1940 Oversized Mystery Set!!!
 

Good evening! I'm hoping to get help with identifying the origin of some examples from a set I purchased about 15 years ago on eBay and just found again recently in my collection. At the time of purchase, the seller did not know the origin. I have a total of 7 examples that appear to come from the same set, although there are 2 different sizes. I have 3 that are roughly 8 3/4 inches by 5 3/8 inches: Dizzy Dean, Jimmie Foxx and Johnny Mize. The other 4 are roughly 9 1/8 inches by 5 3/8 inches: Joe DiMaggio, Hank Greenberg, Joe Medwick and Ted Williams. I say "roughly" in each case because there is some variation in size. All are printed on fairly heavy white stock in B&W with 2 photos of the player on the front along with his name, nickname in some cases and facsimile signature. On the back, all have biographical information plus statistics through the 1940 season along with other statistics from World Series and/or All-Star game appearances. With the exception of the Foxx card, all are stamped in black with "Printed 1940" on the back. Attached are front and back photos for the Dean and Williams cards. I appreciate any assistance you can provide with identifying this set.

I sure wish I could help. I can't, but assuming those are a real and clearly unique issue from 1940, I'm very jealous!

Brad

I'd really want to see them in hand, but....
 

at first glance they appear to be homemade fantasy cards.

I came across some examples and my opinion was they were as someone so nicely put " Fantasy cards" the Printed in 1940 was kind of a giveaway.

opinion
 

I would have to agree with Howard..... real doubts as to that "1940" stamp making those of that vintage.... could be wrong but thats my gut on these

These were shown before, with no definite answer
https://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=334074

Type 1 photo from Spring training 1941 on left and looks like same at bat picture on right.. I’d lean fantasy.

What I noticed is that the font used for the "Printed 1940" stamp doesn't look period. The stats & biographical information look like they were just taken from The Sporting News, but they don't seem like they were made by The Sporting News.

The "PRINTED 1940" looks like the work of a cheap rubber stamp. The facsimile autographs and stats borrowed from period Who's Who books or what have you. The crispness of these also makes me dubious. They appear like they were manufactured yesterday.

And on a more positive note… welcome to the board as I see it was your first post.

Thank you all for sharing your perspectives. It's very much appreciated!

While the date, origin and intent of this issue remain unknown, one thing is clear: someone put significant effort at some point into producing these interesting pieces. Also, based on the fact only one DiMaggio example has surfaced on this forum in the past, and that was 15 years ago, there does not appear to be a lot of others in circulation. Front and back photos of the DiMaggio, Foxx, Greenberg, Medwick and Mize examples from my collection are attached for future reference.

Part of the Hank Greenberg writeup is lifted directly from the 1989 book "The Story of My Life - Hank Greenberg"

The writeups/stats/signatures on the back of these are all (?) verbatim copies from the 1941 Sporting News Baseball Register. Even the line breaks in the text are the same. (The collaged images are also identical to that pub.)

See Dizzy Dean's baseball register entry, for example (ebay photo):
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/IYMAA...-K/s-l1600.jpg

My two cents is that I think they are from the period, made at the same time as the Baseball Register.

What size are those 1940s Baseball Registers, same as these prints? (6x9)

The DiMaggio image was used the the 1941 Sporting News BB Register and the backs are exact copies from the Register.

As stated by BillyCoxDodgers3B, that "Printed 1940" looks fishy...like a rubber stamp applied with different pressures on each one.

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...f298b174_c.jpg

Unless somebody finds an ad for these in an actual copy of "The Baseball Register", I'd have to say these were created by some enterprising modern day graphic designer with access to a 1941 copy of The Register, a scanner and a printer.

Possibly a professional print shop job like a lot of the fantasy pieces on Ebay, depending on when they were actually made, but certainly not 1940-41.

I like the look of them. They are kind of neat...but I doubt period to the time.

Blacklight?

...........
 

Fantasy Island sorry.

not even close to the same picture unless you're arguing they cropped and put Joe on different backgrounds.

I think he said "same at bat", but not the same picture. Only correcting because I thought the same also until I re-read again.

He might be right. Slightly different angle and a lot of the background does look very similar. Or same day at least.

+1 They don't
have the period look from my first glance.

Not to mention, I don't see any period manucaturer using a photo of Joe Medwick smoking a pipe in his bathrobe. Safe bet it was taken from a scan of a wire photo being offered for sale online?

Different pictures yes. They look like same at bat or maybe I should have said same game. I couldn’t fit the larger photos in the collage I made to show. None the less they look interesting and I wouldn’t mind owning one. I would put them next to my Helmer cards

They can go with my Joe Hackson [sic]:

https://photos.imageevent.com/exhibi...%20Jackson.jpg

I hope nobody minds that I saved off these images, Photoshopped them into decent resolution, and printed myself out a set. I think they look pretty cool, no matter who made them.

That's one way to set build!

Uhhh....9" x 5.3" at 300 dpi, and some contrast adjustment, minor rotation adjustments, and they print nicely front and back and then trimmed. Of course, they'll flop with black light and loupe, but we all agree these are some some sort of modern day fantasy creations, yes? Lifted from 1941 Baseball Register? They do look good displayed with a pre-war collection.