. Frank Sinatra short snorter!

Spartcom5

Hey, I thought this would be a nice place to share my recent acquisition as of a few weeks ago. I traded a good friend of mine for this "short snorter" note. It has got to be the coolest piece I own. It was authenticated by Beckett and was looked at by Steve Grad himself. It was authenticated as a 1938 Short Snorter signed by Frank Sinatra including 6 other signatures. I can't for the life of me figure out any of the other signatures, if anyone could help that would be great! Here is a small write up on the note written by my friend, "The Frank Sinatra signed short snorter authenticated by Beckett is a Series 1935 A Silver Certificate that is dated and noted in pen "May 15th, 1938, Crossed Date Line at 22 o (degrees) 5 ' (minutes) N.L. (North Latitude)". In addition to Frank Sinatra there are six other signatures on the front.
On the back is typed "Crossed Date Line May 15th, 1938 / Crossed Atlantic Feb. 10th, 1946 / Crossed Atlantic May 11th, 1946 / Crossed Equator Oct. 12th, 1946". There are no signatures on the back."
Just the fact that the pilot kept log of his flights is truly amazing, starting in 1938 and skipping to 1946. Makes you wonder about the places this note went. Truly a piece of history!! Here are some pictures, the back of the note isn't as bad in person, the scanner machine makes it look like the ink bled through which it didn't!

Timbuk3

Cool !!!

1630Boston

Interesting note

coinkat

So if Sinatra signed the note in 1938, that would have been before he was with Harry James and before he recorded his first record... amazing

gsalex

I think it's much more likely that Sinatra signed this in 1946 or thereabouts. No telling whether the other signatures were all done in one sitting or at separate times.

Spartcom5

Yea, we really don't have any idea when he signed. However, compared to autographs from the 40s it is different in some aspects. He may not have signed everything the same exact way but it is up for speculation!

JBK

There is so much that I don't know that I am hesitant to post, but here goes....

Short Snorters, as far as I know, first became a tradition in WWII tradition, so why would there be a 1938 Short Snorter? Also, I was not aware Beckett authenticates historical autographs (but I might be just plain wrong on that count), If Sinatra was travelling overseas in a military aircraft I assume he was on a USO tour, in which case at least some of the other sigs should be identifiable as notable people.

Those are just some random thoughts.

P.S. - maybe the note was a souvenir of the pilot's when HE crossed the date line in 1938, and was scrounged out of his wallet for the 1946 festivities.

Unknown

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JBK

Thx for the background.

I also know that it was common for short snorters to be taped together at the ends and hung up. The note here might show signs of having been taped on one end (?).

Spartcom5

Yes, Beckett does indeed do historical figures autographs. Also, 1938 is an acceptable date for a short snorter. As for the other sigs none I can recognize. Also, it was taped at one point but whoever had it at one point clearly broke it up and probably sold each individual note to make more money. Finally, it probably was signed sometime 1946? That's a good idea that maybe he did stash it away and broke it out in 1946 and that would explain why there and so many more dates in 1946! So idk Beckett just authenticated it using the earliest know date on the snorter.

JBK

Here are some guesses. Above Sinatra are Mary Thomas and Nancy Thomas. To the right of Washington looks like Jerome L. something. W. F. Molan to the left of the portrait. Another namet that I keep thinking is Zander for some reason. The name that is under and yo the right of the handwritten text about the date line looks to be written by the same person as the text above it.

Maybe they are not all famous people after all, and are people who flew over time in someone's plane. Or, Sinatra may not even have been on the flight at the time, but was added another time. If you Google the heck out of the dates and Sinatra maybe you can see if he was appearing anywhere overseas around that time.

mvs7

Very cool @Spartcom5 - That's an awesome piece of history. Good luck chasing down the rest of the signers.

Ted 1

Anything looked at or authenticated by Steve Grad is suspect in my opinion. The man is a known fraud.

Spartcom5

@Ted 1 said:
Anything looked at or authenticated by Steve Grad is suspect in my opinion. The man is a known fraud.

Then what would you advise me to do? Authenticate at PSA?

Kkathyl

Perhaps his band members

johnny9434

thats kinda cool