Hey, pennant guys

[perezfan]

Thanks for posting that pic of the reverse. Still looks like a dull scissors job to me.

[thetahat]

I have this in my pics … the third team I’ve seen now with two different versions (inverted colors)

[UKCardGuy]

Here's a new arrival. Except for a little bit of the tip missing it's in pretty nice shape. For the price, it was just begging for a new home.

[perezfan]

Nice pickup! That’s a toughie. There an identical Boston Braves version as well, so pretty safe to say it’s a first-year Milwaukee pennant.

[Duluth Eskimo]

I believe the Tigers is legit for what it’s worth. I generally look at Clean Sweep, but missed this one.

[UKCardGuy]

Originally Posted by Duluth Eskimo

I believe the Tigers is legit for what it’s worth. I generally look at Clean Sweep, but missed this one.

Thanks Jason. My questions about the Tigers pennant were down to the quality of it's construction. The uneven cut, the wavy stitching on the spine stood out to me. but the font and the tigers head looked good to me. The fact that the listing mentioned homemade and not hand-made, was another question for me.

I'd like to be educated about the early manufacturing processes if anyone has insight. For early pennants like Greg's Cubs and White Sox examples, I'm guessing these have been made on some sort of manufacturing process even if that was a single room in a shop somewhere? Sewing machines were in wide use by 1905 so I'm guessing these wouldn't have been hand stitched. Is that correct?

[Fballguy]

Originally Posted by UKCardGuy

Thanks Jason. My questions about the Tigers pennant were down to the quality of it's construction. The uneven cut, the wavy stitching on the spine stood out to me. but the font and the tigers head looked good to me. The fact that the listing mentioned homemade and not hand-made, was another question for me.

I'd like to be educated about the early manufacturing processes if anyone has insight. For early pennants like Greg's Cubs and White Sox examples, I'm guessing these have been made on some sort of manufacturing process even if that was a single room in a shop somewhere? Sewing machines were in wide use by 1905 so I'm guessing these wouldn't have been hand stitched. Is that correct?

Clean Sweep scared me off by emailing me to tell me it was homemade so even they didn't know what they had. This consignor got a bit of a raw deal.

[thetahat]

Originally Posted by UKCardGuy

Thanks Jason. My questions about the Tigers pennant were down to the quality of it's construction. The uneven cut, the wavy stitching on the spine stood out to me. but the font and the tigers head looked good to me. The fact that the listing mentioned homemade and not hand-made, was another question for me.

I'd like to be educated about the early manufacturing processes if anyone has insight. For early pennants like Greg's Cubs and White Sox examples, I'm guessing these have been made on some sort of manufacturing process even if that was a single room in a shop somewhere? Sewing machines were in wide use by 1905 so I'm guessing these wouldn't have been hand stitched. Is that correct?

Kyle will know best. I can only speculate that this was the earliest pennant “series”, where a manufacturer made pennants of the same style for different teams. Felt has the feel of an army blanket. They are well made.

[Duluth Eskimo]

Originally Posted by UKCardGuy

Thanks Jason. My questions about the Tigers pennant were down to the quality of it's construction. The uneven cut, the wavy stitching on the spine stood out to me. but the font and the tigers head looked good to me. The fact that the listing mentioned homemade and not hand-made, was another question for me.

I'd like to be educated about the early manufacturing processes if anyone has insight. For early pennants like Greg's Cubs and White Sox examples, I'm guessing these have been made on some sort of manufacturing process even if that was a single room in a shop somewhere? Sewing machines were in wide use by 1905 so I'm guessing these wouldn't have been hand stitched. Is that correct?

Obviously you can never be sure unless the item is in hand and generally Steve Verkman has good experience in vintage collectibles, but I believe it is authentic. The material on these early pennant is high quality thicker material that sometimes curls on the edges. The stain on the reverse piping area is from what I believe to be a previous makers label. Also, legit moth holes appear present in the rear material consistent with the era. Hard to see the stitching between the two pieces, but that doesn’t scare me off. The stitching on piping looks a little funky, but again I’m not worried. I didn’t get it, but I believe it is authentic. It is something I’d like to have in hand before plunking down money for it, but not always possible. If anything, it could have possibly trimmed near the edges. Just giving my take on it.

[Domer05]

Originally Posted by UKCardGuy

Thanks Jason. My questions about the Tigers pennant were down to the quality of it's construction. The uneven cut, the wavy stitching on the spine stood out to me. but the font and the tigers head looked good to me. The fact that the listing mentioned homemade and not hand-made, was another question for me.

I'd like to be educated about the early manufacturing processes if anyone has insight. For early pennants like Greg's Cubs and White Sox examples, I'm guessing these have been made on some sort of manufacturing process even if that was a single room in a shop somewhere? Sewing machines were in wide use by 1905 so I'm guessing these wouldn't have been hand stitched. Is that correct?

Put me in the camp that thinks the Tigers pennant is genuine and unaltered.

Although I understand the temptation for unscrupulous sellers to doctor their collectibles, when it comes to pennants, I think that occurs far less frequently than we all think. The earliest pennants, say from ca. 1910s, were mostly hand made. The felt was cut by hand with scissors using crude templates; then sewn together at lightning speed by a seamstress using a sewing machine. There was variation from one pennant to the next.

For those makers that screen printed their pennants, you saw similar inconsistencies. Sometimes the stencil carrier was in perfect register; and sometimes, not so much. When secondary colors were applied using an airbrush, you saw even more variations. Nobody really cared about quality control, so most of these "inferior" products were sold with the very best of their stock.

For instance, I often hear collectors ID a pennant's tip as doctored because the graphics don't quite line up with the center axis of the pennant. Sure, that's possible ... but more likely: the stencil was not in perfect register with the felt when they screened it. Having screen printed one or two pennants, I can tell you from experience this is really easy to do.

Blunted or squared tips? Yeah, the consumer could've caused this; but, just as likely the pennant left the factory that way on account of the screen printer placing their stencil too close to the edge of the felt roll.

With this Tigers pennant, note that it's of two-piece construction. That means the felt cutter had to get the top and bottom slope/angles of both pieces just right for the pennant to fit correctly. I think he/she may have missed the mark on one piece is all. If I had to guess, he/she cut the orange head-end too short; then tried to alter the black tail-end midway through the cut so it would come together better.