Hi All:
I'm new here and I'm looking for any information/advise that anyone can provide. I hope it is alright to post this here. Anything would be helpful.....
I have, what looks to be, the last home run ball hit by Jackie Robinson and I'd like to know what more information there may be out there, or if it is worth anything. I'm sure there is no way that I could ever prove this, and I can't imagine that in 1956 anyone would even think there would be a need to. I have no interest in sports memorabilia at all and, other than it was my father's, this means nothing to me except it is now a curiosity. Any ideas on where else I could find additional information would be appreciated.
My father had this baseball in his sock drawer for as long as I can remember. He passed away four years ago and I brought it home with me and it has been sitting on my desk ever since (except on a few instances when I had to take it away from my dog). I remember when I was young I asked my father about it and he told me he caught it at a game when he was in the Army and was stationed in Japan. He said he went to the baseball game and he caught this home run ball by reaching over "a little Japanese man sitting in front of him that thought he was going to get it (my father was 6'-2"). He wrote on the ball, "Hit by Jackie Robinson in Tokyo, Japan, 12 Nov '56, Dodgers beat Japan All-Stars 10-2". Being that childhood memories can be foggy, I asked my mother (who is now 77) what she remembered about it and she recalled that "he caught it when he was in Japan and it was hit by some guy and I think it was the next to the last home run he hit, or something like that. Didn't he write what it was on the ball?".
Well, Sunday I was bored and sitting at my desk and wondered if I could find any information on the game. I just love the internet! I never imagined that I might actually find anything. I found this site that described the game:
http://www.walteromalley.com/hist_in...7.php?lang=eng
According to that same website, the next (and last) game they played, nobody hit a home run.
I then Googled Jackie Robinson and noticed on his Wiki page that it said that his last MLB appearance was in October, 1956. I also read that he announced his retirement from baseball via a magazine article that was published in either December, 1956 or January 1957, and I haven't found that he ever played another game after the end of the Japan Goodwill Tour.
My mother said, "I think your father said that whoever hit it came back to the states and hit one more home run". But she didn't even remember who hit it, and I can't find any information that he would have played any other games after this one. Clearly not any MLB games.
Attached are photos of the ball.
Any advise on where else to look, or what to do with it, would be appreciated.
Thanks.
Steve Miller
