Posted By:
Matthew S. MooreHello, folks. Thanks to Joe P. for providing the URL to the 'Dummy" Hoy Homeplate, the official Website of the Hoy Committee, a nonprofit grassroots group, and to Julie Vognar for sharing her info.
The Hoy Committee endeavors to educate the general public about the achievements of Hoy and other pioneering deaf athletes. One of our goals is getting Hoy into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Not BECAUSE he was deaf or disabled, but because he was a fine player who, we believe, was responsible for introducing sign language and fingerspelling into major-league baseball, and who has never been given proper official credit for it. We are still scouting for more hard contemporary evidence that he explicitly taught the umpires the now-familiar signals. But there is plenty of hard evidence that he taught his base coaches and teammates how to signal and fingerspell to him. We do NOT believe that Bill Klem invented the signals, as his HOF plaque claims.
I am now working thick and fast on the first full-scale biography of Hoy, and it's really a community effort. So many people have helped me--members of Hoy's family, librarians, archivists, SABRists, collectors, and fans. I am still scouting for more photos, high-quality images of cards, mementos, artifacts, holograph letters, etc. I don't yet own any cards, by the way. But I do want to reproduce the five Old Judge N172s that Hoy posed for. To the best of my knowledge, this would be the first time they've been reproduced togeher...outside of pricelists.
Hoy appeared in the Old Judge N172s during his rookie year with the Washington Senators (1888). He was included in the mysterious 1888 polychrome set of WG1 Baseball Playing Cards. Until a few days ago, I had no idea that he was also depicted on a Cameo Pepsin Gum pin! (Thanks, Julie...and please get in touch with me, Rhett!) According to Beckett, those were the only cards he appeared in. To devoted Hoy collectors, the five N172s are our T206 Wagners!
I don't have a complete set of photo-prints of Hoy's team shots, and there are some photos I have photocopies of, but need "real" prints...such as the 1927 Adult Deaf Welfare Society baseball-team shot (Cincinnati?) that includes Hoy as a coach. I've acquired some good images..but always want more.
Feel free to contact me if you have a lead, tip, suggestion, or question.
www.dummyhoy.com