Collecting Antique Stocks and Bonds with Signatures of Famous People

While many forms of art appeal to many people with a variety of tastes, nothing is as unique as beautiful, colorful financial documents with ornate designs and engraved vignettes captivating the owner.  These documents, when framed with portraits and descriptive plaques, make historical and aesthetically attractive wall displays for the owner or collector.

In the land of virtual and digital transfers of information and images, it's hard for Millennials and people not familiar with the day when investors and corporations had to sign financial paper to redeem them.

Well many of those certificates and other documents had famous signatures of John D. Rockefeller, Thomas Edison, J.P. Morgan, Henry Ford, Hetty Green and even Presidents of the United States. 

Before these people were known or wealthy, they had to raise capital to fund a new venture or growing, existing corporation.  As officers, major investors or during redemption, they signed the front or back of the certificates or bonds with their signatures.

When they achieved incredible wealth and known status throughout the United States and world, their signatures became valuable and highly sought after.

J.P. Morgan Chase bank was named after John Pierpont Morgan, an incredibly successful and wealthy investment banker, financier and philanthropist of the late 19th/early 20th centuries.  Thus, you can obtain several types of financial instruments of various companies with his signature on it.

Same with Rockefeller, Edison, Carnegie, etc. The list goes on. During the Industrial Revolution and growth of transportation throughout the United States and abroad, investors were seeking capital for their ventures.  To accomplish this, they issued stocks and bonds with the various amounts sold.

Some of individuals signed as an officer, some later signed as an investor when redeeming the paper investments.

In today's era, if you wanted a famous signature like Bill Gates or Elon Musk on their company stock or bond, good luck!

Not only don't they sign their instruments anymore, but getting them to sign anything is next to impossible.  Unlike entertainers of yesterday, they don't need to do shows, like comic hero shows, to get some extra cash.

Additionally, these items make incredible and impressive works of art, unique to any office setting. Just make sure these documents are properly and framed with strict conservation framing standards.

This is a great and addicting aspect of autograph collecting.  And, one with great aesthetics. Study and learn about acquiring these pieces of incredible financial history. You would be surprised the vast amount of wealth, influence and philanthropy these individuals these people left on America.