Hey, pennant guys

[Fballguy]

Well...Allow me to retort...

"You can't know it all yourself. If you think you do, you're destined for mediocrity."

--Donald J. Trump

"The dumbest people I know are the ones who know it all."

--Malcolm Forbes

"The less a person knows, the more stubbornly they know it"

--Rajneesh

"The biggest idiot you will meet in life is the person that thinks they know everything."

--Christopher Jones

"Trench never used that color thread."

--Greg Manco

Mark...I respect your opinions greatly and thank you for sharing them. Obviously, you're considered an authority on the topic of pennant collecting, that's why your name appears in the acknowledgments of Mike Egner's book (oddly, I don't see Greg mentioned. Puzzling). But Mark, in your own words, “cleaning is fine” (Post #4383) and this is not intended as an accusation in the least…just a reminder…you’ve told me that you use fabric glue to secure loose spines. You even told me the brand…FabriTac. Now I’m sure you didn’t do this to deceive, I just know you’ve sold quite a few pennants via LOTG and elsewhere recently. I don’t ever remember reading about fabric glue in any of the descriptions. Maybe you haven’t sold these pennants yet. I mention this only to show the variability that exists in the arbitrary pennant rulebook.

Greg himself has his own set of arbitrary and self serving rules (See Posts #3685 and #4378). He feels gluing a photo on a picture pennant is fine but gluing tassels isn’t. Coincidently he just happened to have a pennant with a loose picture. How convenient is that? And he’s a big fan of Retro Clean (Note his use of the word “another” from which we can deduce he’s done this more than once). But fear not, we can all be sure, when it’s time to sell…He’ll “disclose” he washed (and glued) his pennants.

My thoughts on cleaning also appear in post #4378, so they shouldn’t come as a shock to anyone, least of all Greg since he lives on the forum probably more than anyone (even Rob) and I doubt he’s ever missed a post.

As much as he'd like to think he is, the pennant savant is not the James Beckett of pennants. There is no James Beckett of pennants. Just as there is no PSA for pennants or grading system for pennants. The closest we have is Mike Egner and he states...

"All price ranges given are on the condition that the pennant is in excellent condition, with no alterations. Alterations would include:

*Trimmed or cut edges
*Colored in Graphics
*Dates or names written on pennant
*Tassels cut off"

You'll note there is no mention of cleaning.

And while we all have differing opinions, much as we would like them to be, none of them are hobby accepted standards or rules. They are just opinions. In 25 years of pennant collecting, I've never seen one description that said "this pennant has been cleaned". Yet, Dave "The Pennant King" Stark (I think King outranks Savant, can anyone confirm?) has an entire section on pennant cleaning on his website and states that he receives regular inquiries on how to clean pennants. How can it be that none of these cleaned pennants have ever been sold? He also states it was common practice in the 50's and 60's for people to mix and match spine and tassels more to their color liking. So, any effort to identify a pennant's origins via spine/tassel...or better yet...wait for it...thread color is a fool's errand. For the record, I told Greg if he could produce just one listing since the dawn of time that stated a pennant had been cleaned, I’d let him keep the pennant in addition to refunding his money. I haven’t received anything.

Once disclosing cleaning becomes the norm, I'll include it in my descriptions. In the mean time, when I sell my house, I clean it. When I sell my car, I clean it. And when I sell my 1983 Journey Concert T-Shirt, I don't disclose that it once had a Boone's Farm stain on it. Too each his own. If you prefer your pennants with 70 years of dirt go buy one like that. In the mean time, when I sell something, I want it to look as good as possible.