Shameless plug: Selling some photos

Beginning next Monday, Aug. 15, I'm going to be selling on eBay several dozen vintage baseball photos, most of them authentically autographed, including a lot of signatures of cup-of-coffee major leaguers -- some with as few as one game played in the big leagues -- that might be of interest to team specialists among vintage baseball memorabilia collectors.

Most of this group of photos came from a large lot purchased, if I recall correctly, from a Leland's auction 15-20 years ago.

Most of the photos are the work of a single amateur photographer, probably from Texas. His first name was Ambrose and his last name started with an "E," but that's all the identification I have.

Empirical evidence indicates that Ambrose attended minor league and spring training exhibition games from the very late 1940s through the very early 1950s. It looks like he snapped his photos pre-game from the first row of seats. After developing and printing the photos, he had them signed by the players, often in varied colors of what I believe is fountain pen ink.

All of the photos are in 5" x 7" format, printed on finely pebbled matte paper. The lighting and focus of his photos wasn't always the best, but these are unique poses. Some of the photos are of players on teams other than as we remember them from their baseball cards of the 1950s.

Selling these photos is part of some file downsizing I'm undertaking.

All of these photos will be sold on eBay on Aug. 15-16 and Aug. 18-20. You can find them by searching for me under the seller name goldflamedpt.

Bo (the other Bo) had a one-card set

The Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards is rife with what I call "one-card sets."

These are baseball cards in the old-school sense that they were issued to promote the sale or use of a product or service. Off the top of my head, I don't know when the first one-card set was issued, which player was pictured or what it was intended to promote. Likewise, while I suspect that they are still being issued, I can't tell you about any that might have been issued in recent years, since I barely follow baseball these days, and have zero interest in current cards.

Back in the days when I was working full-time (and more) cataloging vintage cards for the "big book," I was diligent in trying to capture data about single-card sets issued prior to 1981. When I returned to catalog duty in 2009 after a few years away, it was on a very limited part-time basis, and running down one-card sets to add to the catalog just wasn't efficient use of my time.

I'm going to make an exception, though, for a card that was recently reported by a long-time hobby colleague and catalog contributor, Tim Pulcifer. The one-card set that he reported is different because it is something that has been on my radar for decades, but was never listed in the catalog.

I believe that's because somewhere or other in my old files I had only the image of the card's front, and without the information that's on the back, it was impossible to attribute.

Also arguing for special attention is the fact that the card pictures a player that was a personal favorite of mine in the 1960s, Bo Belinsky. I once owned a game-used Belinsky L.A. Angels flannel jersey.

Pulsifer describes Belinsky as one of baseball's "colorful characters" of the era. That's an understatement, 

Tall, dark and handsome, he was West Coast baseball's answer to Joe Namath in terms of womanizing and occasionally brilliant on-field performance. He began his major league career in 1962 with four straight wins, the fourth being a no-hitter. Also like Broadway Joe, Belinsky was more about style than substance, and the totality of his career was mediocre, at best.

Still, in the early 1960s, when he had a no-hitter under his belt, a buxom platinum blonde on each arm, and a Cadillac convertible at his fingertips, he epitomized the playboy-athlete and was the darling of Hollywood.

It was inevitable, then, that a book would be forthcoming, and it's that book that this card was issued to promote. I read Pitching and Wooing many years ago. I remember it as more self-aggrandizing than inside baseball. It might be worth a re-read today.

Too bad Bo died relatively young, at 64 in 2001. An updating of his biography would have been interesting. You can check Wikipedia to get a flavor of Bo's story.

I still have a few Belinsky cards in my binder of favorite players, but never owned this promotional card. Tim got lucky and found his on the internet, paying $1 for it from a seller in Denmark.

I'm unsure how the card was distributed, and it's not common today. Collectors of vintage cards, of course, will recognize the design on the front as a take-off on Topps' 1972 baseball card issue.

Actor Dante was ballplayer Vitti

Uncommon commons: In more than 30 years in sportscards publishing I have thrown hundreds of notes into files about the players – usually non-star players – who made up the majority of the baseball and football cards I collected as a kid. Today, I keep adding to those files as I peruse microfilms of The Sporting News from the 1880s through the 1960s. I found these tidbits brought some life to the player pictures on those cards. I figure that if I enjoyed them, you might too.

Like many baseball players of the 1950s, Ralph Vitti occasionally appears as an autograph guest at conventions, and his cards can be purchased nearly every day on eBay.

 

However, you might not recognize him as Ralph Vitti and he doesn't sign at card shows, but at Star Trek conventions. He's better known as Michael Dante, a TV and movie actor from the late 1950s through the 1980s.



Michael Dante as Crazy Horse
 in the 1967 TV series Custer.



Dante appeared in more than 50 movies and 150 television episodes, but is best known today for a single guest appearance as the alien Maab in the "Friday's Child" episode of Star Trek in 1967. That same year he had a recurring role as Chief Crazy Horse in the TV series Custer.

 

Dante's tall, dark, leading-man good looks got him his break in Hollywood, but his ability to adapt to a wide variety of roles kept him busy in show biz for more than three decades.

 

The actor known as Michael Dante was born Ralph Vitti in 1931, in Stamford, Conn. He played ball and began studying acting at the University of Miami. In 1949, the Boston Braves discovered him playing semi-pro ball in a fast New England league and signed him to a pro contract at the age of 18.



Ralph Vitti/Michael Dante in a 1950s studio portrait.



He played shortstop for three seasons in the minor leagues, never rising above the Class B level, generally hitting under .250 with no power.

In 1950 he was with Class D Olean (Pony League) and Owensboro (Kitty League). At age 19, he was with Alexander City (Class D Georgia-Alabama League), Gloversville-Johnston (Class C Canadian-American League) and Fayetteville (Class B Carolina League).

After injuring his arm, he sat out the 1952 season, and left pro ball after a brief comeback in 1953 with Pocatello of the Pioneer League (Class C).

 

His first acting job came in the 1956 movie Somebody Up There Likes Me. For the 30 years he had guest roles in many of the TV Westerns of the time, along with soap operas, cop shows, etc.

 

You can view his "filmography" at the Internet Movie Database, www.imdb.com and his minor league baseball career at www.baseball-reference.com . Be sure to search under Michael Dante on the former site, and Ralph Vitti on the latter. Vitti/Dante never got high enough up in professional baseball ranks to appear on any baseball cards, but in 2002 and 2007, on the 35th and 40th anniversaries of Star Trek, he appeared on autographed cards in sets produced by Rittenhouse Archives.

Cannon was prize in NFL-AFL draft war

Uncommon commons: In more than 30 years in sportscards publishing I have thrown hundreds of notes into files about the players – usually non-star players – who made up the majority of the baseball and football cards I collected as a kid. Today, I keep adding to those files as I peruse microfilms of The Sporting News from the 1880s through the 1960s. I found these tidbits brought some life to the player pictures on those cards. I figure that if I enjoyed them, you might too.


I was barely cognizant of college football in 1959. Thus I have no first-hand recollection of that most heartbreaking of Ole Miss losses, on Halloween night when LSU’s Billy Cannon’s 89-yard punt return gave the Tigers a 7-3 victory and possibly cost the Rebels the national championship.


Ole Miss got its revenge in the Sugar Bowl, shutting out LSU 21-0, including the first touchdown pass thrown them in 14 games, while holding the Tigers to a negative 15 yards of offense. Cannon was held to eight yards on six carries.

Winner of the Heisman Trophy, Billy Cannon was one of the biggest names to appear in Fleer’s inaugural American Football League card set in the summer of 1960.

As I mentioned on the back of my 1955 All-American style custom card of Cannon, he went on to a modestly successful pro football career before turning to dentistry and counterfeiting.

Until I read the microfilm of The Sporting News for 1960, however, I was unaware of the NFL-AFL bidding war for which Cannon was the prize.

He was the L.A. Rams first-round selection in the NFL draft, but under the goal posts in New Orleans after the Sugar Bowl, Cannon signed a contract to play for the Houston Oilers.

Rams’ general manager Pete Rozelle fumed, threatening to take Cannon and the Oilers to court, claiming, “I have a legal, valid and binding contract with Cannon.”

What did it take for the Oilers to sign Cannon?

According to TSN, Houston gave Cannon a signing bonus and three-year contract that totaled $100,000.


Off-season, Cannon would join Houston owner Bud Adams in the “oil bidness,” operating three service stations for $1,000 a month each, plus 50 percent of the profits.


Cannon also received a band new Cadillac.


Left open for discussion was a proposal for Cannon to lend his name to a chain of “Billy Cannon Health Centers” that Adams would open throughout Texas.


Obviously the Oilers hadn’t been scared off by Cannon’s lackluster performance in the Sugar Bowl. And their confidence must have been restored on Jan. 10, when he starred in the East’s 34-8 win over the West in the Hula Bowl.


In his last college football game, playing for his LSU coach Paul Dietzel, Cannon returned a punt 59 yards for a touchdown in the first three minutes of the game. He scored again on a 12-yard pass from Penn State’s Richie Lucas and capped his college career with a four-yard TD run.


Today, Billy Cannon’s rookie card (at top) in the 1960 Fleer set is among the most valuable of that issue, worth $25-40 in NM condition. The 1955 All-American card shown here is my custom card tribute to Cannon.

Jim Lindsey was no goober

Uncommon commons: In more than 30 years in sportscards publishing I have thrown hundreds of notes into files about the players – usually non-star players – who made up the majority of the baseball and football cards I collected as a kid. Today, I keep adding to those files as I peruse microfilms of The Sporting News from the 1880s through the 1960s. I found these tidbits brought some life to the player pictures on those cards. I figure that if I enjoyed them, you might too.



Jim Lindsey was the ace reliever of the 1930 St. Louis Cardinals. He was big ol’ boy from Jackson, La., who rarely ventured north of the Mason-Dixon line except on baseball business.


Perhaps that’s why Cards GM Branch Rickey thought he could hornswaggle Lindsey in a salary negotiation.


Towards the end of the 1930 season, Lindsey went into Rickey’s office to discuss terms for 1931.


“I started to tell Rickey that I had been in 22 winning games,” Lindsey recalled. “Then I noticed that Branch stepped on a dummy bell device. The phone rang. He picked it up and made up a conversation with someone connected to the Houston farm club.


“When Rickey hung up, he moaned that the club was set back financially because at the moment he had received word of a tragedy in Houston. Rickey said that the Cardinals had been offered $100,000 for a Houston shortstop, but the kid had broken his leg the night before.”


Hoping that Lindsey would sympathize and be inclined to take less money, Rickey smiled manfully and said, “Now, what were we talking about, Jim?”


Lindsey said that he’d tell Rickey as soon as B.R. explained the phony phone device. Trapped, Rickey confessed and quickly offered Lindsey a $2,000 raise.


That was big boost in those days, and Lindsey quickly snapped it up.


After retiring from baseball, Lindsey went to work for the state of Louisiana, supervising the farms at five mental institutions.


Lindsey didn’t appear on any of the mainstream bubblegum cards of the 1930s, but he is included in the 1931 Cardinals team photo pack, and probably a few other regional issues.


The card pictured here is from the 1974 TCMA “Gas House Gang” team set of the 1934 Cardinals.

Middle-aged umpires + Twenty-something "dancers" = trouble

Uncommon commons: In more than 30 years in sportscards publishing I have thrown hundreds of notes into files about the players – usually non-star players – who made up the majority of the baseball and football cards I collected as a kid. Today, I keep adding to those files as I peruse microfilms of The Sporting News from the 1880s through the 1960s. I found these tidbits brought some life to the player pictures on those cards. I figure that if I enjoyed them, you might too.

Two of the umpires featured in the 1955 Bowman high-numbers subset of arbiters nearly appeared in the pages of a scandal sheet when they were victims of the old badger game in 1960.

On Aug. 26, while working games in Washington, D.C., American League umpires Bill McKinley, age 50, and Ed Runge, 42, met a 21-year-old stripper in the Gaity Supper Club, which The Sporting News described as “a joint on Baltimore’s ‘The Block,’ a section of gaudy raucous night clubs.”


The stripper, said to specialize in the Egyptian belly dance, was introduced to the umpires by the club’s manager.


Two nights later, the umpires found themselves at a Hyattsville, Md., motel, with the stripper and another dancer, age 24.


Two men soon burst into the room with a camera, snapped a photo and said, See you in court,” before fleeing.


The umpires returned to their hotel in Washington, and after a night of “soul-searching” decided to call in the Baltimore police.


That night, an envelope with a print of the incriminating photo and a phone number was slipped under the umps’ hotel room door.


Phoning the number, they were instructed to meet after the next day’s game and warned that, unless payment was made, the “picture would be sent to some scandal magazine and the American League president,” and possibly the umpires’ homes.


The initial blackmail demand was for $5,000 in exchange for the negative. When Runge and McKinley said they couldn’t come up with that kind of money, one of the extortionists told them, “You can square this thing by doing business on the field,” an offer the umpires said they turned down immediately.


Following several phone and personal negotiations, the blackmailers agreed to settle for $3,000 and a game to be thrown.


Just like on television, when the blackmailers met the umpires at a Baltimore airport, the police were waiting.


According to New York sports columnist Dick Young, “The two shakedown artists were tough, gun-carrying hoods.” Young said that when the trap was set, one state trooper “was stationed with a tommy-gun, another with a shotgun, at opposite ends of the waiting room."


The two cameramen and the dancer who had first made contact with Runge and McKinley were charged with attempted extortion. The second stripper was held as a material witness, presumably upon her agreement to testify against the others. She told the papers, “It is the old story—you can’t be too careful about the company you keep.”


American League president Joe Cronin said, “I’m happy that the umpires reported the incident. It’s the first time in 75 years that anyone has tried to tamper with an umpire.”


Cronin then granted the umps’ “request” for a leave of absence for the remaining three weeks of the season.


In praising Cronin for his actions, The Sporting News later said that the league president had “furloughed” the frisky umpires. “There are overtones and undertones to all this that are not altogether happy,” TSN editorialized, pointing out that if allowed back on the field “until the whole thing is settled,” Runge and McKinley “could be the subject of criticism or abuse.” You think?


In the tradition of many other wives of politicians, celebrities and athletes caught with their hand in the nookie jar, Runge’s wife publicly stood beside him and “declared she was satisfied her husband had done nothing wrong.”


“They don’t come any better than Ed,” Mrs. Runge said, “He’s never done anything to be ashamed of in his life.”

If Mrs. McKinley made any public statement, it was not reported by TSN.

I didn't read far enough ahead in The Sporting News to find out what justice was meted out to the blackmailers. There doesn't seem to have been any long-term consequences to McKinley's and Runge's umpiring careers arising from their indiscretion. McKinley continued to serve as an American League umpire until 1965, Runge until 1970.

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Cards' Smith was hillbilly entertainer

Uncommon commons: In more than 30 years in sportscards publishing I have thrown hundreds of notes into files about the players – usually non-star players – who made up the majority of the baseball and football cards I collected as a kid. Today, I keep adding to those files as I peruse microfilms of The Sporting News from the 1880s through the 1960s. I found these tidbits brought some life to the player pictures on those cards. I figure that if I enjoyed them, you might too.



In an article in the May 4, 1960, Sporting News, Ralph Ray reviewed the off-field “talents” of various members of the St. Louis Cardinals whom he characterized as manager Solly Hemus’ “Rollicking Redbirds.”


The article was evidently an attempt to distract fans from the Cardinals 7th place finish in 1959 and questionable prospects for 1960, amid speculation that Stan Musial, who had batted a career low .255 in 1959, was through as a ballplayer. Musial rebounded some, to .275 in 1960, and the Cards finished third in the National League.


Among the hidden talents that Ray revealed was that catcher Hal R. Smith (not to be confused with Hal W. Smith, also a catcher, for the Pirates), “the club’s No. 1 entertainer, plays a mean boogie-woogie piano.”


Labeling Smith as a “bench wit . . . sharp with repartee,” Ray said that Smith was a writer of western songs, with two dozen titles among his credits.


Noting that none of Smith’s songs would, “threaten the hit parade,” Ray listed some of the titles as “Robot Romp,” “”Sittin’, Spittin and Whittlin’,” “Pretty Near But Not Plumb,” “30 Yards of Petticoat and a Nickel’s Worth of Gum,” and “I’ve Got a Churnful of Chitlins and a Belly Full of You.” Hal wrote the lyrics, his brother Ronald, a former minor leaguer, wrote the music.


Ray reported that Smith’s music had been performed on the network live network TV program “Ozark Jubilee,” and that his “30 Yards of Petticoat . . .” had been recorded by a C&W group called the Baraga Brothers, though a google-search of that name comes up empty.


Early Sunday mornings, Smith appeared on KMOX radio as a “hillbilly disc jockey.” He told the reporter disc jockeying was something he would pursue after baseball.


Mindful of the need to maintain fan interest, the team hired Smith to work the off-season as a speaker. He appeared before more than 100 groups after the 1959 season, entertaining the fans with baseball story and introducing Cardinals films played for the audiences.

Smith had debuted with St. Louis in 1956. He'd been an All-Star in 1959, batting .270 with 13 home runs. He played with the Cardinals into the 1961 season, when her was diagnosed with a heart condition that ended his playing career. He coached with the Cardinals, Pirates, Reds and Brewers after his playing days. He had a four-game "comeback" with Pittsburgh in 1965, and was 0-for-3.

Tim Flannery, an infielder with the San Diego Padres 1979-1989, is Smith's nephew.