1844.20
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The First Baseball Card, Arguably?
| Salience | Peripheral |
|---|---|
| Tags | Antedated Firsts, Ball in the CultureAntedated Firsts, Ball in the Culture |
| Location | |
| City/State/Country: | New York, NY, United States |
| Modern Address | |
| Game | Base BallBase Ball |
| Immediacy of Report | Contemporary |
| Age of Players | AdultAdult |
| Holiday | |
| Notables | |
| Text | "What's the first baseball card? (I say it's the invitation to the Magnolia Club's First Annual Ball ball in February 1844.)"
[Image to be added below, once Protoball gets help with this task. The Magnolia Club card/ticket appears on the right side in the image.] |
| Sources | John Thorn, FB Posting, 3/1/2022. The announcement of the event appears in the New York Herald on February 8, 1844. |
| Warning | |
| Comment | [1] Another candidate as first baseball card is a group photo of the "Mutual (Green Stockings) B.B. Club of New York," evidently printed as on a souvenir ticket to a 1865 benefit for Harry and Sam Wright. Voigt writes "To finance the affair, a 25-cent admission charge was asked, and all comers were also encouraged to part with an extra 25 cents for a souvenir ticket . . . . Wright was more interested in his cash cut, which came to $29.65." David Vincent Voigt, American Baseball (University of Oklahoma Press, 1966), p. 28. John points out that this event can be mainly viewed as a cricket event. Three games were planned as part of the affair, and two were cricket games. A base ball game was to follow, but it was rained out. [2] Gary Passamonte observes: "This debate has raged on for many years. I believe the 1886 Old Judge N167 set would be the first undisputed group of baseball cards. All earlier possibilities have detractors with good points." [3] For more on the Magnolia Club, see his 2011 article at https://ourgame.mlblogs.com/magnolia-ball-club-predates-knickerbocker-af50771cd24b. In John's Baseball in the Garden of Eden (Simon and Shuster, 2011), pp 89-95, he describes his 2007 discovery of the club -- and the card. "[The ticket] cost a dollar , and, given its enamel-coated card stock and its commissioned rather than stock imagery, was likely intended to be saved as a memento of the event. The baseball scene on the card reveals three bases with stakes (not wickets), eight men in the field, a pitcher with an underarm delivery, possibly base-stealing . . . . This is, from all appearances, the original Knickerbocker game, and that of the New York Base Ball Club. . . . This ticket was the first depiction of men playing baseball in America, and it may be, depending upon one's taxonomic conventions, the first baseball card. Edit with form to add a comment |
| Query | Is it time to further define "baseball card"? Edit with form to add a query |
| Source Image | |
| External Number | |
| Submitted by | John Thorn |
| Submission Note | FB posting of 3/1/2022. |
| Has Supplemental Text |
1844.20 The First Baseball Card, Arguably?"
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