1950's Rawlings Store Ads ??

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Posted By: Tom Boblitt

In Indiana were all toned about the same. Even toning with few real defects. At least I culled out any defects when I bought them from the original seller. If I'm not mistaken, I think Lelands may have sold the ones to Scott or he may have bought them from Lelands when he had SCGAYNOR up and running. Circa 1996-1998 timeframe.

I originally contacted the seller at a flea market in Louisville where I bought 10-15 of them and then was told he had thousands of them. Not sure how many he had after I'd bought the ones I bought but I know it was still a lot of them. I had about 15-16 different versions including 4-5 of the 1/2 sheets like the ones you pictured.

They sold, at times, on ebay in excess of $40-$50 or more. I've subsequently seen some in the Hunt Auctions here in Louisville do exceptionally well given how many of them there are out there. I think a lot have been absorbed into collections and the price started to come back up on them a little.

The original seller lives in Southwest Indiana. They also had some SPOT ON mint 1948 Leaf BB cards (lot of SP's) but knew what they were worth. Wish I could have pried them out for a reasonable price.

I never louped them to see the dot pattern although David is an expert on the printing nuances of stuff like this. I always had my doubts that they were issued for sure in the 1950's but never found anything to refute that claim. There was one that pictured Ted Williams & Vern Stephens I think for the 1946/1947 or so batting championship. It was in with others that were to have been from the mid-1950's or so. They all had the same look, feel, etc, so that was what led me to believe they may have been printed at a later time. Just a personal hunch.

There are a couple others that you see from time to time that are the death of Ty Cobb and death of Babe Ruth. Those are more period to the actual events (1960/1948 or so I think) and printed on different paper than the bulk of these 11x17 H&B and 8.5x11 smaller prints. The Cobb is on a lighter color paper and the Ruth seems to be on a paper that has a different 'feel' in it.

Anyway, I think they are great collectibles and very affordable regardless of the exact date of printing. I'm not sure anyone will ever really know but I never saw a colorized ad of any of the posters that led me to believe that the b/w ones we're talking about were anything but real...........

JMO.............