Player identities on tintype

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Posted By: Rob L

I purchased this from SC Gaynor. The auction listed this as a 1904 photo of several Brooklyn Bridegroom, including Del Howard, George Moriarty, Carl Lundgren and Davy Jones.

Problem is, Moriarty, Lundgren and Jones were on the Cubs in 1904 and Del Howard was on the Cubs in the later 1900s. The identity of the the other is hard to tell.

The auction listed that this came from a players estate.

Handwriting on the paper frame lists Howard, Moriarty and Lundgren on the bottom row. On the top row, the man on the left has Louie or Lowe written above him and the man in the center has Gande, Gandt or something like that. Jones is written above the man on the top right. Under the Jones name is something that say "who took us through China Town tonight".

Anyways, can anyone verify any of these people.

Thanks,

Rob



[edited to crop picture]

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Posted By: Cycleback

The guys on the bottom row appear to be correctly labelled.

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Posted By: Cycleback

Your photograph is rare and unusual, and I think you got your money's worth.

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Posted By: scgaynor

It was identified as Brooklyn in the scrapbook that it came out of, and I didn't research the piece any further, but the players estate that it came from was a member of the Cubs during that time period, so that makes sense.

Scott

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Posted By: Cycleback

Rob, to clarify my second opinion, almost all baseball tintypes are from the 1800s, making this an oddity. Tintypes depicting known major league baseball players are rare, and I've only seen two baseball tintypes with that type of original holder. Lastly, it's got a nice image and pose. So, whether this is the 1904 Brooklyn Dodgers or 1904 Chinatown in Brooklyn, this is a rare and unusual basbeall photograph.

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Posted By: Rob L

I'm wondering if maybe this photo was taken in Brooklyn when the Cubs were in town.

Scott, just curious if you could give me the name of the player who's estate this came from.

David, thanks for the opinion. I think it is a great piece. Just curious if the Howard that is identified looks like Del Howard. He did not play with the Cubs when Jones and Moriarty were on the team. I believe he was in the minors/independent leagues in 1904.

Thanks. Rob

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Posted By: runscott

I meant to snipe it and forgot. I used to have a "bloomer girl" tintype that had the same type of paper holder - I thought at the time that it was from the 1800's, but looking at the scan it doesn't have the same clarity that the 1800's versions had.

I think you did real well on this one.

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Posted By: scgaynor

When I acquired the stuff, I agreed not to mention the player as there are other relatives out there who may not have wanted the items leaving the family, but if you follow stuff offered by some of the major auction houses, you can easily figure it out.

Scott

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Posted By: Cycleback

With this style of New York 20th century tintype, the hat of the photo's owner typically was tipped in the opposite angle of the other hats, which would suggest that the photo belonged to Del Howard.

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Posted By: Rob L

Does anyone know where Del Howard was playing in 1903 - 1904 seasons?

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Posted By: Cycleback

I beleive that in 1904 Del played for Omahah of the Western League.

As probably already half the people reading this know, I'll skip the sublties. Del and his brother Ivor were baseball players. They later ran the Oakland team of the Pacific Coast League. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I am assuming this photo came from the Del and Ivor baseball collection accumulated by Ivor's wife.

And, no, you can't tell who owned a tintype by the angle of his top hat.

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Posted By: Bill Cornell

David gets the day's gumshoe award. Small correction - Del's brother was Ivan, not Ivor. Links to both on baseball-reference.com:

Del Howard

Ivan Howard

And if these guys didn't all play for the Cubs at the same time, perhaps some of the names are wrong? Moriarty (front row center) is a definite, but I don't see Pat Moran (along with Nixey Callahan, a favorite son of Fitchburg, MA) in that picture.

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Posted By: Cycleback

This doesn't correct my mistake (though may conveniently divert attention), but I've seen him named Ivon and Ivan.

I add that cross team friendships and social groups were and are common in baseball-- friendships formed from having once played for the same major, minor league team, All-Star team, childhood team, etc. As professional baseball involves one team visiting another team's home town and visa versa, players regularly changing teams and teams often sharing the same spring training location, this type of social mixing is not uncommon.

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Posted By: Rob L

The name Lowe or Louie is written above the person in the upper left corner. Does anybody know if this is Bobby Lowe? He played with the Cubs in 1902 and 1903. Moriarty, Jones and Lundgren were all on the team in 1903.

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Posted By: Joe P.

I've been up all night trying to find images of all the usual suspects.
Rob, I can't help but agree with you, the Chicago Orphans, or the Cubs, were the visiting team in Brooklyn.
About the Chinatown that was mentioned, I don't think that there was a Chinatown in Brooklyn.
Having spent 60 years in New York City, I don't recall ever hearing about a Chinatown in Brooklyn.
Just in case I missed something, I called my 88 year old uncle in Florida.
We both agreed that the only Chinatown in NYC is the one in the lower tip of Manhattan, near the lower East Side and little Italy.
They played day games during those days so they had plenty of time to have someone to bring them to Manhattan from Brooklyn.

Which brings us to one of the question marks in the picture.
The gentleman in the middle of the top row.
I suspect that the line "who took us through China Town tonight" is a reference to the man in the middle.
He might be a motor or horse drawn hansome cab driver.

For the life of me, I can't explain the Del Howard part, but I'm sure that there is an explanation.

I am now going to try to convey some images.
I'm going to try several ways.
I hope it works.
If not, it's back to the drawing boards.

Carl Lundgren

George Moriarty

Davy Jones

Del Howard

Bobby Lowe

[edited to add links to images on LOC site]

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Posted By: Joe P.

Some of you may have this site of Photographs from the Chicago Daily News.
Asides from having some awesome up close, on the field photographs of Lundgren, Davy Jones, Moriarty, Del Howard and Lowe, it also has an incredible assortment of photographs of all the teams dating back to 1902.
That plus photos of practically any topic you can think of.
I hope this one works.

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/ndlpcoop/ichihtml/cdntopic.html

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Posted By: Rob L

Determining the history of this picture has been great. I have also emailed the head of the SABR - Chicago region to see if he knew anyone that could help with this picture. I haven't heard back yet.

Joe P, I think you are right regarding the man in the center of the top row. Not only is he dressed differently, but the hand writing on the paper frame has his name and the comment about Chinatown on the same line.

Does the apparent "Lowe" designation above the man on the upper left look like Bobby Lowe? I did see one picture of him with a mustache so I couldn't tell. I haven't had a chance yet to look through the Chicago pictures yet.

Thanks everyone. Rob