Thanks for the pics!

If only there was more print samples from Ross. I’m not sure these help much, one way or the other.

edit – The first ‘d’ and ‘t’ do look very Zodiac like IMO. Probably the same for lots of people though.

I learned years ago from a writing expert that ideally, you can not properly compare cursive writing with printed writing. That being said, Zodiac had a hybrid looking printed writing that looked like a blend of cursive, his letter d for example.

We need to be careful and compare Zodiac’s printed writing to Ross’s printed writing, and Ross’s cursive to Zodiac’s cursive-which is limited to the SLA . Unfortunately, while we have a lot of Zodiac’s writing, we have next to nothing for Ross. Using the little bit of Ross writing we have, I think there is a good amount of similarity keep in mind that years have passed, different pens/markers were used

…

That middle o and s is nearly identical and is really odd shaped. No way somebody forged that signature.

More comparison

The "Red Phantom" letter, not cursive but very stylized has some clear similarities.

The W with the long right upper stroke.
Ross G & Y look like the long g in "rage."
Both have ‘i’ with the offset dot to the upper right.
and the very long T.

I’m not surprised. Great find!

Really compelling stuff!

The printed handwriting in the letters from Zodiac always seemed contrived and artificial, like the author was trying to disguise his true penmanship.

In Ross’ yearbook salutation, it’s interesting how the exit stroke of the "w" juts upward.

In a lot of the Zodiac letters, there is a "heavy dot" on the last part of the exit stroke of the "w" — almost like the Zodiac is forcing the pen to rest to prevent it from moving upward.

But there are a few instances of Zodiacs writing with that last stroke of the "w" juts upward — like the author forgot to suppress his natural handwriting.

It would be really interesting if printed (non-cursive) handwriting by Ross ever surfaces for comparison with the Zodiac letters.

It would be really interesting if printed (non-cursive) handwriting by Ross ever surfaces for comparison with the Zodiac letters.

You mean like his SS application? We have that and comparisons have been made.

It would be really interesting if printed (non-cursive) handwriting by Ross ever surfaces for comparison with the Zodiac letters.

You mean like his SS application? We have that and comparisons have been made.

Yes. The SS application is mostly up caps (with a few odd lower case letters sprinkled in). It would be great to find more of Ross’ writing with printed sentence caps down caps — especially with an "f" to compare to Zodiac’s distinctive candy cane "f".

First impression is that the yearbook entry doesn’t disinclude Sullivan, we see cursive, yes, and parts which are similar in comparison to the limited Z cursive examples….taught in elementary schools, especially then, and as people get older many revert to a cursive ‘hybrid.’

The d is good, I would say ‘very’ good, alone it isn’t enough to get an expert opinion, what is heartening to the effort to get the yearbook in first place, is that the belief more yearbooks exist from other schoolmates is reinforced.

Excellent find!

The ‘lower case z’ though similar to Bates, did not stand out to me; however close it is to a lower case z as written in parts of Europe then and now.

Speaking of looking European, I’ve seen here that Zodiac’s choice of words seemed British. Is it possible any of Ross’ teachers were British? Their word usage and writing could’ve rubbed off.

Thanks for the kind words, everyone. Yea, no way in hell this was forged. Im on the hunt for these yearbooks multiple times a day 24/7 and I have buddies in the hobby(true crime collecting) that are now on the lookout too.

It would be really interesting if printed (non-cursive) handwriting by Ross ever surfaces for comparison with the Zodiac letters.

You mean like his SS application? We have that and comparisons have been made.

I tried to get my hands on a higher quality digital copy but it didn’t exist for Ross. I’d love to see the original clearer copy off his ss application

While perhaps not much help as it only contains Ross’s signature, don’t forget it on his selective service card-
viewtopic.php?p=52514#p52514

-m

Been playing with these a bit more