Drifting Off To Sleep???

[softball66]

Appears the glove forum's a bit drowsy.
I'd like to hear from guys about the "STRANGEST" glove in their collection!
I've got a few.
Docktor Strange Glove

[vintagebrett]

I've shared this before but it's definitely my strangest glove:

[softball66]

Brett that color matches my army fatigue outfit. Why Olive tanned leather?
Do you think it was a custom but I guess I could look it up in the Rawlings catalogs i have to see what other colors were listed.
I think I've found the color on this 1b mitt. The 1928 Rawlings Catalog shows basemitts being made in a "willow" horse hide. If I'm seening the word willow right to describe a color then Willow fits the greenish look. And
this color continues into the 1930s.

[Number9]

It's fairly common for late 19th and very early 20th century gloves to be manufactured in colors that we would deem strange today. I think it had to do with these items being considered an accessory that one would wear on the diamond as opposed to a piece of protective equipment. The Victorian era was very well accessorized and the attention to detail far exceeded what we consider to be the norm today. Consider other period equipment like collared lace-up jerseys and tall boots (with a heel!) in the same context and the "fashion" colors start to make sense. Baseball was more of a gentlemanly sporting exhibition in the earlier days than the dusty game it became at the turn of the last century. While it was made a good twenty years later, I would consider Brett's glove to be more of a bridge to an earlier era. I wasn't uncommon during the 1920's for the same style glove to be white. Think of how out of place that would look today.

[stockbuddy]

Hi Joe and others,

My strangest glove is a buckleweb, buckleback crescent padded glove. LOL I traded JD my unique novelty ambidextrous glove similar to the one like Brett shows from the February 2009 gloves of the month category, on this forum. It was a great trade for us both. He is knee deep into the novelty gloves and I and up to my waist deep into the unique webs of the old timer gloves.


Both gloves are odd and very unique.

Dave

[stockbuddy]

Joe, Here is my strange combo glove!!
http://www.baseballglovecollector.com/g ... k+Dave.jpg


Dave

[softball66]

Dave, on that crescent, look how open that wrist opening is. Hardly anything to protect the back of the hand on scrapes. And how the Crescent is padded far more heavily on the thumb end and tapers to the bottom of the glove.

[stockbuddy]

Hi Joe,

There doesn't seem to be much wrist protection on those old timer buckleback gloves. The old buckle web, buckleback crescent glove
has a pretty uniform size crescent padd (wide all the way) on the front of this glove, so I am thinking you are looking at the front of my other cp which is as you describe it (wide on the thumb and then tapers towards the bottom). Joe, click on the glove image on the left of my cp buckleback, buckleweb and that one is the front of the old buckleweb glove. It has a wide crescent throughout. The one you may be looking at is my other cp found on JD's website that has a wrist strap and button on it.

Let me know if that makes sense. LOL

Dave

[ebbets55]

Number9, great observations but I don't know if I agree with you bud. I wouldn't consider it a bridge to an earlier era. While the Victorian age of Base Ball was long over by the turn of the century, the first gloves and gloves through the 90's weren't common at all in that color. They were a lot more neutral, discreet or drab in color. Olive and similar colors appeared a lot in the catalogs up through the teens and 20's mostly due to different tanning techniques and qualities and types of leather. Gloves were quite advanced by the 20's and were made in a huge variety of sizes, shapes, qualities and color. If you go through the Source Book, you see that color come up quite often yet we never see them. Brett, that mitt is super cool and probably the only basemitt of that color I have ever seen on a non-buckskin model. That color on horsehide is what makes it unique to me.

JD

[Number9]

JD, what I meant by the term bridge was simply that this style, in terms of color only, was a connection to an earlier era. You are correct that there were certainly other gloves that were produced around the same time frame as Brett's that were manufactured using colored leather, however, those gloves were not produced in large numbers relative to the best selling models, making them not the norm despite what the source book may indicate. Also, the days of colored gloves in general were ending heading into the twenties in favor of the tans to reddish browns. As for the Victorian era, it is widely accepted to have ended in 1901. Barely a generation away from Brett's glove. Hence the bridge. The fact that we don't see more money green basemitts speaks volumes about their production numbers because we've all seen countless white, black, and brown variations. And you're right JD, the fact that it's horsehide and not buckskin is significant.

I've been studying 19th century baseball for some time and, like you, I've always thought of the light colored gloves made by Spalding and Reach as being the standard issue. However, there were a handful of independent makers, who collectively produced a lot, and the variation of colors and styles is amazing. In my research, outside of the big two, there was a lot more being produced than just neutrals before the turn of the century.

Anyway, I could go on forever about this stuff. So, in closing, I'll just state for the record that we are in complete agreement that Brett's glove is awesome.

[softball66]

Now gentlemen, this is what I call an informative and productive glove session. I love all the comments as it makes us dig a little deeper into a subject undiscussed heretofore I think.
Remember the apochrophal Albert Spalding story about Waite wearing a flesh color glove so as to not tip off he was wearing a glove and Spalding later wearing a clearly identifiable colored glove. I'm sure these might have been buckskin gloves. There was a lot of buckskin used early probably some calfskin worked in. I'm not sure when exactly horsehide was introduced (oh, and don't forget the wapiti elk at D&Ms) maybe in early 1900s.
Tanners were probably asked just to provide the same "drab" colors for gloves, browns, tans, grays, (I like the "mouse color" used in glove descriptions but I'm sure colors began to be worked in probably before the turn of the last century.
Remember the run of colored gloves in the 1970s of the Reds, Blues, few Greens. We'd see the sun and water faded pink (from Red) pale blues in the flea markets etc. We ran a funny pickup newsletter story of the young man who had the misfortune of being given a Red glove that he hated (the color of a Baboon's butt, as he wrote). Nocona had a run of patriotic color gloves while I was doing their work. The fast pitch King,
Eddie Feigner asked for color gloves in red white and blue.
Getting these gloves adds a little color dynamics to our displays for sure.
In my Andy Michael newsletter story I'll make mention of the ugliest glove (homemade) I've ever seen. I think I've posted picture here. Andy was the one who sent it to me and it wound up with Ron Carlson.

[ebbets55]

Great posts guys. Number9, thanks for clarifying. We are exactly on the same page. We have to trade reading lists. Like you, I have a passion for 19th century baseball and have read a handful of great books these last couple of years. I agree that the Victorian era was done at about the time that second rival league started in '01. We'll call it the rookie minor leagues. Would love to see some crazy colored 19th century gloves. I have seen a few Peck & Snyder books and a few other '90's catalogs and I just don't see them in crazy colors. Who were the companies you are referring to? Would love to put the catalogs or pictures in the Library. Thanks.

JD

[vintagebrett]

Wow! I'm glad my weird glove iniated a great discussion.

I've wondered whether my glove was made for a special occasion or as a one time thing. I have not come across another glove with the same "greenness" to it as this one - it's not really olive in real life - almost a dirty Kelly green. The tag is odd too because it's the only Rawlings I've seen that is white with black lettering.

The different coloring of gloves is a cool topic. I'd agree that from 1900 to 1920's you'd see many different shades of leather. I wonder if the depression and WWII stopped this practice because of cost and availability. I don't know what goes into chaging the color of the leather but I'm sure there would be some cost associated with it. I'm guessing a pitcher couldn't use a white glove in this era because it would be a rules violation.

[softball66]

J. D.'s point about color (or maybe showing color in the 19th century catalogs) is a good point. I don't believe color lithography came along until after that century. I did not see any color catalogs (especially the gloves in colors) I believe until the 1905- 1910 period. Correct me if I'm wrong.
On glove descriptions in these catalogs we did get variations, drab, mouse color, tan, brown, black etc. I suspect there might have been some setup or production problems at the tanneries where they wanted different color finished leathers and provided for this as they were using same sort of leather thicknesses for women's purses and some furnishings.

[Number9]

The most likely reason for the lack of specialty colors showing up is quite simply that the glove makers couldn't support the production of these leathers on their own. Like Joe mentioned, the leathers were likely intended for other purposes as well, not exclusively baseball gloves. Draper started out making buckskin work and winter gloves and slowly transitioned into sporting goods over the course of a few years. Other makers probably bought leather that was intended for shoes, bags, etc.

JD, I'd love to expand my reading list. That is one area of my study that is sorely lacking. I've done the bulk of my research studying the physical objects. If you have reference material I'd love to see it, print, online, or otherwise. I'll try to get you photographs for the library.

Since most of the gloves that I have handled are not marked in any way, it's extremely difficult to say who was making what. I'm working on that information but it may be a while before the dots line up. This will be an ongoing process, but, I'm hopeful that I'll be able to release the results of my effort in the coming months. You guys will be among the first to know.

William