Circa 1846 Daguerreotype – Alexander Joy Cartwright debate

[Runscott]

Originally Posted by bmarlowe1

There is no logical reason that I should have the burden of proof. This is not a criminal case where we want to bend over backwards to protect a defendant from a wrongful conviction. We are trying to determine what is true, or at least what is probably true - that is very different.



In very hi-res, some of those hats are clearly not straw - even Corey now agrees to that (I won't waste space posting hat photos, and whether it's 2 or 3 is beside the point) However the hats do illustrate an important point. In a 1997 article in VCBC in which he argued that the HPD was the first baseball photo, Corey states, “First, all the individuals in the image are wearing straw hats.” Corey had maintained that view until recently. Well, they aren’t. Apparently he never noticed something that was plainly obvious when you have the photo in hand (or have a super hi-res scan) until I pointed it out, even though he has owned the HPD for about 20 years. I believe that he sincerely saw 6 straw hats when some were clearly cloth hats because that’s what he wanted to see. Anyway - who are these guys?:

Whether or not the hats are straw is irrelevant - if this were the style of straw hat that the Knickerbockers wore as a team, then it would be more relevant, but still not too important, as they aren't wearing their uniforms, so whatever hats they are wearing for the picture have nothing to do with baseball.

I could see how six friends could get together for a photo and arrange in advance to all be wearing nice dark dress clothing and their best light-colored wide-brim hats, just so that the picture would look good. If this picture had been taken in the deep south, all of them would have had such hats. If taken elsewhere, it would have taken minutes for any of them who didn't have one, to get such a hat at a hat shop.

[barrysloate]

Scott- I'm not so sure the Knickerbockers actually had uniforms. I think they took off their jackets, rolled up their sleeves, and played baseball. I never saw a reference that said the team had uniforms.

Corey and Mark: there is something here about this whole project that I do not understand. Why did the two of you have ground rules? Why did you both have to agree not to keep going back to your experts? Why did you both have to set the rules regarding who was allowed to amend his findings, and who would have the last word? I never understood that. If the point of this exercise is to determine the truth, what relevance do these ground rules have? I'm lost.

[Runscott]

Originally Posted by barrysloate

Scott- I'm not so sure the Knickerbockers actually had uniforms. I think they took off their jackets, rolled up their sleeves, and played baseball. I never saw a reference that said the team had uniforms.

The only team 'picture' I've seen is this one, and it seems to show a 'team' belt and shirt design:

[oldjudge]

Barry-You are exactly right. This dag has been widely used and accepted by the hobby and the sports community alike. Now doubt has been cast upon it and all that matters is whether it is Cartwright or not. A very strong arguement has been made that it is not and now I believe that, if it is to believed that it is, then Mark's arguement must be proved incorrect. Otherwise, as I said before, a cloud of doubt will always hang over this piece.

[bmarlowe1]

Originally Posted by barrysloate

Why did the two of you have ground rules? Why did you both have to agree not to keep going back to your experts? Why did you both have to set the rules regarding who was allowed to amend his findings, and who would have the last word? I never understood that. If the point of this exercise is to determine the truth, what relevance do these ground rules have? I'm lost.

Without ground rules we would have been going back and forth forever and the newsletter would never have issued. As it is, you know how long this took. Also, this discussion need not and will not end with the current newsletter. I plan to address the Curry/Adams/Wheaton ID's in the next newsletter (you've already seen Adams in this thread) and to briefly respond to points Corey made in his final response. Corey can of course seek any additonal expert help that he deems necessary and publish whatever he desires wherever he wants on this subject. If he wants Jerry Richards to go through thousands of 19thC baseball faces, he can certainly do that.

As SABR's pictorial history committee chairman told me, "this will percolate for a long time."

[bmarlowe1]

>>But with respect I say that while you clearly know more than the average person, your knowledge cannot compare to an expert such as Mr. Richards.

That’s why I obtained the services of Stephen Mancusi. That said, I think my response to Mr. Richards holds up very well.

>>As to your point in an earlier post of my failure "to produce known photos of the same early ballplayers that exhibit multiple feature differences as do Cartwright and subject C", that was not my role. That was Jerry Richard's role..

I honestly never considered that this would require an expert. It doesn’t seem very difficult to me to point out such differences if they exist. I can tell you that I cannot easily find such examples – as explained I have certainly tried and I can’t find any. That tells me that such a case would be at least extremely uncommon. This speaks to the likelihood of C being AJC. Of course the question is out there on this forum and through the newsletter. Let’s see what others may come up with. (see last paragraph p. 29)

[bmarlowe1]

..
>> It is the most tortured rational conceivable to say that…

Real rock solid provenance would include reliable 19thC documentation attributable to AJC that describes and identifies the photo (such as a mention in his letter to Debost ). What we have instead is several early documented very odd “missed opportunities” where one would have expected that such a significant artifact would be mentioned or discussed (pp 30-31), followed by the rather sudden appearance of the photo in the mid-1930’s. There is nothing “tortured” in being suspicious of that.

I’ve received a number of emails from people who have had difficulty identifying or have misidentified youthful photos of grandparents, great uncles, etc. – this is not uncommon (there are several posts here that attest to that). The AJC that Bruce Jr. knew from life was an old man as seen in the old man photos in the newsletter. We don’t know what Bruce’s facial recognition skills were, but we do know how bad such skills can be.

One thing that would have been missing in the Carwright for HoF campaign was a nice team photo with AJC (the team photo in Spalding’s book did not include AJC, nor did the 1862 team salt print). Perhaps Bruce Jr. found the HPD somewhere and talked himself into believing it was what he needed (certainly collectors often do just that). Also bizarre – perhaps. I don’t pretend to know what happened here, but there is no narrative concerning the HPD that I have heard that easily connects the dots. This is a thick story for which we have only very thin conflicting slices. One needs to reflect on how little we actually know.

[barrysloate]

Scott- that photograph is ca. 1859, and by then uniforms were worn by players. In the late 1840's, I just don't know.

[barrysloate]

Recently I was looking at a photograph of my grandfather (he died in 1932, 20 years before I was born). Next to him stood his brother. The two of them looked so much alike that I could not distinguish my grandfather from my great uncle. It's not that I didn't know what my grandfather looked like, it's just that he and his brother were such a close match. Take that for what it's worth.

[barrysloate]

Thanks Mark. That was one of those things I was curious about.

[Runscott]

Originally Posted by barrysloate

Recently I was looking at a photograph of my grandfather (he died in 1932, 20 years before I was born). Next to him stood his brother. The two of them looked so much alike that I could not distinguish my grandfather from my great uncle. It's not that I didn't know what my grandfather looked like, it's just that he and his brother were such a close match. Take that for what it's worth.

Barry, it's worth a lot. My great-grandfather presents a situation similar to what you describe - I sent a picture of him as a young man, to my father (who knew him much better than I did), and my father was certain that it was actually his uncle. My father was wrong. Apparently, this is common.

It's reasonable to think that ANY photo of a young AJC that AJC's grandson looked at, would have had little resemblance to the older AJC that he actually knew. For that reason, it's also reasonable to think that his grandson would have simply picked the best picture out of the ones he had available - he was probably proudest of this one, because it featured 'the team'. Just as Corey thinks the dag AJC looks like the other AJC photos he has, AJC's grandson could have felt just as certain. As far as the provenance he had - he could very well have been told by a relative who really didn't know (was half blind or had a bad memory, or other) that the team pic had AJC in it, when in fact it had AJC's brother or cousin.

[benjulmag]

Originally Posted by bmarlowe1

>>But with respect I say that while you clearly know more than the average person, your knowledge cannot compare to an expert such as Mr. Richards.

That’s why I obtained the services of Stephen Mancusi. That said, I think my response to Mr. Richards holds up very well.

>>As to your point in an earlier post of my failure "to produce known photos of the same early ballplayers that exhibit multiple feature differences as do Cartwright and subject C", that was not my role. That was Jerry Richard's role..

I honestly never considered that this would require an expert. It doesn’t seem very difficult to me to point out such differences if they exist. I can tell you that I cannot easily find such examples – as explained I have certainly tried and I can’t find any. That tells me that such a case would be at least extremely uncommon. This speaks to the likelihood of C being AJC. Of course the question is out there on this forum and through the newsletter. Let’s see what others may come up with. (see last paragraph p. 29)

When we started this project, the manner we decided to go about it was to hire an expert and let him opine. As we began discussing this issue, we decided the best route to take was for each of us to hire his own expert and let them do the analysis. That was what we did. In the end we are simply going to have to agree to disagree. I believe Jerry Richards has ripped to threads not only Mr. Mancusi's report, but also his mode of analysis as well as the appropriateness of using an artist to do a photographic comparison. Who Mr. Mancusi works for is irrelevant, as shown by the completely botched iris analysis. And I don't need to hear that the reason for that was because he wasn't given access to the original. Jerry Richards didn't want the original. He wanted a higher resolution reproduction to blow up. If he couldn't get it, he told me anything he would say about the irises would be so fraught with error to be close to worthless. Yet to Mr. Mancusi, before you allowed the change in the wording of the report, that was the most important factor he discussed.

I have spent countless hours over the last year on this project. I've also expended considerable expense. I've done what we set out to do, and now I'm being told that I should be the one to look for images to establish my points. That is not my expertise. I have no doubt that had Jerry expended time on it he would have had a field day doing it. It is not my intention to keep going back and forth. One would think if you were that satisfied with Mr. Mancusi's report settling the matter, you wouldn't feel the need to now act the photo ID expert. If you want to that that is your business. But for my state of mind, which to me is all that matters inasmuch as I own the item and the only person I want to satisfy is myself that I am not fooling myself into thinking something is what it is not, I am satisfied. As much as I respect you Mark, I believe Jerry has considerably more expertise and credibility than you do on this matter, and I choose to defer to his assessment.

[oldjudge]

As Corey has so eloquently stated, he owns the piece and has the right to believe what he wants. Of course he does. What the hobby believes may or may not concurrent with those beliefs, however. The hobby's opinion is what I believe is most important as it will determine the place of this piece in history.

[bmarlowe1]

>>I believe Jerry Richards has ripped to threads not only Mr. Mancusi's report, but also his mode of analysis as well as the appropriateness of using an artist to do a photographic comparison. Who Mr. Mancusi works for is irrelevant, as shown by the completely botched iris analysis.

You neither understand facial comparison, nor the limitations of the analysis your expert provided. In my view you have no competence to judge Mr. Mancusi’s work. As far as my judgement of Mr. Richards, everything I said derives from Mr. Mancusi's report.

>> I have spent countless hours over the last year on this project….

This is not about you, and frankly I don’t think anyone does or should care how much effort you (or I) put in to this. If they are interested they should care about what is true. Now you are complaining because because a key point in your argument was easily refuted. You and your expert asserted that the feature differences shown in the C vs. AJC comparison are not at all remarkable. My expert and I say that they are. I have a counter-argument that resonates at least with some people. If I am wrong it should be easy for you.

>> I've done what we set out to do, and now I'm being told that I should be the one to look for images to establish my points.

No, you weren't told it just now. It is in the newsletter in my response to Mr. Richards report. If you understood what the arguments on my side were, the need for this would have been obvious very early on - when you saw my initial draft plus Mr. Mancusi's report.

>> It is not my intention to keep going back and forth. One would think if you were that satisfied with Mr. Mancusi's report settling the matter, you wouldn't feel the need to now act the photo ID expert.

That makes no sense. Everything I have said thus far in the forum with respect to subject C is supported in his report.

As for the irises, I refer people to page 30. Mr. Mancusi was right - they are smaller.

[benjulmag]

That seems to be your modus operandi Mark, to directly attack a person's competence if he dares disagree you. What I said about Mr. Mancusi's report derives from Jerry Richards. He certainly has the competency to judge what both Mr. Mancusi and you write, and I believe I have the competency to understand plain English, all the more so in this instance because I have had numerous phone discussions with him. You and I have gone back and forth on this for long enough that I feel that no matter what arguments are presented, if they are at variance with the conclusion you reached over one year ago, if won't matter. You know more than anyone else, and you are the ultimate say. And you present technical arguments with fancy illustrations that I dare say very few people have the expertise to evaluate. That is all fine and you have every right to do so, and readers have every right to form the opinions they choose to form. But for those really seeking the truth, as I am, I choose to hire the best photo facial comparison expert I can and let him advise me. In the process I ask him to evaluate what your expert writes, which he also does.

So at the end I am choosing to go with my expert over you. As to the shots you take at my competence to do photo ID, at least I can admit I know my limitations and don't put myself out to be someone I am not. Let's too keep in mind that when we first started discussing this topic, you explicitly told me that photo ID is all science and no art, that photo ID should not take provenance and other external information into account, and that Cartwright couldn't be in the half plate because based on your analysis there were exclusionary differences between subject C and subject A1. Well on the first of these points you were wrong, on the second you were wrong, and on the third you were wrong. In addition now you tell us that it is not necessary to do separate comparisons of the half plate with each of the A subjects. Well on this point you are wrong too. And it is Mr. Richards who is saying you are wrong in each of these instances.

[bmarlowe1]

>>That seems to be your modus operandi Mark, to directly attack a person's competence if he dares disagree you.

After what you have posted you’ve got to be kidding me. That is just what you did. Mancusi’s competence is the core of your argument. I have not said that Mr. Richards is not competent and his report certainly disagrees with me. Really, some of the things you say are simply amazing.

>>And you present technical arguments with fancy illustrations that I dare say very few people have the expertise to evaluate.

The majority of people that communicate with me on this understand them quite well. There are a lot of people on this board and within SABR that have some aptitude for this. The presentations make them think about what they are actually seeing in these photos and correlate well with their own experience. I also get a lot of very good questions. A small minority (of those that contact me) do not understand. I am quite convinced that you do not understand. Also, this is not to say I can't make a mistake with respect to some particular point, but I don't believe that is the case here.

>>you explicitly told me that photo ID is all science and no art,...

That is false, and if I thought that why would I seek out a forensic artist.

>> that photo ID should not take provenance and other external information into account…

No, in fact I specifically asked for you anything you had in that regard.

>> You explicitly told me that…..Cartwright couldn't be in the half plate because based on your analysis there were exclusionary differences between subject C and subject A1.

I did not think that C could be the same person as A, but I also said I needed professional validation and I entertained the possibility that such an expert might not agree with me.

My position was as stated on p. 6:
When I first compared subjects C and A1, I thought that they could not be the same person due to the described feature differences. I also thought that a forensic artist would likely come to the same conclusion, but I was not absolutely certain as to whether the C image was clear enough to yield that result.

>> As to the shots you take at my competence to do photo ID, at least I can admit I know my limitations and don't put myself out to be someone I am not.

Your newly found humbleness is refreshing. I never heard any of it when you insisted H and G were Curry and Adams. I was completely frank and honest about my limitations. From the beginning I told you I was an amateur. And in the newsletter from p.5:
“I am, to say the least, not a practicing forensic artist. Though not a “professional”, if you read this publication often you know that I have “tried this at home,” having studied the subject as best as I can in the available time. I have a good track record of applying sound principles within my limitations, but I certainly can’t do all the things that a trained practitioner can do and I lack the many hours of “face-time” one gets in a full-time job.”

In the end, people interested in this subject will have to make their own judgments as to my level of competence. Most importantly they will be completely uninterested in our debating your interpretation of what I said to you in private communications that I have not published.