Baseball CdVs

[barrysloate]

Tough to say Gary. 200-300 is a reasonable guess, but it's really hard to know. The majority, of course, feature unidentified ballplayers, so most collectors go after the ones that are the most aesthetically pleasing: great uniforms, both bats and balls present, long pants and long beards, etc. And the earlier the better.

And the one Gary pictured above, which he purchased from me via the Mark Rucker collection, is one of the earliest known.

[bcbgcbrcb]

Definitely cards to me............

[benjulmag]

c. 1860 Brooklyn Atlantics

[drc]

Don't invest in them. I plan on flooding the market with my collection of 5. Though one may just be a guy holding a stick.

[oldjudge]

Nice card Corey. Regardless of your definition, I guess that clearly eliminates the SRA card as being the first baseball card. Not that anyone who knew what they were doing thought that that CdV was the first baseball card anyway.

[drc]

As a longtime photograph enthusiast, I've never thought a photo had to be labelled as a 'baseball card' to be good. In fact, I'm rather snooty and would take exception to people calling my photographs trading cards.

To me, I've found it rather comical that once something is called a 'baseball card' baseball card collectors are willing to pay triple the price.

[triwak]

This brings to mind a question I've had about the 1863 Jordan & Co. Harry Wright ticket/card (coming up for auction in the Spring REA):

http://www.robertedwardauctions.com/...preview/3.html

If 150 of these were sold (according to the research), why has only 1 example surfaced? If people had paid the extra 25 cents to obtain one of these images, wouldn't more have been saved, perhaps in scrapbooks? Or does this even predate the scrapbooking era? It just seems like a relatively large number (with respect to ultra rare items), to have only one survive. Or maybe the fact that the Civil War was still raging, has something to do with it?

Also, my 2005 Standard Catalog lists George Wright instead of Sam Wright as part of this "set." Has this been corrected in later editions? I seem to recall seeing a George Wright CDV that was obviously taken in the same studio and at the same time, but did NOT have the game ticket info on the back. George apparently didn't play in the match.