Breaking Into the Big League, 1913 silent film NYG photos

[TCMA]

Pulled the below photos from our archive, which has a large concentration of images from 1910 - 1913. Each photo has "Breaking Into the Big League" added at the bottom. After a quick google search I learned that BITBL happens to be a "lost" silent film (see poster artwork from wikipedia below) released in 1913.

All of the photos here are on thick, card-like stock but appear to be photo prints. All of the backs are blank. Promotional material for the movie, perhaps? Not sure what to make of them and have never seen these images before. Any ideas out there?

From John Thorn's "Our Game:"

One early film that garnered a fair amount of press coverage was Breaking Into the Big League (1913, Kalem), partially shot at the New York Giants’ Marlin, Texas, spring-training camp, with the articles centering on the presence of John McGraw, Christy Mathewson, and other Giants. The Los Angeles Times described the film as “a drama with an intense appeal to lovers of baseball. Big-league players are shown in games and practice. The story concerns a young ballplayer, who makes a costly error that loses the pennant for his team. It also loses him his sweetheart. He goes into a troubled sleep and dreams of breaking into the big league….”

[btcarfagno]

These may be the early version of lobby cards. Before the 1920's, lobby cards were often no more than 8x10 still photos of scenes from the film, often on the heavier stock that you mention. That would be my guess anyway.

[TCMA]

[TCMA]

Originally Posted by btcarfagno

These may be the early version of lobby cards. Before the 1920's, lobby cards were often no more than 8x10 still photos of scenes from the film, often on the heavier stock that you mention. That would be my guess anyway.

Thanks for the info, that would definitely make sense. I know there's at least one more of these out there, a Mathewson that was loaned out years ago for use in a publication but it never made it's way back to us.

[btcarfagno]

Lobby cards tend to be in groups of eight, although from the early to mid teens that would vary.