circa 1870's mystery mounted baseball photo

[bbpostcards]

Here's a mystery that someone might help to solve. The caption written on the mount reads "Alaska BBC." The number "16" is at the bottom of the image. Written on the back is "pp. 1779" and a few stray notations. A New York team in that time period was called the Brooklyn Alaskas. As well, a Hawaii newspaper in 1880 refers to the Alaska BBC (probably the U.S.S. Alaska, which stopped there in 1880). An "A" is clearly visible on their uniforms. At the extreme left is what looks like a small flag on a pole. The image is quite brown in tone, so I've included a manipulated version of the picture to make it clearer. Any ideas?

[steve B]

The PP1779 looks like a page notation. I don't know of any books about oldbaseball that are that long, but many old magazines ran a consecutive page count from the beginning of the volume. It may be a long search, but once the source is found there should be some good info.

Steve B

[GaryPassamonte]

This image looks very familiar, but I can't place it. It's interesting that some players have long pants on and some have knickers. What appears to be a scorekeeper is a nice addition. I'll keep looking.

[aquarius31]

That's a very interesting image! I don't know if any of this helps but here's some information I found after a quick search.

1. SABR reference to an 1876 Alaska amateur baseball club of New York City (link)
2. Reference to an amateur "Alaska" club that played at the Union Grounds in the late 1870's (link)
3. An excerpt from a book titled Eye on the Sporting Scene with reference to an "Alaska Nine of New York" club that was expelled in 1876 from playing on the Union Grounds due to gambling (link)

I'm not sure if the above links all refer to the same team but imho I believe it is the same amateur baseball club that played in New York at that time.

Perhaps the page notation is tied to a book on the history of baseball in New York???

[Runscott]

I pick up any book I can find that has images of 19th century players. Fortunately I've got a good memory for faces and patterns (not so much for actual facts), so any time I see a 'familiar face' in an old image, I go back to my library and start digging.

None of these faces look familiar, but the technique does work. I once owned a tintype of a man who appeared to be a baseball player, but had no equipment. I sold it for $75. Later I located his uniform on a hall-of-famer. Although I was never able to i.d. the player, it was an 1860's tintype of a player who played professionally

I recommend locating the two SABR publications on 19th century stars.

[deebro041]

Is the man laying down in the front holding a catcher's mask?

[bbpostcards]

...it appears so.

[deebro041]

From research online, the catcher's mask was introduced in 1877 and first available from the Spalding catalog in 1878.

[steve B]

The Alaskas may not have stayed disbanded, or may have reformed. There are a lot of references in the referenced newspaper which is happily online and searchable for free

http://eagle.brooklynpubliclibrary.o...AppName=2&GZ=T

Lots of interesting stuff there.
steve B

[steve B]

The search I used was "base ball alaskas" Forgetting to make base ball two words only gives one result.

Steve B