Been having a great email convo with Kyle regarding the WGN series of pennants that we date to 1950-52. Thought I’d share an observation. I’m suspecting that the same company was the “major” producer all during the 1940s. Speaking specifically about the pennants with: wide spine, soft thin tassels not close to edge, single stitch. There exist pennants in the series we know that have this construction.. See NYG and Cubs pennants below. (Cubs has tassels tucked behind.)

Now observe the script of ‘Wrigley Field’. Looks exactly like that on my 1944 Browns pennant. So I’m thinking this is the company behind all of these - the pennant wheel pic I found online. ... Kyle noticed that the Yankees pennant matches letter font to the 1950, 1951 ASG pennants. Anyway, I found this to be interesting!

I look forward to Greg’s Google photo albums, grouped by series. ;)

Not all the Cub pennants from this series had tassels. Why would certain ones be made differently?

Because some worker at the factory (making 25 cents an hour) knew that 70 years later, in the year 2021, a few baseball nerds would be analyzing the crap out of these felt triangles... and he/she just want to f*ck with us.

Seriously I don't think there's much rhyme or reason to these anomalies. I can't imagine an executive at WGN barking out to his seamstress, "Sheila, put tassels on those green ones, but be sure the red ones remain tassel-free.

Perhaps it's something as simple as the seamstress was running late, and wanted to put dinner on the table that night. So she cut corners at work, and said to hell with the tassels. Or perhaps it was a temporary cost-cutting thing. Or maybe there was a lazy employee who had to be let go. Or maybe the company just ran out of stock on tassels for a period.

Maybe WW2 caused there to be a tassel shortage. Only one thing's for sure... we will never know why some had tassels and some don't.

I soooo want to believe that they did this just to f**k with us years later. Because it’s working. 😂

Most of them don't have tassels. But I think the few that do provide the link to others with same construction but different artwork.

Here's my album for this series, hopefully this works. Only team missing is the Cardinals, and if that recent crazy eBay auction for a dull Cards pennant is any indication, I’ll be going to my grave without a complete set :(

https://photos.app.goo.gl/znecMcWWbjS1uJpJ7

Here’s one with tassels but without Wrigley Field at the bottom.

Good stuff Mark! Lol

Keep it up, Greg. I’m a visual learner. :p

LOL! Probably right But on the other hand, at a time when you could only get at most 2 or 3 different flavors of ice cream at the corner market, you could venture down to Ebbets Field and get one of at least SIX different colors of Emmet Kelly. (I think there’s orange?) ...

These might have been a bigger deal than we think ... if only because the variety of souvenirs in general was limited to just a few items. And screen printing one color at a time is an ordeal. .... But yeah, I don’t think there were big board meetings to discuss “tassels or no tassels”.