The Big Back Door.
A year inside an auction house: $30 million in consignments, a commission that never came, and money "floated" between consignors.
Open chapter
Best-Selling Author · An Insider Investigation
Gary Hendershott names the scoundrels the collectibles trade won't.
After 50 years inside the American collectibles market, appraiser Gary Hendershott breaks ranks. Fakes & Scoundrels documents the forgers, the auction-house games, the laundered provenance, and the collectors who paid millions for lies.
Available at Amazon Barnes & Noble
Exhibit A
A Must-Read for Every Collector, Dealer & Museum Curator
Every art and historical collection has a fake.
The question isn't if — it's which one. As Gary Hendershott writes on page one: every collection has a fake or two. It may be one in a hundred — but rest assured, it's there.
- Forgery in Every Collectible
- The Auction Game
- Insurance Frauds
- Bank Frauds
- Fake Appraisals
- Theft & Repatriation
The Indictment
What the trade has been selling you.
A signed Washington document — restored. A Civil War sword — re-hilted in 1987. A coin in a slab — re-graded by a dealer the grader owed money to. A "find" from the Old West — manufactured in a garage outside Tulsa.
The collectibles world runs on trust. Fakes & Scoundrels is the first book to dismantle that trust with names, dates, and exhibits — written by the appraiser who watched it happen.
Inside the Book
Twenty chapters. A lifetime of evidence.
Loan to own.
A $25,000 painting, a false $650,000 appraisal, a $400,000 loan — and a scoundrel who walked away with a cool $1 million.
Open chapterThe most valuable — and most forged.
The highest price ever paid for any collectible was $450 million, for a single Leonardo. Where the money is, the forgers follow.
Open chapterThe Catch-22.
The 1933 Double Eagle — struck the year gold was banned — sold for nearly $20 million. The rarer the coin, the more reason to fake one.
Open chapterThe most-faked field in America.
More "Confederate" relics trade hands each year than the Confederacy ever made. The supply math has never added up.
Open chapter“Lightning.”
Insurance fraud in collectibles is an easy crime to commit. All you need is a patsy — someone to pin it on.
Open chapter"I sat in those rooms. I shook those hands. I watched the bidding go up, and I watched the appraisals come down. After fifty years, somebody has to put it on paper." Gary Hendershott — Appraiser, Collector, Witness
50+
Years In The Trade
20
Chapters
300+
Documented Cases
1st
Of Its Kind, Ever
Meet the Investigator
Gary Hendershott has spent a lifetime authenticating what others sold as truth.
Arkansas-born, self-taught, and unafraid: Gary began collecting at nine, built a working appraisal practice over five decades, and handled some of the most significant American documents and artifacts of the 20th century.
- Authenticated Gilbert Stuart's Athenaeum portrait of George Washington
- Authenticated Washington's 22-page signed "Fair Reading" speech
- Five decades appraising fine art, militaria, coins, and Native American artifacts
- Court-experienced witness on questioned provenance and forgery
Explore the history he has handled at his historical archive, or read his other book, B-4112: The Blue Diamonds.
The Collection
Fifty years of American history, handled firsthand.
Long before the book, Gary Hendershott built one of the country's most significant private trades in Americana — personal effects tied to George Washington, Robert E. Lee, and Nathan Bedford Forrest, and working relationships with more than twenty museums.
In 2014 he donated his Amazon tribal art collection to Tulane University. His historical archive gathers the pieces, the provenance, and the research behind a lifetime spent telling the real from the fake.
Also by Gary Hendershott
B-4112: The Blue Diamonds
A Holocaust survivor. More than a hundred rare blue diamonds buried beneath a Ukrainian church. A fifteen-year quest to bring them back into the light.
Richard Friedemann endured three concentration camps marked as prisoner B-4112. Gary Hendershott spent fifteen years documenting his account — a true story of survival, memory, and a fortune hidden across two world wars.
The Campaign
The dark truth behind collecting.
Spread the word — share the investigation.
Limited First Edition
- First-edition copy of Fakes & Scoundrels
- Available now on Amazon & at Barnes & Noble
- Author-signed copies available on request
- Press & museum bulk pricing available