A walk down glove memory lane

[softball66]

David Cunningham's latest glove book "Baseball Gloves Merge With America's Past" just arrived and I thought I'd received an antique glove from Brother Dave. His book cover cleverly utilizes an image of antique glove leather and, like Dave says on his cover, it's . . . . "A Fielders Dream Glove Collection." With this and John Graham's magnificent book highlighting his extensive collection and JD's web site, it's hard not to find a great glove that we don't admire or desire. But there's no chance of overdosing on vintage gloves is there?

And I find useful the way Dave has his newest formatted and organized throughout with his own personal touches of family photos and timelines of events of America's past.

I'll be showing off this latest addition to our glovers' library at our Dallas glove meeting here Saturday!

[ebbets55]

Our great hobby is getting all kinds of publicity lately with the Tornado Palm, Brett on ESPN E-60, Joe's comments in the Dallas Morning News, John Graham's book and now Dave's enjoyable follow-up book entitled Baseball Gloves Merge With America's Past in which Dave weaves an American historical thread through the evolution of ball gloves. This new book has many more glove pictures and pages than his two previous books and was written with the love and memories of his dad in mind.

Great job Dave. The hobby can always use more glove books. Thank you.

Dave can fill you in on all the specifics if you contact him directly at cunninghamd1707@yahoo.com. He's selling this book for $24. Please chime in with the details Dave.

JD

[stockbuddy]

Hi guys,

This is a lengthy post. Not sure it will all fit.

Thanks goes to Joe and JD for sharing some info. on my new glove book, “Baseball Gloves Merge With America’s Past” As some of you know this is my third book dealing with glove evolution. I do believe this will be my last solo authorship effort in writing a glove book. I just can't envision finding enough different vintage web styles and glove styles that it will warrant another glove evolution book being written by me. I want this book to reach interested glovers and those outside of our hobby. I hope it will then bring in new people to this cool hobby once they read through this third book.

I want those who purchased my previous book called “A Visual History of Ball Gloves” to realize the similarities and differences between my previous glove book and this third book. I want former buyers to realize there is going to be a significant overlap of glove pictures and glove evolution information that was used from the previous books. If you bought my last book and you feel this book to be too similar I will totally understand your passing on picking up this new book. However, there are some new glove images and expanded glove sections in this new book. Below, I have summarized the similarities and differences so a previous buyer can make an informed decision as to whether to purchase this new book. I also want the reader of this new book to get a feel for what the American culture was like over the various decades the old gloves were being manufactured and then highlight various inventions and discoveries and accomplishments that were made during the decades from the mid-1800’s through the mid- 1950’s. Below is the comparison of books.

"A Visual History of Ball Gloves"

85 different baseball glove styles and webs styles
65 different web (in web ID section)
14 group web shots
12 vintage softball gloves
over 180 glove related images
28 pages cover to cover (stapled)
glove evolution only

"Baseball Gloves Merge With America's Past"

112 different baseball glove styles and web styles ( 27 new glove images)
80 different web (in Web ID section, 15 new webs identified)\
16 group web shots (2 new group web shots)
12 new glove loft shots
39 vintage softball gloves)
60 pages cover-to-cover with laminated flat cover and perfect binding
over 300 glove related images plus 45 non-glove related images
Glove evoloution, American culture, lifestyles,discoveries and inventions and type coin pics.

Pricing of this new book is as follows:

22.00 to previous buyers of either of my glove books (this includes the shipping) A previous buyer discount.

24.00 to new buyers on Brett’s glove forum, Mike Wakefield’s glove forum and JD's website (this includes the shipping) A glove forum discount.

To get one of the above discounts I must have you PayPal me at cunninghamd1707@yahoo.com or just mail me a personal check made payable to:
David Cunningham
1707 Mary Lane
Olney, IL 62450

I do need your shipping address so I make sure to send the book to the correct mailing address.
Please do not buy from my ebay link as I can not give any discounts through ebay. They charge to many fees. Ebay buyers will need to pay 27.00 (includes shipping)

My ebay link to the glove book is below. The ebay link just offers you some sample pages from the book and a bit more info.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... CA:US:1123

I think the new printer company did a nice job with this book, I hope you will agree should you purchase a book.
.
Thanks to all who purchased one of my glove books in the past. I do hope those that buy this new book will find it offers a new learning experience surrounding both glove evolution and America’s past.

Feel free to email me with any questions you might have. My email address is cunninghamd1707@yahoo.com

Thanks guys.

Dave

[stockbuddy]

Guys,

I forgot to add there are 2 new sections found in this new glove book that were not in the previous book. I have listed them below.

1. New section dealing with a comparison of vintage baseball gloves to that of vintage softball gloves
2. New section dealing a bit with glove labels, wrist fasteners and embossments.

Dave

[BigD-Moonlight]

I received my copy of Dave's new book last night and I really enjoyed it. Good job Dave!

As a matter of fact, we had a glove meeting at my home today and Joe and I both were bragging about the new book from Dave and the other guys had me send Dave's e-mail address to them so that they can order their own copy.

Good to see our glove collecting hobby getting nice promotion.

[stockbuddy]

Hi John,

Thanks so much for the interest in the book and the kind words too. This past week I became a Grandpa for the second time. This time my son and his wife had a little boy. I wonder if he will like old gloves. My grandson's birth trumps giving birth to this new book too. Books are neat and important to our hobby but one can't beat the birth of a grandbaby.

A couple of months ago a cool thing happened that centers around my "Fielder's Dream Glove Collection" and books. I have been reluctant to mention it on the glove forum as I will not get a complete confirmation about this event until sometime in January, but it does center on promotion of our glove hobby. The collection and my book(s) may be shown on a tv program called Heartland Highways. They came to my home about 2 months ago and were filming for 2 1/2 hours. That program focuses on unique stories and interesting collections in Illinois, Indiana and Missouri. It should initially air near the Spring months but they are to send me a letter in January to tell me when in the Spring it will air, I believe on four local channels. Once that airs on Heartland Highways it will be turned over to RFD (Rural Farm Development program) which does their own scheduling of programs. I believe RFD is a national tv program that can be seen on Dish, Comcast packages and a few others.

I tried to get them to film the resouces for our hobby such as Joe's books, your new book and mine and mentioned about the websites of Brett, Mike and JD but the producer just wanted to focus on my collection and my glove book(s). I still talked about our books as resources and yet that 2 1/2 program will be edited down to under 10 minutes (which includes a commercial so really about 7 or 8 minutes) on the Heartland Highway program. I had no control over what they will edit out or keep in. I just hope I did not say something incorrectly in the way of information. Heartland Highways program last about 30 minutes long with about 3 different unique stories, so that breaks it into the 10 minute thing.

I can share with the glove forum once I get a confirmation date on the air time for those that may be interested on the glove forums.

I guess my enthusiam for the hobby and the old gloves is still there. Perhaps some of the veteran collectors can write their book next, for all of us to read. John, you and I know the time, effort and energy that goes into making these books happen. Actually, these books took the efforts of many folks from the reviewers to the printer people. I hope we see more interest in this hobby over time.

As I mentioned in a prior post, I am likely not doing another solo effort on a glove book. I had 200 books ran off on this first run. I am down to 150 remaining. Unless, I find an outlet for this new book that can create a large order I will not be doing another run on books. To get my printing cost down to something even close to a small profit on a book I have to order 200 books at a time. I am sure you and Joe well know how these orders go. My previously used printer used to let me run 25 books at a time, this new printer, which creates a nicer looking book in my humble opinion, would do the same, but my cost would be nearly 20.00 each per book. That would not include various taxes, supplies, shipping and gas to drive the books to the post office and time and effort to get the books out to people. So, it would be nice to get books ran for free, but that is not the case.

Thanks John for commenting on my new book. If other glovers buy this new book I hope they will share their comments on the glove forums too, good bad or ugly. I appreciate all those who have bought books in the past and if you get this last book I hope you will enjoy it too.

Dave

[stockbuddy]

Hi John,

Thanks so much for the interest in the book and the kind words too. This past week I became a Grandpa for the second time. This time my son and his wife had a little boy. I wonder if he will like old gloves. My grandson's birth trumps giving birth to this new book too. Books are neat and important to our hobby but one can't beat the birth of a grandbaby.

A couple of months ago a cool thing happened that centers around my "Fielder's Dream Glove Collection" and books. I have been reluctant to mention it on the glove forum as I will not get a complete confirmation about this event until sometime in January, but it does center on promotion of our glove hobby. The collection and my book(s) may be shown on a tv program called Heartland Highways. They came to my home about 2 months ago and were filming for 2 1/2 hours. That program focuses on unique stories and interesting collections in Illinois, Indiana and Missouri. It should initially air near the Spring months but they are to send me a letter in January to tell me when in the Spring it will air, I believe on four local channels. Once that airs on Heartland Highways it will be turned over to RFD (Rural Farm Development program) which does their own scheduling of programs. I believe RFD is a national tv program that can be seen on Dish, Comcast packages and a few others.

I tried to get them to film the resouces for our hobby such as Joe's books, your new book and mine and mentioned about the websites of Brett, Mike and JD but the producer just wanted to focus on my collection and my glove book(s). I still talked about our books as resources and yet that 2 1/2 program will be edited down to under 10 minutes (which includes a commercial so really about 7 or 8 minutes) on the Heartland Highway program. I had no control over what they will edit out or keep in. I just hope I did not say something incorrectly in the way of information. Heartland Highways program last about 30 minutes long with about 3 different unique stories, so that breaks it into the 10 minute thing.

I can share with the glove forum once I get a confirmation date on the air time for those that may be interested on the glove forums.

I guess my enthusiam for the hobby and the old gloves is still there. Perhaps some of the veteran collectors can write their book next, for all of us to read. John, you and I know the time, effort and energy that goes into making these books happen. Actually, these books took the efforts of many folks from the reviewers to the printer people. I hope we see more interest in this hobby over time.

As I mentioned in a prior post, I am likely not doing another solo effort on a glove book. I had 200 books ran off on this first run. I am down to 150 remaining. Unless, I find an outlet for this new book that can create a large order I will not be doing another run on books. To get my printing cost down to something even close to a small profit on a book I have to order 200 books at a time. I am sure you and Joe well know how these orders go. My previously used printer used to let me run 25 books at a time, this new printer, which creates a nicer looking book in my humble opinion, would do the same, but my cost would be nearly 20.00 each per book. That would not include various taxes, supplies, shipping and gas to drive the books to the post office and time and effort to get the books out to people. So, it would be nice to get books ran for free, but that is not the case.

Thanks John for commenting on my new book. If other glovers buy this new book I hope they will share their comments on the glove forums too, good bad or ugly. I appreciate all those who have bought books in the past and if you get this last book I hope you will enjoy it too.

Dave

[GloveCrazy]

Good job on the book, Dave! Got mine the other day and I think it is a real nice upgrade. Thanks for all the hard work you put into it!

[stockbuddy]

Hey Rob, Glad you liked this book. Each book has been a learning experience for me and this one required a lot of digging into both baseball history and US history. Thanks for sharing your comment .

Dave

[jpop43]

Just received a copy of Dave's latest book and am looking forward to checking out all the meticulous research he did in the way of glove design and innovation, particulalry as they paralleled all the advancements in American industry, technology, and culture...quite an interesting concept and one of particular interest to a history enthusiast like myself. Thanks for your contribution to the hobby, Dave.