why did this program sell for so much?

[RedsFan1941]

i am more of a reds collector than indians but living near cleveland i see a lot of indians stuff. so even though i am not a cleveland expert i still think the price of this program is crazy. can any program collectors educate me? i would have guessed this would sell for around 1000-1500?

https://auction.lelands.com/bids/bidplace?itemid=91274

[Jim65]

I wonder if the Coca-Cola ad had something to do with it?

[slidekellyslide]

Wow, that seems crazy. Is there something special that happened in the game?

[RedsFan1941]

going by the 8-7 score of the game in the program it was the first game of a doubleheader on august 16.

[1880nonsports]

was it an exchange ticket/coupon?

[benjulmag]

That is one nice program! Condition looks really good, height of the dead ball era, two important teams with many HOFers, and an aesthetically pleasing Coke ad. Plus the program is scored which to me makes it more valuable. So if I were to start collecting programs, this one would be a great place to start.

It can be tricky to try to draw conclusions from one transaction as there could be special factors at play (e.g., two well-heeled collectors who each for reasons unique to him/her had to have this particular program), but based on what other memorabilia sells for, the price doesn't strike me as that crazy. For those familiar with the program market from this period, are you saying that the programs that sell for $1,000 - $1,500 have all these attributes? I'm not suggesting they don't, but if they do, they seem to me to be undervalued.

My experience with the memorabilia I do collect is that, as with baseball cards, slight differences in attributes (e.g., condition, teams, players, year, etc.) can make a big difference in price.

[MCyganik]

It’s visually striking, seems to be in good condition, a great image of Lajoie, and while programs from that era are in general hard to come by, Cleveland ones seem to show up less than say, Boston, New York or Pittsburgh. As said before it was probably just a handful of rich bidders who got carried away but for advanced Lajoie collectors it’s a pretty great item.

[itslarry]

Originally Posted by Jim65

I wonder if the Coca-Cola ad had something to do with it?

I wouldn't be surprised. My friends mom is SUPER into coke, it's crazy to me What She will spend on advertisements, but it's a serious group of folk.

[slidekellyslide]

Coca Cola ads from that era are really easy to find in magazines that sell for nothing though. I doubt this has anything to do with Coca Cola. Just two bidders that wanted it badly. I’m prepared to overpay for something today too.

[Leon]

My guess is a Lajoie collector and a program collector went toe to toe. It is a nice program.

[MVSNYC]

As mentioned above, very visually striking, FWIW.

[patricka]

I have been collecting deadball era programs for 25 years and that price blew me away. Although I admit I cant recall seeing a 1907 before, I have had other 1904 to 1909 Indian programs and most of them have a similar cover design with a head shot of Lajoie. They typically sell in the $500 to $1,200 range. Love of Game auctions sold a 1905 a few years ago that looked similar for around $500.

My guess is two longtime Indian program collectors that were missing that year and didnt want to wait another 20 years until another one surfaced went at it. I did the same thing when a 1904 Cubs program came up ebay this year that I was missing.

[doug.goodman]

It was some sort of "perfect storm".

Reds collectors
Indians collectors
1907 collectors
Lajoie collectors (I'm too lazy to figure out if that game was his 2000th hit).

All could have had an interest.

Maybe Danny Murphy's great grand daughter was excited about his 19th career HR.

Doug

[bobw]

Article about the game from the Philadelphia Enquirer.....seems Murphy's homer rolled through a hole in the fence.

[barrysloate]

It's a scarce program and I'll bet two Lajoie collectors went head to head.

[icollectDCsports]

Originally Posted by patricka

My guess is two longtime Indian program collectors that were missing that year and didnt want to wait another 20 years until another one surfaced went at it. I did the same thing when a 1904 Cubs program came up ebay this year that I was missing.

I think this is the most likely scenario.

[certainteed52]

I have a 1929 scored detroit tigers and new york yankees program that has yankees uniform numbers on it how rare are these program?

[oldjudge]

I think older programs in general are undervalued, but virtually all are scarce. I would be very surprised if the scarcity of this particular game program had anything to do with the price. I think the most likely scenario is a bidding war where ego trumped common sense (take it from someone with first hand experience). Another explanation for unusually high prices can be shill bidding, although I’m not suggesting that that is the reason here. With that all said, the price seems unusually high to me.