ID Help - Anyone ever seen one of these?

[CobbSpikedMe]

I swear I've seen these before on a collector's website who collected rare cards, but I can't find it again. So, has anyone ever seen these before and does anyone know what they are. They picture Frank Chance and Frank Baker and are numbered 1 and 4 respectively.

Any help would be very appreciated.

Thanks,

AndyH

[brianp-beme]

Yes, not sure exactly what they are called, but they are from a board game.

Brian

[Butch7999]

Sorry Brian, no disrespect, but they're almost certainly not from a board game.
If we recall correctly, Leon has (or had) several of these, discussed in one or more threads here
some years ago.
We don't recall their source ever being identified, though, but we think the best guess was
that they'd been cut from a box of... something.

[brianp-beme]

Originally Posted by Butch7999

Sorry Brian, no disrespect, but they're almost certainly not from a board game.
If we recall correctly, Leon has (or had) several of these, discussed in one or more threads here
some years ago.
We don't recall their source ever being identified, though, but we think the best guess was
that they'd been cut from a box of... something.

No offense taken...I tried to make a withdrawal from my memory bank, and now realize that I may have overdrawn my account. I conclude by saying they are awfully skinny.

Brian

[GoldenAge50s]

---you are correct that there was a thread or 2 about these back a few yrs, but I sure can't recall what they were called, so can't bring the thread up! I seem to remember that it was determined they were cut from something, like as you say, probably a box. Someone will remember, I bet!

[swarmee]

Although board game would make sense since they are printed front and back and with all the wear at the bottom, they could have been affixed to a stand and then moved around as pieces.
If they were just cut from a box, why would the back have been printed?

Are they all Cubs and Phil As? Would they have been specific to the 1910 World Series?

[swarmee]

https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/2...ames-1884-1969



Maybe this one from Milton Bradley dated to 1910?

https://huntauctions.com/live/imagev...=932&lot_qual=

[CobbSpikedMe]

Wow, I knew the board would come through and help me out here. You guys are great. I'd love to find the old thread that discusses these, I tried to search but came up empty as I don't know what to call them or what to search for.

That image of all the other ones is awesome! Thanks for posting that. I'm glad to see they are believed to be period pieces cut from something. Any more help would be great if anyone knows any more.

Thanks guys,

AndyH

[Leon]

I think I might have owned all of those at one time, or nearly all of them. I don't remember too much about them though. I always thought they were either game pieces or cut from some sort of box or advertising. (did I get all of the bases covered?) I know many of us discussed them in the past.

[Butch7999]

Same problem (and lack of success) here trying to find those earlier threads...
just tried Darren's Google/"search site:www.net54baseball.com" trick and that didn't help either...

Andy, we wouldn't swear they're "period" (nor would we insist they're not). The font on those strips
always made us suspicious about whether they're as old as they seem -- it looks a bit "modern" to us,
but a typography historian could tell us how old that font style actually is.

John, they're not from Milton Bradley's Game of Base Ball (which really isn't even a "baseball game" at all,
just a "chase" game, a la Snakes and Ladders, with baseball graphics). BoardGameGeek is a superb resource
in many ways, but as an unvetted wiki, it's fraught with errors (the very first entry on the page you linked,
for example, identifies the The Champion Game of Base Ball, definitively from 1915, as an "1888" product).
Good point, though, about the front-and-back printing -- a curious element.

Leon, thanks for chiming in -- yeah, we're pretty sure the pic we posted was of the strips you had.

Interesting to note (can't remember if it was mentioned in the earlier discussions) that Chance, Hofman,
Kling, and Tinker, in the red set, have identical bodies, and Baker, Collins, Davis, and Hartzel (in blue)
likewise, with just their faces Photoshopped (or some ancient precursor) swapped onto them.

Ooh, one more edit to add: occurs to us that Andy's player strips might maybe possibly perhaps originate
in some as-yet-unidentified sheet of cut-outs, vaguely similar to McLoughlin Bros' 1894-95 Amusement for
Boys to Cut Out, recently discussed here [ http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=21824 ],
first identified after years of mystery here [ http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=175103 ],
and covered in some further detail here [ http://baseballgames.dreamhosters.com/BbMcLoughlin.htm ].

[swarmee]

At least we've got improved checklists:
Cubs
1) 1B Frank Chance
2) P Orval Overall
3) SS Joe Tinker
4) OF Jimmy Sheckard (or possibly Steinfeldt or even a misspelled Schulte?) (next to #3 Tinker)
5/6) OF Solly Hofman and C Johnny Kling (need better scans to determine #)

Athletics:
1) 1B Harry Davis
2/3?) 2B Eddie Collins
2/3?)
4) 3B Frank Baker
5) OF Topsy Hartsel
6) ?

So between both teams we have C, 1B, 2B, SS, 3B, 3 OFs, and a P. Still missing a couple to call it complete, since presumably there are an equal number; I'm guessing two more Athletics for #1-6 (if Sheckard is #4) to match the Cubs.

[Butch7999]

We're given to wonder if a closer examination of the printing process involved might not offer some insight.
We'll include, below, for closer analysis, the full-sized picture of the strips (not necessarily the full, true, or
accurate size of the actual strips themselves) that we cribbed off an earlier Net54 thread. You can try
blowing it up even larger.

The red and blue strips each appear to have been cut apart from a continuous panel, but the images appear
to have been photographed from pre-existing strips previously cut out of something else -- we're imagining
a sort of panoramic montage that might have appeared in a newspaper or magazine of the day -- and laid against
a dark background.
Look at the edges of the images (not the strips, the player images) particularly on Kling, Tinker-Sh--, and Davis.

The player names on the front of the strips appear to have been cut out of whatever the original source
might have been and taped on -- Kling is crooked, Overall appears to overlap his foot (again, not taped on to
the red and blue strips, but taped onto the images that were photographed to produce the red and blue strips).

The numbers on each strip are obviously handwritten, not typeset -- but without being hands-on,
we can't guess whether the numbers are literally handwritten on the strips, or are printed there
from handwriting on the source material.

[CobbSpikedMe]

Thank you for continuing to opine on these.

The numbers seem to be written on the original source and not the finished strips themselves.

Also, I should've mentioned earlier that they are on a thicker cardboard (think a little thicker than a cereal box) stock as opposed to a thinner strip card stock, so the possibility they were cut from a box is plausible.

The actual sizes are quite small, about three inches tall, Baker is obviously a little shorter than that.

Also, I noticed that on the bottom of the back of my Chance there seems to be another Chance front slightly showing. See image below with the bottom of the back of Chance flipped over and placed next to the front. Interesting, no?

[Ricky]

If those are hand-cut from boxes or sheets, those are some amazingly straight cuts. From the marking on the bottoms, they almost look as though they were torn from something, like a matchbox or ticket-type binding.

[gonzo]

The Cub photos on the cardboard strips are strange.

I think the heads and torsos are taken from this team photo of the 1910 Cubs, but with heads, torsos, and legs cut-and-pasted.
https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/n...photo/73333815

Look at Sheckard in the team photo. Note his belt loops, the way that his jersey folds a bit to cause a sort of dent in the top of the “C” on his chest, and the way that his shirt folds noticeably on his right arm as he crosses it under his left.

Compare that to the cardboard strips for Hoffman, Kling, Tinker, and Chance. It looks to me like those photos are identical below the neck, and they all resemble that photo of Sheckard from just below the neck to below the belt.

The legs for those 4 seem to come from some other photo, but again, they look like the same set of legs, comparing the marks and folds by the knees.

Overall’s cardboard strip image, from his head to just over his knees, seems to have been copied from that team photo. But his legs from the knees down are still taken from somewhere else, to make it look like he is standing.

On the Athletics cardboard strips, the bodies all look the same to me from the chest down, with the heads cut-and-pasted in.

[CobbSpikedMe]

Very interesting. I agree the torsos look very similar. How odd though to take the torso from one guy, legs from another and heads from everyone else and put them all together to make these cards.

[brianp-beme]

Originally Posted by gonzo

The Cub photos on the cardboard strips are strange.

I think the heads and torsos are taken from this team photo of the 1910 Cubs, but with heads, torsos, and legs cut-and-pasted.
https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/n...photo/73333815

Look at Sheckard in the team photo. Note his belt loops, the way that his jersey folds a bit to cause a sort of dent in the top of the “C” on his chest, and the way that his shirt folds noticeably on his right arm as he crosses it under his left.

Compare that to the cardboard strips for Hoffman, Kling, Tinker, and Chance. It looks to me like those photos are identical below the neck, and they all resemble that photo of Sheckard from just below the neck to below the belt.

The legs for those 4 seem to come from some other photo, but again, they look like the same set of legs, comparing the marks and folds by the knees.

Overall’s cardboard strip image, from his head to just over his knees, seems to have been copied from that team photo. But his legs from the knees down are still taken from somewhere else, to make it look like he is standing.

On the Athletics cardboard strips, the bodies all look the same to me from the chest down, with the heads cut-and-pasted in.

Interesting, and good spotting on the team photo. I'm not saying that this is indeed the case, but if they were game pieces you would definitely want the players to be depicted upright, instead of sitting.

I guess I am always trying to work a game angle on these.

Brian

[swarmee]

It really makes sense. Think of a button base with a slit to stick the "card" in with a little glue and move around a board. The fact that they're so narrow also is a point in their favor.

[CobbSpikedMe]

Possibly found the source for the Baker body here. Thoughts?

.

[Butch7999]

Andy, Gonzo, beautiful job of sleuthing! This is exactly what we were suggesting in our previous post, but
we wouldn't have put money on anyone coming up with the photo sources for the images, let alone this quickly.
Absolutely, Sheckard's torso and most all of the guy on the far right in the A's picture are what's pasted repeatedly
into the assemblage for the artwork printed on the colored strips. The faces of Baker, Collins, Davis, and Hartsel
are also copied from the A's team portrait and pasted onto those body templates. We'd bet the Cub faces
are taken from the same team photo that provided Sheckard's torso.

It'd be nice to know where the Cub legs and Overall's pose came from, too, but the bigger questions remaining
are why and when these little collages were actually done. Were they made in 1910, or a great many years later?
We're completely confident they weren't made for any commercially-produced game, but might someone
have constructed them for a homemade game? Or were they cut out of a box housing some other
commercial product -- candy, cigars, baseball equipment, underwear? Were they decorative features
on a schoolboy notebook? A lot of possibilities...

[esd10]

I believe they are from a game with the damage that is consistent on all pieces like they had been possibly been glued to a piece of wood. If these had been cut from a box or advertisement why would the company print the names on the back of a box or advertisement?

[Butch7999]

Fair and valid questions, esd.
Also, if they were part of a commercially-produced game, why were they printed like crap
and cut with such poor alignment in such extremely varying widths with angled bottom edges?

[CobbSpikedMe]

Originally Posted by Butch7999

Andy, we wouldn't swear they're "period" (nor would we insist they're not). The font on those strips
always made us suspicious about whether they're as old as they seem -- it looks a bit "modern" to us,
but a typography historian could tell us how old that font style actually is.

Hi Butch. I took the liberty of looking into the font style and believe it to be Garamond or at least a variation of Garamond. Claude Garamond died in 1561 so this serif style has been around for quite some time. I don't think it would preclude the cards from being produced circa 1910.

They were obviously attached to something at one time, hence the paper loss on the bottoms of all of the examples shown so far. But what was it? I agree they weren't from a commercially made board game since they are all of varying sizes. But I also don't see them as being from some homemade game that someone created either. They would've had to have been printed at a professional printers shop and machine cut (in my opinion).

They also all have what looks like dried adhesive on the bottoms where they were attached to something and the adhesive doesn't look like it was applied by hand to me. It could've been, but I don't think so.

And why does my Chance have another Chance front printed on the back bottom of the card?

Just thinking out loud and not expected any real answers here. But I am interested in opinions still. Oh, one more thing...has there ever been a second example known of a particular player or are all of these one of a kind at this point?

[brianp-beme]

I have Overall. It happens to be the same exact one pictured in the group scan, and it is not like I have seen a bunch of these over the decades. It is a strong possibility that there are only one of each of these out there, making them possibly a prototypes (of a long lost game).

Brian

[docpatlv]

Andy,

I was the underbidder on the Chance & Baker. Thought I’d add them to my collection of “1”. As a previous poster mentioned, I always imagined they were torn off like matches for some type of raffle/drawing or as others have mentioned, for some type of game to be played (not necessarily a board game).

Here’s their long, lost brother...

[brianp-beme]

Just to point out that the Collins shown is also the exact one shown in the group lot in post #3, so still, as far as we know, these cards are all 1 of 1.

Brian

[Butch7999]

Brian, doc, Andy, esd, all good stuff. Nice to see so much energy being put into solving these possibly insoluble
not-quite-really-cards-and-what-the-hell-are-they.

Brian, we consulted some typographical experts as well, and, well, they're still not quite sure what the font is.
It very strongly resembles Caslon 540, we're told, but it's not a perfect match. In any case, the Caslon family
(dozens of increasingly modernized variations were developed over the years) dates back centuries, and
there was quite a revival of several variations of Caslon around 1900-1905, so we'll concede that the strips
could date back that far. Still doesn't mean they couldn't have been produced at a much more recent date, either.

We'll politely disagree on "commercially printed" and "machine cut" as certainties. A couple of us worked
for years in in-house graphics and printing operations, and we could easily have turned out a better-looking
result with little time and effort (granted, we had computerized copiers to facilitate some of the pre-press
work, which obviously wouldn't have been available to someone making these in 1910, if in fact
that's when they were made) -- but the basic procedures would have been the same, with just
a little more done-by-hand effort involved. And anyone with a metal straightedge and a razor
can cut a piece of cardstock well enough to make it appear appear machine-cut.

However, along with esd's reminder that these are printed front-and-back, the apparent presence of
a second Chance on one strip does suggest some attempt at multiple sets for distribution.
The notion that the strips were part of some prototype for a game that never actually went into production
is plausible. We just finished checking patents granted between 1908 and 1913, though, for games
that were in fact never manufactured, but none of them, unfortunately, involved any suggestion of
player-figures or markers of any kind for fielders or baserunners.

Damn, this is intriguing...

[baseball tourist]

The wear on the bottom reminds me of some pages ripped from a flip book.

[Butch7999]

Bit of an update: the typeface has been identified pretty definitely as being "Recut Caslon," a Caslon variant
that's been in use since at least 1907. Which means, obviously, that the strips could indeed have been printed
in around 1910 -- although also at any time thereafter.

edit to add: we have the typography.guru forum to thank for that ID, particularly a contributor who goes by
"Greg Yerbury."

[Baseball Bob]

Brr! For anyone who does not believe climate change has happened, look at those sweaters!

[CobbSpikedMe]

Originally Posted by Butch7999

Bit of an update: the typeface has been identified pretty definitely as being "Recut Caslon," a Caslon variant
that's been in use since at least 1907. Which means, obviously, that the strips could indeed have been printed
in around 1910 -- although also at any time thereafter.

Nice Butch. Thanks a lot for looking into this and identifying the font as being a possible font used in 1910. I'm still fascinated by these little cards and really appreciate everyone's input so far. I'd love to see more examples too if anyone else has any to share.

[dstudeba]

As I posted in another thread, I believe that these were meant to work with stands and that is why there is damage on the bottom. When I purchased mine over 10 years ago they came with the wooden stands shown below.

[CobbSpikedMe]

This is great, now there are examples from the Pittsburg club. All of the examples I've ever seen are either from the Phila. A's or the Chicago Cubs.

[brianp-beme]

Originally Posted by dstudeba

As I posted in another thread, I believe that these were meant to work with stands and that is why there is damage on the bottom. When I purchased mine over 10 years ago they came with the wooden stands shown below.

Thanks for posting the cards and their wooden stands. I think the stands and the bottom damage on each of the known cards, in conjuction with the 1 of 1 known of each card bolsters the argument that these were playing pieces for an unpublished game.

Brian

[CobbSpikedMe]

So I'm assuming Willetts is Ed Willett from the Detroit team and Adams is Babe Adams from Pittsburg. So we have four teams represented now. Has anyone else ever seen another example of a Detroit or Pittsburg player?