Greg,
I didn’t have that version but did win it. I believe I am only missing one other version now.

Very impressive Mike! Love all the variations. Which one are you missing?

I think I've seen an orange felt version with black graphics? :confused:

A pennant I’m waiting for (nothing thrilling) got within a couple of miles and was U-turned to Florida. Looks like it made it back…for now.

Tigers
 

Noticed this one from a seller on line. Not sure that I’ve seen this Tigers version before?

I’m not talking about different colors when I say different versions. Each of these five have differences in design. Most are obvious, but if you notice the black and orange does not say “Wrigley Field” but the red one does. Here is the one different version I have seen but don’t own. There could be more as WGN seemed to go crazy with this particular design.

Great group of pennants, Mike!

Chris, it’s a fairly tough one, and also very cool, the tiger has a pastel look to it. The Tigers have the best pennants by far and certain the most variability as far as Briggs/Tiger Stadium versions. Here is a pic of 10 different Trench and the two dates ones I believe are WGN. … There’s another Trench I don’t have, with a Tiger that looks like Tony from the Frosted Flakes box …

Agreed Great Group of pennants Mike

And this thread is a Forever Thread of amazing pennants and amazing displays

Getting me tempted to take the Pennant Plunge

You sure you didn't order a Yo Yo? Boomerang maybe? :)

Cool Pennant. I think it dates to the 1950s. There's also a red variation.

Thanks Jeffrey. Come on in, the water great! Just make sure you have lots of wall space. 😂

It is, but things seem to be slowing down. :(

I think I will.

But for now keeping within my collections
So I will focus on pre 1930 to start

Probably with the 1916 pennants that includes Joe jackson

I recently picked up a purple one of these (which I believe to be the rarest color). It's a super cool pennant in-person, and one of the tougher of their many Briggs Stadium variations.

Greg:
Do you happen to have an image of the "Tony the Tiger" version?

Great stuff, everyone!

Post #69 within this thread contains what I believe to be the rarest of all Tiger "Stadium" Pennants. The image was posted by the great pennant collector Mike Hoevet prior to his passing away. Mike beat me to it at The National about 9-10 years ago.

RIP Mike.

Mark, yes, here it is. There are white stadium pennants, too, which seem to have been made from mid 60s into the 70s. And a bunch of 40s from what seems like WGN, as is (I think) the one from post #69.

That's GRRRRRREAT!

It does look like Tony. Since it's not really a "toughie", I am guessing you either can't make room for it or just don't want it?

I’d like to get it if it comes along, but yeah I’m really running out of room. Nine tubs filled now. I’m thinking of limiting myself to just those that would be wall worthy.

My favorite is the big tiger with his arm around Briggs. A real beauty.

What became of Mike’s pennants?

So I still have this unhealthy obsession with the 1969 stamped cloth ASCO pennants. Finally got this Cubs version, in general not too hard to find in felt and undated but this is the first white one on cloth that I have seen with the date. Also have the red version.

The Cubs and Twins are the only teams I know with multiple colors. The Cubs also have those cool “Cub Power” picture pennants in both white and red, also by ASCO.

I have the Dodgers and Expos but in poor condition. Still need the super-rare Giants and have never seen the A’s in cloth.

In my opinion, this series was the swan song for pennants.

That being said, my next project is to complete a set of 1960 and 1961 team picture pennants. Many of the 1960s have felt graphics which is cool. Of course not every team has such pennants (no Cubs, Red Sox, Giants, Senators).

I love the team and photo pennants too. I'm not targeting a specific run but I'm getting them when I can. I guess I can look forward to being the underbidder to you Greg. :o I'm waiting for these two to arrive soon. Not the rarest items but I love the graphics.

Gary, those are great, the white Red Sox is especially rare. Both of them are ASCO/Button House.

Thanks Greg. I just read the history of ASCO (and Button House) at Pennant Fever - Great read! (https://pennantfever.weebly.com/blog/asco-inc-winona-mn)

It shows the Banks Cub Power (#1 in the attached photo) is made by Button House/ASCO. Are all the rest of the pennants in the photo also made by ASCO/Button House? The one I'm least certain about it #6.

Agree that those are great. The Conigliaro is less than full size, is it not? I noticed the team pennant has the same "M" we've seen before. I'm not sure if Kyle or anyone else ever nailed that down...

I'm wondering Gary if, being based in London, you are using the same avenues as your stateside brethren for finding and buying pennants...i.e. primarily eBay? Since I only search for Giants, I never see these other beauties!

Wow!!! Really love #3. Yes I think all of them are ASCO/BH including #6. Gifts love those Cubs floating head team pictures …

Actually, i dont think ive bought a single pennant on eBay. Ebay prices seem too high for my liking. I tend to look for the less well travelled parts of the internet for small auction houses and estate clearances, etc. I also frequent the more established auction houses that we all know well. 8 bought my first few pennants were from Fballguy.... That got me hooked. (Rob, I'm not sure if my wife would thank you though:D)

I takes me a while to get my deliveries. I use a stateside mailing service to consolidate my items so that i can get a number of purchases sent at a time for one price. That really reduces my cost of shipping to the UK. But the cost of shipping to the UK and import duties sucks. It's another reason why I'm after bargains.

I need to find those “less well travelled parts of the internet”! Let me know if you see any Giants you don’t want!

Madaras, Inc.
 

Glad you mention it ... the mysterious "M" mark. Well, mystery solved.

"M" stands for Madaras, Inc. Guess where they were based? Minnesota. St. Paul, to be more precise.

Like ASCO, Madaras was an acronym; although I don't believe they ever marketed themselves as anything but "Madaras," it technically stood for "Marketing and Design and Research and Sales." That's a lot of ands, isn't it? You see why they just went with "Madaras" now, right?

(ASCO technically stood for "All Sports Company"; however, they too never identified themselves externally by their full name. They used "ASCO" because it put them near the top of the telephone directory.)

As I mentioned in Pennant Fever, ASCO was founded by Lars Granberg. (By the way, thanks for the plug, Gary!) I learned recently that he had a co-founder: Lou Hough. Together, they ran ASCO through the late 1960s. Eventually they split up. Granberg took ASCO; and eventually sold it to Campbell-Mithune, a large advertising firm based in Minneapolis. Hough, on the other hand, maintained his grasp on a lucrative artificial snow making business they had built together as a side-business. (Me: why do you need to make artificial snow when you live in f---ing Minnesota!? I don't know ... but that's what happened.)

By 1973 ASCO was in the hands of Campbell-Mithune, who had by then fired Granberg and most of his cronies from the company's leadership. So, Hough started his own pennant making venture! And thus, Madaras, Inc. was formed. What's more, for 18 months, Madaras had a license to manufacture MLB pennants. The "M"-marked pennants we've been discussing were made by them.

But wait! Don't these Madaras pennants look a lot like ASCO's work?? Turns out Granberg and Hough remained the best of friends well after their business split. Moreover, Madaras' pennant making factory was located at--wait for it--Second and Chestnut streets ... in Winona. Yup. So, nobody should be too surprised that these 1973-74 Madaras pennants resemble those from the previous decade by ASCO/Button House/Idea Promotions. They were likely made by the same Winonans; using ASCO's old artwork.

Think of Madaras as, like, a short-lived re-incarnation of ASCO.

So, in 1973, there were in fact three pennant makers making pennants in Winona: (1) ASCO/BH/IP; (2) WinCraft; and (3) Madaras. I'm beginning to think Winona was the pennant capital of the world! :eek:

Great information, Kyle…..as always!

Agreed. Great stuff Kyle.

Here is an Astros with the M.

Kyle you are the Sherlock Holmes of pennants! Great job!

Thanks Kyle. You're the pennant savant.

I'm just glad someone appreciates this obscure side of the hobby! :rolleyes:

My source on all this was a former ASCO employee that went on to help run Madaras in 1973. I showed him the "M" mark and he confirmed everything. I also asked about the equally mysterious "VET" mark we've discussed. Up to now, I was quite certain this was a concessionaire's mark used by ASCO during the early 1970s. So I inquired.... Unfortunately, he could not recall ever seeing it and could not identify its significance.

So there's still some mysteries left for us to solve.

I’m thinking more like Columbo.

In my opinion, the VET pennants are relatively rare and unusual given how easy it is to find ASCO pennants of the same age. The version of Giants and Astros pennants marked with VET is rare when actually marked with "VET", but maybe even more rare when not (i.e., same pennant, not mark). I've seen some, but don't have any (vet colors/design, no vet mark). The vet versions also have a bit more color/design than the typical Giants/Astros ASCO pennant.

I can tell you, the first pennants I ever got were VET pennants as a six or seven year old … mid to late 70s .. at Veterans Stadium. The VET pennants are all stiff and are often cut crooked.

Note that, of these two Giants pennants, one is marked "VET"; and the other bears ASCO's mark.

Here's four Dodger pennants from that same series/era. One bears ASCO's mark; the other Madaras' mark; next one shows "VET / MADE IN USA"; and the last simply reads "MADE IN USA" (No mention of VET). I've also seen a fifth variant bearing no mark at all--just an MLB logo and the year "1969"; and sixth variant with no MLB logo or date or maker's mark--absolutely nothing (probably from 1968, before the league cracked down on licensing).

Regardless, I think all six were made by either ASCO or Madaras; including the "VET" ones, which I suspect was simply a concessionaire's mark used by one of these companies.

Wow

Those Astros Pennants really pop.

The orange and the graphics works well

Another dye job on some not too valuable pennants. In fact, I just picked up the "crossed bats" for $23. Speaking of that pennant, did other teams use this design? It would seem they would have.

I used almost a gallon of dye solution on these two pennants :eek: . I'll bet I sprayed them (from the back) over 20 times. Note: the spines haven't been re-sewn, yet.

Incredible improvement. Really nice job Rob.

How long did the entire process take from start to finish?

Great job Rob.

With regards to the Cross Bat design....I've catalogued 1,360 pennants in the latest version of the Pennant Catalog here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1poP...ew?usp=sharing

The crossed bat theme is used in a number of pennants, but the giants are the only one that I've seen that use that specific layout. The closest that I've seen is a Hall of Fame pennant (HOF008-TBC) that uses crossed bats with glove and ball.

I started after I came home from the bar :p , 9 hours of sleep, finished up by 5:00 the next afternoon.

I remember being disappointed in the Polo Grounds pennant when I got it 25 years ago. This was pre-ebay and I would buy pennants, sight unseen, from Bob Rothschild’s SCD ads.

Some more pics. The spines were nasty, too. I also guess I never realized that tassels are one piece of felt, folded over. Neither of these are "display pennants," so I just spray glued the spines back on and called it good. I gotta go through my SFG pennants...I may have a green, "Giant on the bridge" pennant that needs freshening up. I think green was as bad as blue, when it comes to fading.

That's surprising. Aside from the baseball incorporated into the "G", the bats, glove and mask is a very simple design I would have thought to be used by other teams.

Rob’s national league champs pennant seems to be of that mystery maker that we have discussed recently. I do believe Kyle when he says the Trench used that design, but it’s the construction is very unique and unlike Trench. You can see that the spine has sort of a “two ply“ material, not quite felt and not cloth. And this is similar to the World Series Pennants from 1954 through 57 that list both teams, all cloth and all are hard to find unfaded. I believe it is also the same maker as that 1956 NFL championship Pennant that just sold.

The spine is strange. I put it in a weak bleach solution and it damn near fell apart. It also “grew” about an inch in length.

As a collector of all teams I typically don’t emphasize color variations, if I already have the same design. Exceptions are Dodgers Emmet Kelly pennants and STL Browns pennants with the Apotheosis “shield” logo. I’m always looking for different colors of those. Also Phillies blue jay pennants. So I was psyched to get this incredibly bright and clean blue Jay pennant. It appeared to be a fourth color of the late 40s version: I had gold, powder blue, and what appears to be turquoise. This one is baby blue. Not sure if the turquoise was the same color originally and it “aged” uniformity.

This pennant maker is that other “mystery” we still haven’t figured out … same one that does all the sliding runner pennants.

Two beauties! Usually these have faded to a light baby blue or even a sandy grey.

And definitely the same maker as the sliding scene Pennants.

Mark, the baby blue really is a distinct color from the darker blues above. Can tell from the back and peeking under the spine. The two on opposite ends of the bottom row are distinct.

agreed the blues do pop but that Black really is sharp and stands out

Nice overall Display

I wonder if that "weak bleach solution" works on anything else? You could be sitting on a gold mine Rob. What's the formula?:D

Haha!

Did anyone here happen to snag this one?

https://www.ebay.com/itm/28445064750...p2047675.l2557

Very nice! Obviously, not I. :cool:

Not me but I grabbed his two Emmet Kelly Dodgers. Both were cloth and looked like they never saw light.

That Jackie Robinson pennant is really nice. I can't compete with that, but I did pick up a monochrome version of this WGN Giants pennant. The WGN pennants from this era are usually so colorful. Hard to find one this colorless.

Damn, you!! :p

That's nice. I have a blue one with no color but it's the one with the 1958 date. Where'd you find your latest?

It was an ebay. My favorite part about it is the groovy spine.

That’s a nice pennant Marc. Probably the rarest of all those styles in blue and black.

I think that's an "end of the roll" spine. Great looking pennant though. He had a nice black and white Dodgers too.

That spine is far out! Have you checked to see if it glows in the dark?

You must have far greater patience than I do. The act of weeding through thousands of modern, common, beaten-up, and overpriced vintage pennants just to find a good one like that seems more overwhelming every day. It's become a "needle in a haystack" exercise in futility.

In retrospect, I was fortunate to corral some good ones back in the earliest days of eBay (when the searches were a lot less exhausting).

Mail day today! 2 months of hunting and bidding...

I'll spend the weekend sorting them out. I've put in an acrylic shelf like others have done. I'll add these to the rotation. :)

The tassels on the Fenway Park Scroll are in an interesting location. The spine looks good. I'd be interested in thoughts/feedback on it.

Nice, Gary, especially the All Stars.

About ebay etc.... it is really hard to find stuff these days. Most good things sell right away. Within minutes. There were some really rare Raiders pennants a few weeks ago. The seller had them as an auction, closed, and then listed as BIN. I think they sold in about 2 seconds once listed as BIN. It was crazy.

This Giants pennant was a BIN, and I probably bought it within an hour of it being listed. Most good things with BIN don't last even that long.

Somehow, Jonsstats always seems to come up with rare and interesting stuff. Usually not for teams that I buy, but interesting to watch.

Someone....I think....is on ebay more than they admit. :p

Another lucky pennant (three bottom tassels). And an undated ‘54. Trench must have at least half a dozen different ‘54 versions.

I’ve noticed that the scroll font is usually one of two types. Before 1950 the names look neatly handwritten. From 1950- they look stenciled. This pennant has a mix of the two, mostly stenciled but some handwritten (Avila, Rosen, Doby, Mitchell).

Nice haul, Gary...

Those are 3 terrific All Star Game Pennants. With regard to the Fenway Pennant, that may be the closest-together set of tassels I've ever seen on a vintage pennant. The Mitchell & Ness reproductions very often have sets of tassels that are closer together than normall. But nothing close to the Fenway pennant you posted.

I'm guessing the laborer was either intoxicated, very tired, or perhaps just messing around to construct it that way. Very bizarre, but a cool find none-the-less!

I’m not seeing it (stencil vs. handwritten). :confused:

Thanks Mark. I'm thinking quality control wasn't the main aim for pennant manufacturers back in the day.

Erik, I love that Indians pennant. I like pennants that I can date. There's another similar Indians scroll pennant that I was confusing with yours. This one is from 1950. I don't own this one - but I'd love to. I can date it by the last player on the scroll - Hal Saltzman. He played in the minors from 1947-49 and then picked up by the Indians for the 1950 season but never made it into a game. https://www.baseball-reference.com/bullpen/Hal_Saltzman

Now that’s good stuff, and it complicates my “theory”. These are mine, I actually thought both were 1949 because of Ken Keltner being on the red, he never appeared in 1950 but I see that he was released in mid-April. So thank you for that info.

Here’s a 1950 Red Sox with a mix of two different fonts, more obvious when comparing the 1949 and 1950 Braves.

Gary: those All star pennants are fantastic!

As I have the Tony and Billy Conigliaro pennant in hand...I can confirm it's 19.5" long.

Also following up the thread about ASCO/Madaras/Button House, Here's a photo of the rear of my Conigliaro pennant.

Does anyone have any period pennants which show Ty Cobb on it? I haven’t searched this long thread and sorry if one was showed earlier.

The only one that comes to mind are the 1916 Ferguson Bakery Ty Cobb Pennants

https://i.pinimg.com/564x/90/b5/01/9...ee2de6109a.jpg
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/i...gfonA&usqp=CAU

There is also a BF2 premium of Cobb

This one appears to have been removed from some kind of display. There was also a McGraw that had the same trimming and stitch holes.

Thanks for posting. I’ve never owned a Ty Cobb pennant before and I want to add one for the collection. I didn’t realize there were a couple options.

Mark, I was the winning bidder on this one. I didn’t want to say anything until I had it in hand. This Jackie Robinson barnstorming pennant was on my “top 3 pennants wanted” list, and I was surprised to see it turn up in a 24 hour eBay auction. There must be more of them out there, but I haven’t seen one for sale before. The barnstorming tours are a fascinating story and important part of baseball and American history, dating back to Ruth and Gehrig and continuing up through the date of this pennant. Jackie headed up 3 tours, one in 1948, one in 1950, and the one this pennant was made for, 1953. Interestingly, the last one was the only one that also featured some white players on his team, including Branca and Hodges, however there was at least one game when the white players had to sit on the bench when local laws segregation laws prevented blacks and white from playing together. This is only my fourth Jackie pennant, and by my count I still have 5 to go.

Attachment 479625

I can see font differences from pennant to pennant but not within the same scroll…. :confused: