1606

An American Hero.

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles Start Price:137.00 USD Estimated At:275.00 - 350.00 USD
An American Hero.
Wonderful signed photo of "Sgt. Alvin C. York," World War I Medal of Honor awardee, killing 32 German soldiers, and capturing132 others plus 32 machine guns. 8 x 10, olive-greentone glossy. Showing him later in life, in weathered hat, holding rifle, licking his thumb as he eyes a shot off camera. In medium-light blue ballpoint, on mid-grey background at lower right. Short crease at lower right, away from signature, else about V.F. Having had a religious conversion in 1915, he claimed to be a conscientious objector. Joining the Army he remained conflicted between his newfound pacifist beliefs and the realities of war. On Oct. 8, 1918, the die was cast: "I didn't want to kill any more than I had to. But it was they or I..."--diary. He remained obscure, even in Tennessee, until a 1919 article unfolded his saga, laying out "the themes that have dominated York's story ever since: the mountaineer, his religious faith and skill with firearms, patriotic, plainspoken and unsophisticated, an uneducated man who 'seems to do everything correctly by intuition'..."--Saturday Evening Post. York's life story became the top-grossing movie of 1941, garnering eleven Oscar nominations.