A local newspaper went behind the story revealed on PBS to discover a dark chapter in the Frederic Remington museum’s history:

Last week, the popular PBS series “Antiques Roadshow” aired an episode in which Alabama resident Charles T. Dodge was told that a family heirloom — a portrait of his great-grandfather painted by renowned artist Frederic Remington — could be worth as much as $800,000. […]

After an exhaustive search, museum director Laura A. Foster said Monday she is now convinced that two forged Remington paintings, relegated to the museum’s basement for decades, are works that likely were part of the 1938 deal that took the Febiger portrait out of the hands of Ogdensburg museum officials and placed it into the hands of Mr. Dodge’s grandmother.

“The fakes that I think are the bought items are unconvincing, to say the least,” Ms. Foster said. “They are in old, deteriorated frames and backings, suggesting that for a long time the museum has recognized them as fakes, and not invested in their care.”

Ms. Foster said the two forged Remingtons were catalogued as such in 1971, with the letter “F” for “fake” preceding their accession numbers. She said her belief that the two paintings were part of the 1938 trade with Mr. Dodge’s grandmother was reinforced after finding a March 2, 1939 article published in the Ogdensburg Journal that briefly mentions the acquisitions.

(Watertown Daily Times)