Burke postcard invoice.....to Mickey Cochrane

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Posted By: leon

Picked this up recently....not sure exactly what to make of it other than the obvious....and cut and pasted from the auction description:

The invoice is official George Burke letterhead. It has been marked 'OK' (to be paid) in the Tigers front office on the authority of WALTER O. BRIGGS, JR. ('WOB JR' in pencil on the invoice) who was a Tigers executive and son of Walter Senior, owner of the club. Mr. Briggs was just about to change the name of Navin Field to BRIGGS STADIUM, so this invoice may very well be one of the last things addressed to the Tigers organization at NAVIN FIELD.

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Posted By: davidcycleback

Players used Burke photos for autograph requests, which is why you see a lot of Burke photos autographed.

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Posted By: leon

So chances are these were postcards of himself, so he could autograph and give them away? I guess his cost was 8 cents each....next I go to solving the square root of......never mind. For now I will stick with 4.00 / 50 = .8

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Posted By: davidcycleback

That's probably exactly the case. Mickey ordered real photo postcards of himself to fulfill autograph requests, many through the mail requests. The Tigers footed the bill. I do not recall seeing a bill/receipt like this before, but knew players, including Ruth and Foxx, ordered photos from Burke. Burke's address on the bill and receipt is the same one that appears on the back of the photos. As a sport and non-sport photo collector, I can tell you that bills or receipts for photos from famous photographers are rare. They are like historical documents in and of themselves.

To complete the display, you would want to pick up a Cochrane signed Burke postcard with that address on the back.