Check out Gary Cieradkowski’s new card for William “Hippo” Galloway, a Canadian who was the first black man to play in a professional* hockey league, and the last black man to play (openly) in organized baseball until Jackie Robinson.
UPDATE 2/21/2013 *-The Central Ontario Hockey Association was amateur (at least officially); openly professional hockey didn’t start until a few years later. The Canadian League was a professional baseball league, though.
Gary has got the Pete Hill Card Set fresh from the printer, and they look absolutely fantastic. He’s also offering a special extra card, featuring Pete in a 1906 Philadelphia Giants “World’s Champions” uniform (the Giants claimed the world baseball championship for 1905), if you order by December 31.
I’ve teamed up with Gary Cieradkowski (of Infinite Baseball Cards fame) and Ron Hill to produce a special set of Pete Hill cards. We’ve painstakingly researched Pete’s career to create 15 cards that tell his story from his early days with the semipro Pittsburgh Keystones, through his heyday with the powerhouse Philadelphia Giants, Chicago American Giants, and Havana Reds, to his stints as player-manager with the Detroit Stars and Baltimore Black Sox. We’ve also put together his playing statistics against Negro league, Cuban, and white major league teams.
If you read this blog you know Gary’s art, and you know the care and attention he puts into getting every detail as accurate as possible. It’s a beautiful set of cards, and in my opinion one of the best things he’s done. This set is also in a class by itself—I don’t think there has ever been a project focusing on one Negro league player like this.
They’re available for pre-order here—in fact, they ought to be shipping fairly soon, so you should be able to get your set(s) in plenty of time for the holidays.
In 1923 The Sporting News used stylized drop caps to lead off its articles. Mark Aubrey decided to track down as many different letters as he could; he’s got 21 so far. (Good luck finding an “X”.)
Check out these Japanese bromides from the collection of John Gall, co-author of Sayonara Home Run: The Art of the Japanese Baseball Card. Gall describes the approach of Japanese card artists from the 1900s until the late 1960s in his article, “Cut Through the Roaring Thunder with Your Swing!” at AIGA:
Like other delightful mutations that have come as a result of foreign artisans dipping into the American popular culture trough (i.e., contemporary, West African, hand-painted barber shop signs that depict hairstyles last seen on the ‘80s R&B stars, Boys II Men; or the surf guitar that pops up in the middle of a Bollywood musical), Japanese baseball cards take the basic idea of a baseball card and turn it into something new and uniquely Japanese.
Unfortunately from about 1970 it seems that Japanese cards increasingly imitated their blander American cousins. I wonder if there is any chance of a revival...
What do the Cuban Stars, Langston Hughes, Syd Pollock, the Spanish Civil War, and the Cuban poet Nicolás Guillén all have in common? Check out my turn as guest author at Gary Cieradkowski’s Infinite Baseball Card Set.
Gary Cieradkowski has designed and illustrated a baseball card for Dave Brown, which he has graciously allowed me to post. He is a fantastic artist—check out his site, where you can see more of his baseball-related work, including a Camden Yards logo and Orioles season tickets. He’s also writing a book on the Baltimore Elite Giants. (I am guessing he is from Baltimore.)
This may look like an April Fool’s joke, but it isn’t. This cartoon really did appear in the Indianapolis Freeman on May 23, 1914. The only context I can provide is that the Indianapolis A. B. C.’s had just been taken over by C. I. Taylor, who brought along his brothers and other players from the West Baden Sprudels to remake the A. B. C.’s into a powerhouse on the black and independent baseball circuits.
The same issue contains box scores for two recent victories by the A. B. C.’s over the Sprudels, so I suppose the cartoon might refer to Taylor beating up on his old team. Other than that, I’m clueless.
(click to enlarge)
...by the Scottish cartoonist Tom Gauld:
Thanks!
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