Posted By:
Brock G.I agree wholeheartedly with the last posts of Dan, Greg, and Mike. The great focus of the book should of, in my opinion, been on the featured collectors and have a more personal feel. Like Mike said, it dealt too much with the history of baseball and was a little on the wordy side. And with all the individual photos of the memorabilia it did have an auction catalogue feel. I mean anyone who has the Halper catalogue had seen just about everything in the Penny Marshall collection before this book.
I did enjoy the book and thought for the most part that it was well researched, educational, and eclectic in the memorabilia it covered but now with all the great points you guys are making I realize it could of been much better.
The Smithsonian Magazine from 1987 which featured the Halper collection would be a great model if one were hoping to assemble a book like mentioned in the original post. A little back story on how Barry got into collecting, stories on his favorite pieces and how he obtained them, and great shots of his collection displayed in his house.