O/T Who has signed the most autographs

[BillyCoxDodgers3B]

The Bob Feller Museum is/was smaller than a one room schoolhouse. It is/was partitioned into two rooms: the "museum", which was nothing to write home about, and the gift shop. As I recall from my visit in the 1990's, practically everything was signed, including things on display as well as nearly everything that was for sale in the gift shop. The museum was fairly devoid of interesting memorabilia. I remember feeling that Bob wasn't very giving of his mementoes for this project and figured the best stuff was either in Cooperstown or still in his attic. The one item that sticks in my memory was the cap he wore during WWII (not the uniform hat, but rather some ratty, green thing, which was all frayed). Of course, he had signed it in black Sharpie for some reason, in spite of the fact it was something HE owned!

Dan beat me to it with what he said about the players who have been signing insert cards for companies ad nauseum since the 1990's. Feller did as well, but some of these these guys are really starting to make a run for the record.

[sycks22]

I remember being at Twinsfest back in 2008 at the dome. I was walking around and looked up and made eye contact with Feller sitting at a table with a sign saying "$20 for all autos.". I figured why the hell not? So I stopped on by and got him on a ball. Super nice guy to talk to as well.

[jethrod3]

Originally Posted by BillyCoxDodgers3B

The Bob Feller Museum is/was smaller than a one room schoolhouse. It is/was partitioned into two rooms: the "museum", which was nothing to write home about, and the gift shop. As I recall from my visit in the 1990's, practically everything was signed, including things on display as well as nearly everything that was for sale in the gift shop. The museum was fairly devoid of interesting memorabilia. I remember feeling that Bob wasn't very giving of his mementoes for this project and figured the best stuff was either in Cooperstown or still in his attic. The one item that sticks in my memory was the cap he wore during WWII (not the uniform hat, but rather some ratty, green thing, which was all frayed). Of course, he had signed it in black Sharpie for some reason, in spite of the fact it was something HE owned!

I have somewhat different memories of the Bob Feller Museum and they were good ones. My 2 trips occurred when I was visiting relatives in Des Moines, a short distance away, in the early- to mid-2000's. Yes, it was 2 rooms, but when I went they were packed with stuff to see & read about. I recall spending 90 minutes to 2 hours there, including looking at merchandise for sale and talking to a staff member there. They had the famous bat he had let the Babe use & there were many of Bob's items as well as some material on loan from other players.

Bob may have stopped signing at the time of his death, but I was told by a staff member that he hoped he could keep the museum open well after his death, and one mechanism he envisioned for accomplishing this was by signing a lot of memorabilia that was to be sold AFTER he died. This included the yellow HOF plaque cards. I remember purchasing for those cards for $5 at the time, and in fact, everything there including signed photos and neat little HOF busts were very reasonably priced. So I would say that Feller probably signed the most autographs, and from this collector's point of view, he set a high bar that other athletes could learn a few things from.

[egri]

I think it's Bobby Doerr. The longevity of his signing window is unmatched; he broke into professional baseball in 1934 and likely started getting autograph requests around then (or at the latest, his MLB debut in 1937), then kept signing until a couple weeks before he died in 2017. He never charged a fee either; even the nominal one charged by many of the others mentioned would have cut down on requests to them.