Currier and Ives issued a number of baseball lithographs that depicted African-Americans using less than flattering stereotypes. Among them were umpires wearing birdcages over their heads for protection. The notion that umpiring was a dangerous avocation goes back to baseball's earliest days.
That is a nice trade card and from the scan looks real to me. But you have to examine the paper in hand to be sure.
Last edited by barrysloate; 07-15-2012 at 05:00 AM.
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