The Color Barrier Robbed us of some Great Players and Great Cards

[steve B]

Originally Posted by Seven

Probably due to licensing issues along with a racial sentiment, I'd wager. There are actually a couple of sets in the early 20's that had prominent players like Oscar Charleston. Believe it was a Cuban Tobacco set. Gibson however missed out on that, as he was not playing yet.

Licensing seems doubtful. The fees for major leaguers at the time were pretty low and I have to think the Negro leaguers wouldn't have been more, probably less.

The Cuban cards were as I understand it, from the players playing there in the winter, so a normal part of the Cuban leagues.

Unless I have it wrong, there was a whole separate group of businesses serving the local communities, and I'm surprised none of those businesses produced anything like a card set in the entire first half of the 20th century. Not even a small set for the local team.

[cardsagain74]

As far as other sports, the fact that most fans wouldn't even know the names Marion Motley and Bill Willis just shows how insignificant football was in the late '40s.

Not only did they beat Jackie Robinson to the "big leagues", but they were both such dominant players from the outset of their NFL career. Motley was probably even better than Jim Brown (but didn't get nearly as many carries, so his numbers were largely ignored).