Ebay Postcard Warning

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Posted By: davidcycleback

Dan, I think we all agree that these eBay Kodak postcards are from later. The Kodak stampbox didn't exist in the 1930s-40s.

Any photo with the Burke's name and Belmont Ave Chicago address, as shown above, was by Burke himself. That was his personal stamp. If a collector sees that stamp on a Babe Ruth photo, he doesn't have to worry about if it's a reprint by Brace, Rowe or anyone else.

Brace himself made some nice originals from later years, ala Willie Mays and Stan Musial. These usually had his name, 'George Brace,' stamped on back.

And, for those lurkers who don't know by now, Burke and Brace were both Chicago baseball photographers and business partners. Brace was much younger, outlasted Burke by a few decades, and made both his own originals, reprints of Burke photos and owned much of Burke's original archives. Which explains why a small collection from Brace's archives might contain originals and reprints from a range of years. Brace essentially ran a photo service, making and providing images upon request. No doubt he also sold photos directly to the public too. His contemporary Jim Rowe, also of Chicago, was similar but marketed collectible photos to baseball fans-- postcards, small photos, etc. The earlier Burke was a professional photographer, who was paid to photograph players and teams, but also sold photos to players, the public and no doubt magazines and books. Even in his day, Burke was regarded as one of the premier baseball photograhers, hired to shoot the 1933 Goudey set, team photographer of the Cubs, White Sox and NFL Bears and preferred photographer of folks like Ruth and DiMaggio. In those days, he hired a young assistant named Brace.

A lot of 1930s Babe Ruth autographs are on George Burke photos (Burke stamp on back). That's because Ruth bought the photos directly from Burke to fulfill fan requests. Babe Ruth gave his personal thumbs up to Burke's photography skills, and amongst baseball fans there's probably no higher honor than that.