The Handwriting Analysis Expertease

Our audience tonight is composed mainly of calligraphers. And Clare Sera, since you're an expert in handwriting analysis, we thought we could probe your area. What? Of expertise. Spelled wrong. Naturally. You're listening to Expertise, spelled wrong, the podcast where the world's most expert experts discuss their areas of expertise expertly. Ladies and gentlemen, podcast listeners from around the globe, welcome back to the Expertise Knowledge Podcast. For listeners who like to get their knowledge in podcast form, I'm your host, Danno Sullivan. My very special guest today is handwriting analyst, Clare Sera.

Welcome to the Expertise Podcast. Thank you so much, Danno. Thank you for having me on your podcast and thank you for sending me in advance this little note that I asked you to write. I have to admit, I was a little nervous about sending that over. It's like when you find out that someone you're talking to is a dentist and you're all self-conscious about smiling. Well, you have a lot to be self-conscious about. Oh dear. Now, I did take the precaution of typing the handwriting sample that I sent over to you. You would be amazed what it still reveals. Really?

So you are a true expert if you can get anything about my personality from that sample. Well, it wasn't easy, but I appreciated that you used a real old-fashioned typewriter and sent me the carbon copy trying to keep me one layer away. I typed it up in triplicate. That's a habit from the good old days. So I keep a copy for myself, a copy to send to you, and then a copy for tax purposes. You're an OCD hoarder. I beg your pardon? Hmm? Huh? What? And these are just terms that we handwriting analysts use. Well, Claire, before we make it all personal and all about me, and don't get me wrong, you know how much I like that, but let's delve in to the background of handwriting analysis in general.

Can we? Yes, absolutely. I'd be thrilled. I feel like that as long as there have been humans with pens and hands, there has been handwriting. Is that accurate? Absolutely inaccurate, Dano. Writing as we call it did not exist until the late 1500s. The 1500s? Yes. So this is the time of Galileo, Christopher Columbus, the Pope. Queen Marie Antoinette. Yes. I mean, a little before her, but we were thinking about her in our culture. I'm sure people were writing about queens to be. That was the very first writings that were done. The first writing was speculating who might be queen 200 years from now.

Yeah. If you go to the Netherlands Museum in Finland. The handwriting archives in Finland of the Netherlands. Yes. You can see the earliest handwritings. Oh. Now, I mean, because we do, you know, a handwriting analysis such as myself, professionals, professionals in our profession. We do not consider anything before the 1500s handwriting. We consider it stub scratches. Yeah. You know. Is that because evolution of man happened so much later than we generally believe it to have happened? Well, our thumbs and fingers were the last to evolve. Okay. So, stub scratching.

Yes. Was that an effective method of communication? I mean, I understand that we don't consider that handwriting, but could we actually communicate through stub scratching? Oh, absolutely. I mean, the Rosetta Stone has a bunch of stub scratches. The Bible. But we get a lot of it wrong. A lot of the Bible. Yeah. And the Rosetta Stone. Now, I find it interesting that as part of your studies, that you have provided some new translations to some of the Bible verses where they particularly call out the hand, the finger, and the communications that we have gotten wrong and that you have corrected.

Well, and I really do think that this is going to help the evolution of mankind, or more rightly, womankind, once we have gotten some of those errors corrected with the elongated fingers and the elegant thumbs of today. Yeah. Yeah. You just make it sound almost romantic. Well, you know, at the time, it wasn't romantic. It was horrifying for the folks in the 1500s to wake up with these stretched out appendages. Yeah. Great flabby bits of flesh flopping. They could. They... Bones came later. So, it really was flabby flesh a-flopping. Yes. That's my favorite verse from the 12 Days of Christmas, by the way.

Oh, absolutely. That's one of the traditions. So, for example, the story of Noah in the Bible. Yes. The animals come in two by two. Yeah. And with no digits, Claire, with just stubs, how are they even able to count and do that simple multiplication? Well, they couldn't count. You're absolutely right, Daniel, because what do you count on? Your fingers. You don't count on your stubs. There could have been 40 animals or none. Well, Claire, as fascinating as that is, I know that's not your specialty, and you specialize in the actual era of handwriting from the 1500s on.

From the 1500s on. So, I analyzed Michelangelo's handwriting. So, some historical personage handwriting analysis. Yes. So, give us the big picture. What does handwriting tell us about the person? I assume it tells us the person can write. That is the first... If you were to put a list, and we like to put lists in my profession. They can write. That goes first. I feel like maybe I'm accidentally something of a handwriting analysis myself. You have a very good tuition. Let me see your thumbs. Look at that. Only four fingers on each hand. No, that's just a little joke.

I was hiding my thumb behind my palm. You know, I also... You see how I did that? No, that's... Yeah. That's an old... Every year at the conference, some dork gets up and does that joke, because he was hired to be an emcee by SAC Theater Company, because he can't do a convention without a jokester emcee. I mean, what are we, the 1300s? Get me Stubbs McGee to host this conference. Okay. Clearly, I rubbed you the wrong way with my four digits on each hand. My apologies. Yes. Apology accepted. So, that's the first thing we can tell about a person by the handwriting.

Next thing on the list. Are they a murderer? Oh, yes. And I think that's why handwriting analysis is used so often in court cases. Am I right? Absolutely. Because you can just tell yes or no. Check it off the list. Yeah. Murderer, yes. Murderer, no. You just get that out of the way immediately. So, for example, one of your claims to fame is doing the handwriting analysis of Jack the Ripper. Yes. London's unknown assailant. We don't know who he was or do we, but we do know that he was a murderer. Murderer. Murderer. So, I'm fascinated by this case in particular, Claire, because how can it be that we have a handwriting sample of Jack the Ripper?

Because he left behind some things that he had written. Uncanny. I can see that you really are an expert in your field, but he didn't sign his name, did he? Or did he just write Jack the Ripper? JTR. JTR. And from that short message and those three initials, you're able to determine that he is absolutely a murderer. Yes. You're able to determine that he is absolutely a murderer. A murderous R, as we would call it. He had a murderous R. What's special about the R? The loop at the top of the R was shaded in like a noose. Oh, it does seem like a bit of a giveaway.

And then the stalk, as we call it, of the R was shaded in like a knife with blood dripping off of it. And then the curl of the R was a scythe, you know, like a death, death's scythe. Oh, representing death. Yes. Yes. And I'm never sure whether to call it a scythe or a scythe. I would think that an expert would look that up. I'm embarrassed myself at the convention. Now I'm just curious, Claire. I said I didn't want to make this all about me, but you do have my typewritten handwriting sample there. Yes. And take a look at my R and see if there's anything interesting or unusual.

Quirky, fun, happy, cheerful, good-natured. You know, Dano, your R is perfectly normal. Oh, whew. Thank goodness. Yeah. But your Q is quite suspect. I knew I shouldn't have signed it. Quincy. The one thing I've learned as a handwriting analyst is that I don't fear people. Why is that, Claire? I'll tell you why, Dano. I'm curious why. Would you like to know why? Yeah. If you wouldn't mind telling me why. I really am wondering why. Let me tell you why. Yeah. I don't fear people. Why? They're transparent. Because of their handwriting. Because of their handwriting. So if I am ever in a situation in my life where I'm slightly nervous, say perhaps it's a tall person wearing all black and a black hoodie over their face, you know, a black ski mask and maybe carrying a gun and a scythe and coming at me in an alley and making a sort of a, kind of a noise, something like that, you know.

So your first instinct would be to be a little put off, a little worried. Most people might have a little bit of a sense, you know, little prickles on their neck. And you know, the common advice is heed those physiological warnings. But then you're making a snap judgment. Sure you could run the other way. Sure you could pull out the rape whistle. Sure you could bring your personal size scythe out and be ready. But you've come up with another system, another way. Yeah. Always have a little pad of paper and a pen. A little doodle pad. And just ask them to write their name.

And with your years of experience as a handwriting analyst. It's a very fair judgment that I then make whether or not to pull out my gun. How has this played out for you in real life, Claire? Have you had any incidents in a back alley where a seeming assailant comes at you with a weapon? Well, let me just answer that by saying my R now has a noose and a bloody dagger. Wait, you yourself? I had no choice. It was self-defense. I mean, nobody actually lunged at me. But when I saw the handwriting on the wall, and because sometimes if I don't have a pen or a pad on me, I asked them to put the handwriting on the wall.

So I just want to make sure you understand what happened. What? Why don't you understand? This is not in the alley. Okay. An ominous brooding presence appeared coming towards you in a dark alley, wielding what seemed to be a weapon. You asked for a handwriting sample and determined that it was a likely assailant. This was Florida. I was standing my ground. So in an act of self-defense before anything happened that you had to defend yourself from. Right. Proactive defense. Proactive self-defense. Sure. Did you use your pen to stab your assailant? Luckily, I had it on me, and I like to use ink from the 1500s, which has got mercury in it.

Oh, oh. So you've got a sharp jabbing object and then poison to boot. Yeah. Very thorough. Yeah. I became a widow that day. Only to realize after you'd killed the person that it was your own husband. He was coming to pick me up after the conference, and I mean, granted, I was wound up after that MC had just been. It's insulting, Claire, when they come at you that way. Everything's a joke. Everything's a joke to them. Yeah. They're undermining something that's so important in your life. And so you were just out of your head. You're out of your mind. You're out of your gourd.

Why were you even walking down a dark alley in the first place? Well, I mean, that's a good point that luckily nobody in the court asked. So you killed your husband. I self-defensed my husband. So I feel like this is a dark backstory, but really completely off the subject of handwriting analysis. Did your husband leave any samples behind? By samples, I mean handwriting. I would like to say that although that incident was unfortunate. Yeah. Yeah. For some more than others. Yeah. I will continue to say to this day, as I said in the court, and showed it. In that back alley, he did pass me a note as I'd asked him to.

And when I showed people in the courtroom, the note upon which I based my decision to self-defense him, his handwriting clearly shows murderous tendencies. Nobody could deny. And you know, the great thing about Florida is they work so hard to make it a true jury of your peers. So these were all fellow handwriting analysists. Yeah. Yeah. Female. In the jury box. Yes. And also all married to your husband, it turned out. Yeah. We were all originally from Utah. I completely understood what you were suffering that night in that darkened alley. Thank God, because I am free to continue to practice my handwriting analysis out here in the world.

Let me ask you a few maybe random questions about handwriting and analysis. Sure. Sure. I'm going to hold up a birthday card that my grandmother sent. This was when I was four years old. Okay. And as you can see, it says to my loving boy, love your Grammy, $2 enclosed, right? Don't spend it all in one place. Hahaha. Stars. Stars. Star. Yeah. New England. Lesbian. Oh my God. That was uncanny. Yeah. All right. Next. Well, here's a card from my other grandmother that lived with the first grandmother in New England. Her card says, best wishes for a happy birthday. Love to you and the family.

Don't spend it all in one place. Fisherman. Nope. New England. Lesbian. Oh, darn it. Sometimes the U and the Fs get me a little mixed up. Yeah. That's what my grandmother used to say. You Fs mix me up. Well, what must have been quite a lively time of tradition day at your house. Well, you know, with all those $2s rolling in, you know, we were maybe not rich in dollars, but rich in happiness and same sex love. Thank you so much for having me on the show. If anybody wants to hire me as a professional handwriting analysis, they can check me out at right girl.org.

That's W R I T E G I R L.org. I've heard some very charitable things about them. Yes. My guest has been Claire Sarah, handwriting analysis and right reader to the stars. Claire, thanks for being on the program today. Thank you for having me. The expertise spelled wrong podcast is free and like the Amish, all are welcome. Be sure to sign up for our email announcements at funnypodcast.co and follow us in your favorite podcast app. Like the expert podcast listener we know you are. You do not simply walk into murder.