OT - Christmans Gift

[Harliduck]

This may be a bit pre-war'ish, but relevant to the folks here. My future son in law is a collegiate pitcher and is obsessed with gloves/mitts. My daughter is a collegiate softball player so the two of them crack me up when it comes to this...if I were to pick up one of their mitts (and yes, they have SEVERAL...my daughter is sponsored and has some pretty high end mitts) and set it down incorrectly they would have a heart attack. I love it, as I have had a baseball/softball in my daughters hands since before she could walk...

Anyway...my future son in law LOVES Rawlings. So for Christmas I have put together a "Bill Doak" gift package. As you know, Mr. Doak was responsible for designing the first mitt with a "pocket"...prior to his patented designs most mitts were just organized padding to protect the hand. This really revolutionized the game, there is a lot of debate out there when you read up on this matter that how many of those line drives when Cobb was hitting over .400 would have been caught with a modern glove.

First up in the package was of course a card of Doak...can't have a baseball gift from me without some cardboard -




Next up are a couple of pictures relevant to the situation. First is a period actual magazine advertisement for the Doak Rawlings glove, I think from the early 40's...



Next is a picture of Bill himself with some of his designs. These two items are being matted and framed together to hang on the wall...




Next are the really cool items. I got him a LEFT and a RIGHT handed Rawlings Bill Doak original mitts. Both in excellent shape with all the proper writings well visible...









Totally stoked to give him this gift. I have purchased mitt stands, as I know he will want to hold them, but I will offer to have them shadow boxed for the wall for a display if he chooses. Like I said earlier, he is obsessed with mitts, and how they are handled...so I will let him make all those calls! Cool bit of baseball history not many people know about. Mr. Doak was very important in the evolution of the sport...