[thetahat]

Originally Posted by Domer05

Well Greg, that is a fine observation; and I had wondered about that as well....

I think it's a combination of several factors. First, the Great Depression probably didn't help any. Not only were less people attending ballgames in the 1930s, they were buying less consumer goods in general. Money was tight. Advertisers used pennants to help sell all kinds of products. It's no surprise then that the single most common pennant of the late 1930s was the BF3 mini pennant. It could be made so cheaply, advertisers gave them away as promotional items. They were so collectible, apparently everyone forgot about the full size and oversize pennants that had dominated the first two decades of the 20th century.

Second, and this was likely the biggest reason, is the absence of children from ballparks until the 1940s, and onward. In the 1910s and 20s, no respectable family would take their kid to a ballpark. It just wasn't done. Kids had to sneak in or watch the action through a knot hole in the fence. So concessionaires, like Charles Shear and Harry M. Stevens, focused more on hot dogs and beer for the men in attendance.

This slowly began to change in the late 1930s and 40s, when ballparks began making a concerted effort to draw ladies and children inside. Not surprisingly, this is about when we see a huge influx in screen printed, 3/4 size pennants, right? It was the ideal souvenir to sell to a kid: it was cheap and its size was suitable to be waved from a dowel without really blocking anyone's view.

The MLB pennants we know surviving from the 1910s were probably made in really small batches. Nothing like the output of Trench, ADFLAG, WGN, etc. by the 1950s. In those days, pennants were more common on collegiate landscapes--not ballparks.

Great stuff Kyle! And yes it makes sense.