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Posted By: Hankron

Lastly, there are known baseball Daguerreotypes, including one pictured in Ken Burn's Baseball book. Most are not identified as baseball Dags not because of the equipment, but because the people in the images are known and known to be baseball players. When no one knows the identity/history of the person (as is usually the case with tintypes and such), you have to rely upon the uniform and equipment.

As Jimmy indicated, tintypes of gymnasts and firemen (early fireman and baseball uniforms were often almost identical) and childred peeling grapefruits are sometimes labelled as baseball tintypes. Even in England and in Germany it is well known to photography collectors/dealers how desirable and valuable are early American baseball photographs, so a lot of this labelling is wishful thinking.