Tin Litho Baseball Player
 

Can anyone tell me anything about this fella? He stands about 4-3/8" tall to the tip of his bat, and is a single thickness of tin litho (printed both sides). Is it a piece of something larger, a simple hanging decoration, or something else? Is he meant to represent a particular player? (The lack of visible logos makes me think no). Any idea of when he was produced would be helpful too. I see one other seller on eBay who has one listed right now, but he doesn't appear to know any more about it than I do. Thanks in advance for any hints as to this guy's origins!

It is the batting figure from the vibrating baseball games

Thanks for the heads-up, Jim. Do you happen to know what the specific name of the game is? I can't seem to find a match, even with the point in the right direction. Sorry if it seems like a trivial thing, but these are the kinds of details that bug me :p

Tudor Electronic Baseball Game

Just a bit more precisely, Tru-Action Electric Baseball by Tudor Metal Products, 1950-early 1990s.
The tin litho batter shown is in only some 1950s-1960s editions, as the game was redesigned and subtly retitled many times over the years.

I finally figured that to be the case, after seeing many many of the later versions with the plastic figures. I still haven't found a photo of the early version showing the tin litho players, but did find mention of Tudor and their long-running often-tweaked game in the baseballgames Yahoo group along with some pictures (just not the particular shot of the early year game I was looking for :p)

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/baseba...66520/pic/list

I'd still like to see a photo of this guy in action, but otherwise, I think this is enough to satisfy my curiosity. Thanks for the help guys!

Hi again, Lance -- sorry, s'funny, but we don't have a real good shot of the tin batter properly placed for game play.
Until we have a few minutes to get our game out of the vault and set up, this is the best we can do --
you can see the batter suspended on the front of the backstop at the extreme left of the pic, as well as illustrated on the box lid:
http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e2...eTudor50sb.jpg
That's a 1950s version titled Tru-Action Junior Baseball Game.

Back at our Forum (thanks for visiting!), you can have a better view of the tin batter (in different uniform)
similarly placed on another version of the game (the photo next to the one you linked):
http://tinyurl.com/b9jjnyp
That's from a circa 1958 Tru-Action Electric Baseball Game.

Over its forty-plus years on the market, Tudor also produced the game as Tru-Action Baseball Game (the original early-1950s versions),
Electric Baseball (several different versions from around 1960 into the 1990s), Jr. League Magnetic Baseball, Magnetic Baseball,
Major League Electric Baseball, and Action Baseball.

Ah, okay, that makes much more sense now. I didn't realize that the batter shown on the backstop was a separate piece from the backstop itself, and kept looking for something standing on its own (fitted into a slot or somesuch). Thanks for clearing that up!