Cabinets

One of a Kind: Frank Navin Helmar Cabinet #19

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Last April 27 (2011) I auctioned off this Frank Navin cabinet card. Navin was, of course, owner of the Tigers for some time and the stadium was long named for him. He was quite a guy-as a young man in law school (Cooley College of Law, here in Detroit) he paid for his tuition by working in a casino as a croupier. From that humble start began a career that would make him a wealthy and respected man. The cabinet itself was an experiment, something I love doing. While I expect to eventually make a different cabinet card of Navin, this is the only one that will be made like this. It sold for $14.27.

The Top 15 Sought After Hand-Made Baseball Cards

Here they are, listed by the highest auction prices realized over the past twelve months. It is nice to see that these top cards are spread over the several different series that we’ve been working on.

Rank      Amount      Series                                 Card #      Player Name

1           $315.00       R319                                  49               Ruth, Babe

2           $305.00       R319                                  93              Cobb, Ty

3           $302.00       Helmar Die-Cut                14              Clarke, JJ; Young, Cy; Bradley, Bill; Joss, Addie;

Easterly, Ted; Flick, Elmer;

4            $294.00       Helmar Imperial Cabinet 11             Jackson, Joe

5            $286.69       R319                                  49            Ruth, Babe

6            $281.56      E145                                    2             Ruth, Babe

7            $277.00      R319                                   94            Lloyd, Pop

8           $274.00       R319                                  117           Mantle, Mickey

9           $265.00       R321-Helmar                      2             Jackson; Williams; Risberg; McMullen;

10        $257.52        Imperial                              18            Wagner, Honus

11        $246.02       E145-Helmar                       2             Ruth, Babe

12       $244.27       E145-Helmar                       1             Wood, Joe

13       $237.50       Helmar Imperial Cabinet     17          Ruth, Babe

14      $236.46        T206-Helmar                        10         Cobb, Ty; Wagner, Honus;

15      $235.50        R319                                    129        Mantle, Mickey

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Deacon White, 1873: .392, 327 Hits & 206 Runs Batted In? On Only 1 Home Run?

Ok, so I’m being a bit provocative. But only a little. Not many of today’s fans have ever heard of the name Deacon White, but his fame was proclaimed far and wide among the nineteenth century’s rooters. Not only was he one of the absolute best players in the game for a full twenty years but he also tended to play on championship quality teams.

But about that 1873 season. Deacon was the star catcher for Boston that year, a year they ran away with the league championship. Their 46-13 record left a strong Philadelphia team (36-17) in the dust. Deacon played in all the team games, compiling his .392 average. Still, he placed just third in the average rankings, edged out by Cap Anson (.398) and far behind teammate Ross Barnes (.431). When it came to runs batted in, though, no one came even close to his 77. If you extrapolate his numbers over today’s 161 game schedule, Deacon would have compiled huge numbers–327 hits and 206 runs batted in. Normally we think of a big run producer as a long ball hitter, but Deacon had just one home run that year. It is really quite amazing.

The Pharaoh’s Choice Imperial Cabinet shown below depicts Deacon on the 1887 Wolverines, another of his championship teams.The image is recessed into the framing. It is being auctioned this week on eBay. I hope that you enjoy it!