University Archives is pleased to announce its next online-only sale on September 9, 2026. The auction will include over 400 lots of outstanding historical material ranging from autographs, documents, and archives, to books, photos, artwork, and relics. Major collecting categories include U.S. Presidents, Science, Civil Rights, World Leaders, Early America, Entertainment, Literature, and Music.
We are proud to have been selected to bring The Douglas Wertman Collection to auction. Wertman, the longtime Secretary of the Universal Autograph Collectors Club, was a true Collector’s Collector: shrewd, inquisitive, and meticulous. His passion for history, combined with his professional background (including a 3-decades-long tenure at the United States Information Agency), influenced his collecting choices, which are particularly strong in U.S. Presidents, First Ladies, Politics, the Supreme Court, and the Civil War. The Douglas Wertman Collection will be offered in a series of auctions. Each lot was carefully identified, documented, and researched by Wertman, who often acquired contemporary autographs in person.
For more information about Douglas Wertman, click here.
U.S. Presidents
Lot 22 is a presentation photo signed by President Bill Clinton, ca. February 13, 1997, inscribed by him along the bottom margin as: “To the people of Israel – with gratitude for the ties that bind us. Bill Clinton.” PSA/DNA slabbed and graded GEM MT 10. The color photo shows Clinton conversing with Israeli Premier Benjamin Netanyahu in the White House Oval Office, where the pair had met to promote the Hebron Agreement signed the previous month by Netanyahu and his Palestinian counterpart, PLO chairman Yasser Arafat. The accord – in which Israel and Palestine agreed to jointly control Hebron, a holy site and mixed settlement in the West Bank – was widely viewed as a step forward in the Middle East peace-making progress.
Lot 67 is a Thomas Jefferson autograph letter signed, dated May 4, 1786 from Paris, France, which the statesman wrote while serving as U.S. Minister to France. In this 2pp letter addressed to Colonel William Stephens Smith, John Adams’s son-in-law, Jefferson fondly remembers his old revolutionary comrade. Jefferson also provides the latest news on The Diamond Necklace Affair: a swindle perpetrated by Jeanne de la Motte, a female forger and thief impersonating Marie Antoinette, which later served as one of many catalysts of the French Revolution.
Lot 142 is a George Washington letter signed, dated May 22, 1779 from military headquarters at Middlebrook, New Jersey. The Commander-in-Chief writes Brigadier General James Clinton regarding preparations for the upcoming Sullivan Expedition, a frontier campaign against the British ally the Iroquois Nation, where the Continentals planned to employ “scorched earth tactics.” Washington addresses supply shortages and clarifies military policy. On the same day and in the same headquarters, Washington’s aide-de-camp Alexander Hamilton also sent out letters in a feverish push to get ready for the important military campaign.
Science
Lot 395 is an Albert Einstein autograph letter in German signed, sent from Berlin, Germany on May 1, 1926 to his close friend and colleague Michele Besso. In the letter, Einstein contends that simple experiments are not sufficient in themselves; instead, they should reveal an underlying order, rational structure, and deeper truth – in short, one of “God’s secrets.” Einstein argues this in the context of rejecting the clumsy investigations of a Swiss chemist named Johann Gottfried Beck, whom Einstein derides as having used “apothecary’s methods.”
Lot 398 is a J. Robert Oppenheimer typed letter signed, dated March 14, 1949, and addressed to businessman Joseph Schaffner, copying Albert Einstein and Admiral Lewis Strauss. Oppenheimer inquires whether Princeton University’s Institute For Advanced Study should contribute to the Einstein Award – rolled out that very day, on Einstein’s 70th birthday – to subsidize scientists, or whether they desire to donate to another worthy cause, such as to Israeli scholars. The four men – Oppenheimer, Einstein, Strauss, and Schaffner – were tied together professionally and by a love of science, but were separated by significant personal and political divides. Accompanied by a JSA LOA.
Civil Rights
Lot 248 is a Martin Luther King, Jr. signed program from the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia, presented to a Northern visitor on March 25, 1968, just 10 days before King’s assassination on April 4th. PSA/DNA slabbed and certified authentic, and accompanied by a JSA LOA and detailed provenance information about the original autograph recipient, Ed Zysk of Oakham, Massachusetts. This is probably one of the last autographs King ever presented to a well-wisher before moving on to the infamous Lorraine Hotel.
World Leaders
Lot 355 is an archive of correspondence penned by British military commander Charles George Gordon, who died trying to defend the city of Khartoum, Sudan against Muslim Mahdists in 1884. This impressive group of 55 documents and more than 100pp contains at least 50 Gordon signatures. The archive contains examples from Gordon’s time at Khartoum, before he and approximately 7,000 defenders were slain.
Lot 355, Charles George Gordon Archive
Lot 348 is a Winston Churchill signed George Philip Edition of a monumental map, Dunkirk to Berlin / June, 1940 – July, 1945 / Journeys Undertaken By The Rt. Honble. Winston S. Churchill, O.M., C.H., F.R.S., M.P., / Prime Minister of Great Britain In Defence Of The British Commonwealth And Empire. The mixed geographical and pictorial map shows the 19 destinations to which Churchill traveled during World War II, including in the United States, Iceland, Iran, and Northern Africa, and was published to accompany a 1956 reprint of his war memoirs.
Lot 350 is a Princess Diana autograph letter signed, dated November 27, 1995, one week after Diana had discussed her failed marriage during a controversial royal interview on the British news television program “Panorama.” In this touching letter to a subject named Michael Barratt who had written Diana expressing his support, Diana writes that she hopes she can teach her 13- and 11-year-old sons, Princes William and Harry, to learn how to better communicate with their future partners. Less than one month later, Diana and Charles received a divorce mandate from Queen Elizabeth II.
Entertainment
Lot 289 is a Marilyn Monroe signed early 1946 “Photographic Model Release” signed by her as “Norma Jeane Dougherty,” using the last name of her first husband, James Dougherty, and before the creation of her iconic stage name. PSA/DNA slabbed and graded NM-MT 8, with a companion LOA. The contract between Monroe and photographer Richard C. Miller dates from April 30, 1946, when Monroe was just 19 years old. Photos from this Miller photo shoot show Monroe on the beach, in a swimming pool, and in a ski chalet, further cultivating her Girl-Next-Door image.
Literature
Lot 365 is Ernest Hemingway’s signed Florida driver’s license, quite probably the only one ever issued to him, and dating ca. 1939-1940 from Key West, Florida. PSA/DNA slabbed and certified authentic. The license lists 907 Whitehead Street as his primary address; today this is the site of the Ernest Hemingway House, a National Historic Landmark. Hemingway lived at 907 Whitehead with his second wife Pauline Pfeiffer during the 1930s, there writing To Have and To Have Not among other works. The driver’s license dates from a very short time period between the passage of Florida’s first driver’s license legislation in 1939, and Hemingway’s move to Cuba in mid-1939.
Music
Lot 277 is an original sketch of John Lennon signed by all four The Beatles bandmates: John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr. The sketch accomplished in blue pen shows Lennon in profile, with a manuscript arrow and caption as “JOHN / BEATLE.” Accompanied by a JSA LOA.
These are just some of the extraordinary lots in our September sale.
We hope you can join us!
