Great new baseball memorabilia book...

[base_ball]

No vested interest here, but I happened upon a new book last night--Baseball Americana: Treasures from the Library of Congress—which I heartily recommend. It’s a coffee-table volume filled with fabulous, luscious depictions of baseball memorabilia: baseball cards, cabinet cards, documents, woodcuts, photos, programs, advertisements, and more. While the game is covered up until modern times, readers of these pages will be pleased to know that the book’s strongest suit is 19th and early-20th Century pieces, many of which I have never seen before. On initial perusal, I had some reservations about the design and organization, but I only spent about 20 minutes with the book and my mouth was watering, so that may change. I will say that Baseball Americana immediately enters the pantheon of great baseball “stuff” books, along with Smithsonian Baseball and the Barry Halper auction catalogs.