From 1922–$2.00 East of the Mississippi, $2.50 West of the Mississippi and Canada.
Boys! Never in your life have you had a game like Christy Mathewson Own Indoor Baseball Game “Big Six.” it is just like real baseball and you can make your own nine amongst your chums–and have great sport–or you can play with the big leaguers and be manager of the Giants–Yankees–The Tigers or any of the Big League Teams.
Box cover and game board–Christy Mathewson “Big Six” Game
“You’ve got to hand it to this Reach crowd. When I told them what I figured was needed in major league mitts and gloves–I knew they’d do a good job of making them. But I didn’t know how good till I saw the gloves they turned out.
“I stuck my hand in the different models. And they are great. Big and roomy, like you need, yet fitting just right. I bent and twisted my hand and fingers, and these gloves moved as natural and easy as an old shoe. When a new glove does that–you can take it from me, it’s a real glove.
“And how these gloves snare the ball. A specially formed pocket does the trick, Reach tells me. Whatever it is, any ball that smacks into one of these gloves sure does stick.
“I’m ready to recommend them to any fellow who plays ball–in the field, on the bases, or back of the bat. They got a pretty low price on them, too, for major league glove.”
Babe Ruth
April 1930 advertisement for Louisville Slugger, featuring Hall of Famers Al Simmons, Jimmy Foxx and Mel Ott.
“Here are new reasons for using Louisville Slugger Bats–three new Autograph Models and a new finish that increases the Wallop in every hit. The bats used by Foxx and Simmons, noted sluggers of the World Champion Athletics, and Ott, third on the National League sluggers list, have been added to the Louisville Slugger Autograph Line. These players have used Louisville Sluggers in piling up their great records and now we make available to all ballplayers their own particular bat models, with their signatures, and our BONE-RUBBED trademark burned into the barrels”
A 1918 advertisement for the June issue of The American Boy magazine featuring Hall of Famer George Sisler; at the time the magazine had a circulation of nearly 300,000 and was the most popular magazine for boys in the United States.
“George H. Sisler, the cleverest youngster who ever starred in the big leagues, will tell you how to play baseball in a series of articles beginning with the June issue of The American Boy.
“In his first article he will tell you how to get and keep in condition, how to throw, how to field and how to pitch. You must read this first great article in the June issue of The American Boy, then you’ll know how helpful the ones that follow will be to you and your team.”
Also from 1918, Sisler on the Cover of Baseball Magazine
“A Clean Pitcher and a Close Shave.” Hall of Fame pitcher Christy Mathewson for the Durham Duplex razor. “Big Six” says:
“I have used the Durham Duplex Razor for a long time, and it has been my best friend in many a close shave.”
Mathewson won 372 games for The New York Giants and one for the Cincinnati Reds from 1900-1916, including four 30-win seasons, and was a member of the first Hall of Fame induction class.
“Christy Mathewson brought something to baseball no one else had ever given the game. He handed the game a certain touch of class, an indefinable lift in culture, brains, and personality.’”
— Grantland Rice
A 1937 Williams “Twin-Action” Shaving Cream ad featuring that year’s National League Most Valuable Player, Joe Medwick.
“Like thousands of men everywhere,” Medwick discovered that Williams’ “takes all the ‘starch’ out of tough whiskers.”
1937 was Medwick’s best season, he won the triple crown with 31 home runs (tied with Mel Ott), 154 RBIs and a .374 average; he also led the league in games, at bats, hits, doubles, and total bases.
Medwick was never popular among baseball writers, or really anyone for that matter; in 1942 Dizzy Dean called him “The most unpopular athlete who visits Sportsman’s Park. Not only among fans, but also among players.”
Medwick was not elected to the Hall 0f Fame until 1968. Upon his election a United Press International article by Milton Richman said:
“He was opinionated and argumentative. He’d as soon pop one of his own teammates on the button as someone from the other club. He wasn’t the most popular boy in the fraternity.”
Dean was among Medwick’s “own teammates” who he once “popped.”
A rare 1908 Coca-Cola Honus Wagner advertisement– featuring Wagner the picture taken in 1905 by Carl Horner, the one on the famous 1909 T206 card.
Original 1905 Carl Horner photo of Honus Wagner
Hans Wagner says:
“You can’t play good ball without vim–you’ve got to be full of enthusiasm and energy and keep your brain going.”
T206 Wagner
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