Small but notable stash of 1916 Ferguson Bakery pennants uncovered

[Bugsy]

Originally Posted by spec

I concur with you and Leon that these BF2s and the premium pennant likely came from the same issuer. It's just that the large pennant illustrated on the Ferguson blotter is in the style of the pennants on the pillow top, not this exaggerated version of the BF2 style. Furthermore, I'm not aware that any of the premium pennants have been found in the Boston area, while the extant pillow tops usually have been.

The blotter mentions a 9" x 24" Photo Prize Pennant. The large Evers photo on the blotter is actually an image of one of the pillow top pennants. While nobody has found a 9" x 24" version of a pillow top pennant, over the past 20 years, there have been 15 or so like this Alexander to turn up that do measure 9" x 24." Is there an undiscovered set of large pillow top pennants out there or did the printer take a shortcut back in 1916 and not use an accurate image showing the large 9x24 pennant? I am comfortable making the leap that the 9x24 pennants mentioned on the blotter are referring to the large 9x24s that are in the catalog today, but I guess that conclusion isn't shared by everyone. I would love to hear other theories.

Thanks.

Chris

[spec]

Originally Posted by Bugsy

The blotter mentions a 9" x 24" Photo Prize Pennant. The large Evers photo on the blotter is actually an image of one of the pillow top pennants. While nobody has found a 9" x 24" version of a pillow top pennant, over the past 20 years, there have been 15 or so like this Alexander to turn up that do measure 9" x 24." Is there an undiscovered set of large pillow top pennants out there or did the printer take a shortcut back in 1916 and not use an accurate image showing the large 9x24 pennant? I am comfortable making the leap that the 9x24 pennants mentioned on the blotter are referring to the large 9x24s that are in the catalog today, but I guess that conclusion isn't shared by everyone. I would love to hear other theories.

Thanks.

Chris

Your theory that the printer might have taken a shortcut in illustrating the large pennant on the blotter is plausible. However, it does not match the Evers pennant on the pillow top, either, which would likely be the source for this image (note different design around the photo and the inclusion of position above player's name). In addition, none of the players depicted on the known premium pennants has a strong Boston connection (Jack Barry joined the Red Sox midway through the 1915 season, but he was in decline and was never a marquee player), which seems very odd for a Boston product. And, of course, the photos on the premiums, and the BF2s, are from the Mendelsohn repertoir of action shots, not the U & U portraits that appear on the verified D381 Ferguson issue of the same year.

[Bugsy]

Originally Posted by spec

Your theory that the printer might have taken a shortcut in illustrating the large pennant on the blotter is plausible. However, it does not match the Evers pennant on the pillow top, either, which would likely be the source for this image (note different design around the photo and the inclusion of position above player's name). In addition, none of the players depicted on the known premium pennants has a strong Boston connection (Jack Barry joined the Red Sox midway through the 1915 season, but he was in decline and was never a marquee player), which seems very odd for a Boston product. And, of course, the photos on the premiums, and the BF2s, are from the Mendelsohn repertoir of action shots, not the U & U portraits that appear on the verified D381 Ferguson issue of the same year.

Then I guess true Ferguson 9x24 pennants are yet to be discovered. Of course, I would be interested in hearing any explanations on the 9x24 photo pennants that are known to exist.

[spec]

Originally Posted by Bugsy

Then I guess true Ferguson 9x24 pennants are yet to be discovered. Of course, I would be interested in hearing any explanations on the 9x24 photo pennants that are known to exist.

Having no expertise in felt pennants, I can only wonder whether 9x24 was a common dimension in this period. If so, that would make the size match less compelling and enhance the possibility that the large pennants we've seen were a premium that was part of the BF2 promotion, wherever that was.
As for the fact that no large pennant matching the style shown on the Ferguson blotter has surfaced, the scarcity of the pillow tops (far fewer than 10 have been found) suggests extreme rarity, while their size and utility might have given them a better chance of survival.
By the way, although I collect the D381 Ferguson set, I have no real interest in the BF2s or larger pennants. My skepticism about their origin is purely the result of never encountering them in original holdings over a lifetime of collecting in the Boston area, nor having seen any advertising for them during many hours of microfilm research of Boston newspapers of the period.

[Leon]

Originally Posted by spec

Having no expertise in felt pennants, I can only wonder whether 9x24 was a common dimension in this period. If so, that would make the size match less compelling and enhance the possibility that the large pennants we've seen were a premium that was part of the BF2 promotion, wherever that was.
As for the fact that no large pennant matching the style shown on the Ferguson blotter has surfaced, the scarcity of the pillow tops (far fewer than 10 have been found) suggests extreme rarity, while their size and utility might have given them a better chance of survival.
By the way, although I collect the D381 Ferguson set, I have no real interest in the BF2s or larger pennants. My skepticism about their origin is purely the result of never encountering them in original holdings over a lifetime of collecting in the Boston area, nor having seen any advertising for them during many hours of microfilm research of Boston newspapers of the period.

My money is on all of these shown in this thread being put out by Ferguson's. The minor differences aren't any big deal. No way in heck do I think there are other 9 x 24 pennants we will find, which are Ferguson's, and not like the ones found, from the same time period and with ultra close designs put out by a different mfg. They are all Ferguson's Bakery felts to me. Am I 100%, no, but I am close to it.

[matty39]

SPEC, as I understand you, you are saying that the large bf2 pennants shown here are not the pennants advertised on the blotter because the picture on the blotter does not match the large pennants. Also that the pillow top is a Ferguson premium because it does match.
On the blotter there is also mention of movie star premiums. I have owned a movie star pillow top premium which matches exactly the style of the baseball pillow top. I have also seen several of the large movie star pennants which again match in style the baseball pennants in this thread.
That both the baseball and movie star pennants do exist and that your hypothetical pennants matching the picture on the blotter have never been discovered seems to make your argument extremely difficult to accept.

[nolemmings]

Call me a contrarian, but I do not find it hard to accept at all. I think it strange that Ferguson would tie its cards, its blotter and its pillowtop to images taken from Underwood & Underwood and then use the Mendelsohn photos for this large 9x24 pennant.

Now if the BF2s are actually the "pennant tickets" referenced in the blotter, then it would be a natural progression to offer a King-Size version of those tickets as a premium. Have we ever seen anything else purporting to be or construed as such a ticket? Has it been confirmed that BF2s were in fact placed in Ferguson loaves? If not, then it seems to me an open question.

[Leon]

Originally Posted by nolemmings

Call me a contrarian, but I do not find it hard to accept at all. I think it strange that Ferguson would tie its cards, its blotter and its pillowtop to images taken from Underwood & Underwood and then use the Mendelsohn photos for this large 9x24 pennant.

Now if the BF2s are actually the "pennant tickets" referenced in the blotter, then it would be a natural progression to offer a King-Size version of those tickets as a premium. Have we ever seen anything else purporting to be or construed as such a ticket? Has it been confirmed that BF2s were in fact placed in Ferguson loaves? If not, then it seems to me an open question.

Definitely an open question, Todd. And after looking at them and thinking about it some more, it is probably further from 100 than I was previously thinking. I hadn't really even thought about the picture of the pennant, on the blotter, being one of the small pennants on the pillow top. I just assumed it is what the large ones looked like. In that case it still seems plausible, if not more plausible, the bigger ones seen today were put out by Ferguson's. Now, the smaller, "BF2" are another story. No, I have never heard of any proof they were found in loaves of bread. It is assumed. They might have been, but that is about all we are sure of.

[matty39]

Todd, I don't think anyone is trying to prove that the small BF2s were distributed by Ferguson. On the contrary, in an article I wrote for Old Cardboard several years ago I stated that these little pennants could well have been distributed by many different companies and there is to date no real proof of a relationship with Ferguson bakery.
The substance of this thread was to show the relationship of the large pennants to the blotter and hence to Ferguson. That we have discovered large pennants both of the movie stars and the baseball players that fit the description on the blotter seems to be an open and shut case as to that connection. To say that these large pennants are not those indicated on the blotter and there are other still undiscovered large movie star and baseball pennants out there seems rather preposterous.

[Matthew H]

Very cool items guys.

I've never seen the blotter, it seems that the d381s came with Peerless, and the BF2s came with Honey Bread?

[spec]

Originally Posted by matty39

SPEC, as I understand you, you are saying that the large bf2 pennants shown here are not the pennants advertised on the blotter because the picture on the blotter does not match the large pennants. Also that the pillow top is a Ferguson premium because it does match.
On the blotter there is also mention of movie star premiums. I have owned a movie star pillow top premium which matches exactly the style of the baseball pillow top. I have also seen several of the large movie star pennants which again match in style the baseball pennants in this thread.
That both the baseball and movie star pennants do exist and that your hypothetical pennants matching the picture on the blotter have never been discovered seems to make your argument extremely difficult to accept.

I must admit, even I find it more plausible that the 9x24 baseball pennants we've seen are the premiums offered by Ferguson than that not one of these individual pennants has surfaced. However, more than 40 years of collecting in the Boston area without encountering groups of the small pennants, let alone a large one, have made me skeptical that they were issued in this area. The use of Mendelsohn photos and the absence of Boston subjects (besides Barry) make me even more dubious. Since the pillow tops (which do match the blotter illustration) are so rare, perhaps no premium pennants were ordered, or survived.
Meanwhile, this latest group of small pennants plus the large premium suggests the two sizes are connected.
I am not an Internet expert, but I just poked around a bit on Google and discovered that 9x24 is not an unusual size for a pennant, whether vintage or modern, so the size match seems a bit less than compelling. Furthermore, I found an ad in the June 1917 issue of Motion Picture Classic magazine offering both small and large (9x24) movie star pennants for sale by a mail order firm (D.A. Dobie) in Long Island, NY. The illustrations match the movie star pennants we've seen in recent auctions (Legendary, Hake's, etc.).
So, I'm hoping someone runs across an ad offering baseball player pennants, large or small. Another possibility is that the pennants (either baseball players or movie stars, or both) were a national promotion. Ferguson Bakery became affiliated with, I believe, Continental Baking about this time after many years as a locally owned entity.
While all this may seem preposterous to some, I think there's still a lot to learn about these pennants.

[nolemmings]

Todd, I don't think anyone is trying to prove that the small BF2s were distributed by Ferguson. On the contrary, in an article I wrote for Old Cardboard several years ago I stated that these little pennants could well have been distributed by many different companies and there is to date no real proof of a relationship with Ferguson bakery.

Given this statement, I struggle with the logic of your conclusion. You state these miniature versions using Mendelsohn photos have no proven relationship with Ferguson and could have come from any number of unknown sources, yet it is preposterous that larger pennants depicting the very same photos could have come from anyone but Ferguson? Huh?

I just searched ebay for movie star pennants and found a variety of circa 1916 examples with different lengths. Are they attributed to Ferguson Bakery and if not, is it preposterous to think that whoever made these might also have made larger pennants?

All of that is great, but it still suggests that no real Ferguson 9x24s have been found to date and the known 9x24s have an unknown genesis. That seems impossible to me.

Keep in mind that these premiums were not mass-produced like cards were. The blotter may have even been printed BEFORE the actual large pennants went into "production." You needed a whopping 50 tickets to redeem a premium. It would take quite a while to accumulate that many. I can't imagine many of these were redeemed

This too escapes me. You can't imagine that many of these tickets were redeemed for larger pennants, which would then mean that there might not be many/any out there, yet then conclude that it seems impossible that we haven't found any and that those that do exist could be anything other than Fergusons. Why? How is it apparently logical that a multitude of Bf2s can have an unknown genesis but a larger version of those pennants must be tied to Fergusons? Just because of the size? Why not use the Underwood photos already available to you if are Fergusons making large pennants-- why switch to action photos from another source? The actress pennants are not action shots. Why couldn't whoever made the small BF2s have offered larger versions as premiums-- because we can't find a blotter that says so?

I do not reach any conclusions with regard to these, and remain hopeful that further evidence will surface. Until then, I'll just enjoy looking at them and not try to classify/catalogue them one way or another.