[bmarlowe1]

Dave -

Let's first start with ears as "fingerprints" absent severe injury - yes it is valid to use them as such. There is very little change in them until about age 70 - of course that is an average age. What is most noticeable is that for people with large lobes, they start to droop in old age. Even so, you can still compare old guy to young guy ears, but you have to keep the droop in mind.

Of course injury can change the appearance. Boxers are a perfect example. It has occurred to me a number of times that I am glad my interest is in early baseball images, not boxing images.

After looking closely at thousands of Deaball Era and 19thC baseball faces, I see little evidence of "cauliflower ear". Boxer's are repeatedly hit in the ear. A ballplayer may occasionally get a ball in the ear, or get into a fight and get hit in the ear, but I have not seen an example of this type of permanant gross deforming injury in early ballplayers. Of course, there may be some that I haven't come across yet.

I have seen what look more like smaller deformaties - like Tom Tido Daly's left earlobe (see Okkonen's Baseball Memories 1900-1909, p.97). I haven't seen an image of him where this is not present. (His right side looks normal). An injury? a birth defect? - I dunno.

Mark

edited to add: - I agree with Perezfan - our posts overlapped in time.