Friday, March 29, 2013

Reccius cigar Wagner card seen in 1950 TSN


As I was nearing the close of 1950 in my reading of microfilms of The Sporting News, I was surprised to find a familiar image on Page 18 of the Dec. 6 issue.

Imbedded in the third installment of the paper’s serialized baseball biography of Honus Wagner was a picture of the Henry Reccius cigar card that stirred up so much interest and a bit of controversy in the hobby more than a decade ago.

Produced by a Louisville cigar manufacturer, the black-on-orange 3-3/8” x 4-11/16” card has a portrait photo of Wagner in what is presumed to be a Louisville uniform dating from the years (1897-99) he played there. On back is a poem extolling trade unions.

What made the card such a big hobby deal is that it was touted as Honus Wagner’s “rookie card.” With no indication of when the Reccius card was distributed – some suggested it may have even been years after Wagner’s played for Louisville – owners of the two known examples claimed the card predated what had generally been accepted as Wagner’s first baseball “card” appearance, in the 1898-1899 National Copper Plate series of 10” x 13” baseball player portraits. Those portraits, and additions to the series, were reissued in a slightly different format by The Sporting News in 1899-1900. These are classified within the hobby as M101-1 supplements.

The M101-1 Wagner is a $10,000+ item in top condition. The first-known Reccius card has been graded Poor-Fair by PSA and was auctioned in November, 2001, for $21,850. It appeared at auction again in April, 2006, and was hammered down for $52,040. If it has resold since 2006, I don’t have a recollection of the details or of its current whereabouts.

A second example of card, graded “Authentic” by PSA was found in 2012 and sold in mid-year for $21,400.

Among the loose talk by nay-sayers after the discovery of the Reccius card, some even suggested that it was not vintage at all, but a recent fabrication. I guess the appearance of the card in TSN in 1950 lays that theory to rest.

Wagner vs. ATG Pitchers

Also in that issue of TSN was a chart of how Wagner performed against the All-Time Great pitchers of his era. I think that chart is worth reproducing in modified form here.

Pitcher                        Threw  G         AB       H         Ave.
Amos Rusie                  R          5          21        11        .524
George Wiltse              L          31        117      43        .368
Nap Rucker                  L          37        135      48        .356
Kid Nichols                  R          27        105      37        .352
Cy Young                     R          17        70        24        .343
Christy Mathewson     R          86        327     106      .324
Mordecai Brown         R          49        181      50        .276
Clark Griffith                R          15        58        16        .276
Joe McGinnity             R          40        149      41        .275
Grover Alexander       R          27        100      20        .200

No comments:

Post a Comment

Your comments, criticism, additional information, questions, etc., are welcome . . . as long as they are germane to the original topic. All comments are moderated before they are allowed to appear and spam comments are deleted before they ever appear. No "Anonymous User" comments are allowed.