re: the Expos pennant...

I've seen that batter on hundreds of pennants but don't think I've EVER seen the large ball with "movement marks" around it.

"One of baseball's least interesting teams"??

Ever heard of the Tampa Bay Rays? :D

There’s a Milwaukee Braves Pennant with the same Batter and “pulsating” Ball, but it’s full-sized.

I don't even acknowledge the existence of any team that came into being post 1980. ;)

Penguins Pennant
 

Picked up an insanely rare 1969-70 season Pittsburgh Penguins pennant.

I've never seen another one for sale in my almost 9 years of collecting hockey pennants.

The second photo is an image from the Penguins first-ever Stanley Cup Playoff game in April of 1970 against the Oakland Seals. You'll see on the novelty items for sale page that this is the exact Penguins pennant they sold at the game during the 69-70 season for $1. This is how I was able to determine when this was sold.

It's actually quite odd that this pennant is so hard to find. Maybe they just never made many of them for sale, or people just didn't buy them.

Great Penguins pennant and your post is very timely. I was just about to pose the question: Does anyone have photos or other provenance of any of their pennants that helps pinpoint their origins? Very cool that you're able to connect the dots on this one.

I'd love to see what others have been able to find.

Thanks. Great question actually. Outside of the common hockey pennants - NHL services dated ones and 1980s and prior, finding images of vintage hockey pennants are near impossible. Most team programs from the 70s and prior didn't have images- and if they did, they didn't show pennants- mostly t shirts and pucks. To be honest, I didn't even know this Penguins pennant existed until I flipped through this game program and saw it. I like to collect first year/first game hockey items.

That's a great Penguins Pennant. Do you know for sure that it was sold at the stadium? Perhaps it was sold only via the Catalog, and that explains the rarity.

I'm guessing 98% of all pennants were to sold to fans in person/at the stadium, as opposed to them mailing in. I worked for a major (top 10) Food Company, who did Mail-in discount coupons as well as IRCs (instantly redeemable in-store coupons). Redemption rates on the IRCs were in the 90% range, as opposed to roughly 2-3% redemption for the mail-in type.

Most people just don't make the effort to complete paperwork and mail-in, and seem to prefer the ease of an impulse-driven purchase.

Just a theory... However, if you know for a fact that this pennant was sold at souvenir stands within the stadium, then nevermind :o

Great point. I actually have no idea, but you very well may be correct that it was only available via mail order since it's doesn't denote availability at souvenir stands and says you have to mail in to get those items. I bet you're correct that this was specifically done up by the Penguins for mail order because NHL Services licensed pennants throughout the league from 1968-1970. I'm sure you've seen the common dated ones that are all over eBay. A few from 68 and 69 are tough to find like the Penguins and Seals.There are also glitter varitions of those same NHL Services pennants, which are very tough to find. I actually have almost the entire glitter set- missing Atlanta Flames, Red Wings, Canadiens, Rangers, Penguins, Bruins and Leafs.

Here's few example of "provenance":

I don't know the year of the ice cream bar wrapper but I know the Giants pennant pictured ("crowd at feet").

The 1964 Giants merchandise mailer shows some pennants (the Giants one is somewhat rare).

The picture of the vendor is from the 1961 All Star Game.