Collecting 19th Century Woodcuts vs. 20th Century Original Photos

[bcbgcbrcb]

David:

Yes, the NY Clippers were one of the key woodcut issues that I was talking about. You're right, thery are the closest to cards as they are listed in the SCBC and there was a series of around 68 different ones issued over a two year period from 1879-80. Of course, there were many more before and after and a book was recently published which was dedicated to over 500+ NY Clipper baseball woodcuts.

Initially the 1879-80 series were numbered but the numbering dropped off after the first several were issued, I don't think they even made it up to #10.

Here's a scan of one of those.........

[novakjr]

Very nice Phil. The Harper's are another mess all-together, especially since I only deal with full-issues, or at the least, full-pages. Currently I count mine, but will eventually upgrade to individual items. Cards/NY Clippers/Pins/whatever. Once I upgrade though, I still plan on keeping the Harper's as display items...They look awesome matted and framed.

I'm still undecided on the July 25, 1874 Athletics, and the May 3, 1890 "Opening of the Baseball Season" woodcuts. I'll have to say that I don't like the ones that have been cut into original card-like pieces. BUT they were eventually re-printed as cards by TCMA in the '70s, so I might give them card-like consideration..Again, my preference is the whole page though..

[bcbgcbrcb]

Agreed, David, full-pages are better, sometimes full issues can be cumbersome though. Almost all of the 1874 Philadelphia woodcuts that I have seen are full pages, not so with the 1890 since that one spanned about 8 pages total.

[mcap100176]

"The bottom line here is that I am trying to decide whether to keep my 19th Century woodcuts as my player representations for my HOF collection or replace them with cards or something else more widely accepted within the hobby? Keep in mind, my objective for my collection is to own the earliest image of each HOF'er and in many cases my woodcuts pre-date the player's earliest card by several years. "

Why not just collect the cards while keeping the woodcuts?

Michael

PS - I'll gladly take your woodcut collection for free if you want to give it up!

[bcbgcbrcb]

Michael:

Believe it or not, I have thought about doing exactly that. The primary thing stopping me is the money, in just about every case, the cards will be much more expensive than the woodcuts.

[h2oya311]

Originally Posted by mcap100176

"The bottom line here is that I am trying to decide whether to keep my 19th Century woodcuts as my player representations for my HOF collection or replace them with cards or something else more widely accepted within the hobby? Keep in mind, my objective for my collection is to own the earliest image of each HOF'er and in many cases my woodcuts pre-date the player's earliest card by several years. "

Why not just collect the cards while keeping the woodcuts?

Michael

PS - I'll gladly take your woodcut collection for free if you want to give it up!

I'm with Michael on this one...but I'll have to one-up him (since I'm later to the post) by actually "paying" for your woodcut collection if you do decide to part with it...I'm guessing it'll be the HOF "rookie" collectors out there who are most interested in your woodcut collection.

[bcbgcbrcb]

Thanks guys, tempting offers......... I think that you're right, Derek. It seems that only HOF Rookie collectors or at least "one-time" HOF Rookie collectors have an opinion on this subject. No one else has chimed in yet.

[oldjudge]

Do what you enjoy, but something cut out of a newspaper is not a card.