Vintage Baseball Glove Forum

A telltale feature of some Goldsmith gloves in the 1930's-40"s was the "No Rip Thumb" design. I thought the patent was related to the one piece face.
Below is a Harry Craft model.


Below is a Charles Gehringer model.



The catalog description focuses on the one piece face of the gloves and I assumed the patent was related to that feature.
below is a 1934 Goldsmith catalog page

Below is a 1940 catalog page


I could not find any patent in the 1933-34 period that described a one piece face. I then remembered that many early gloves were manufactured with a one piece face and that particular feature was common practice and not patentable.


I looked more closely at the Goldsmith gloves and saw that the one unique feature was a design of the thumb seam protector. Most thumb seam protectors wrap around the base of the thumb but the Goldsmith design called for a tongue of leather sewn at the crotch between the thumb and forefinger. Below is a close-up of that feature.


The patent was easier to narrow down and the "No Rip Thumb" design was patented in 1934 by Alban Richey. Below is a detail of the patent that shows the construction of the tongue of leather(#10) attached to the forefinger seam(#11) and covering the thumb seam at the crotch.

Nicely researched, Mike. Amazing how many small improvements and variations of design there were on baseball gloves. This is from Ken-Wel's 1928 catalog. They did patent their version of a seamless thumb, also.



I want this glove.

I didn't know that KenWel even had a one piece face model. I have seen the 1924 Joseph Kabat patent in passing but never connected it to KenWel. I like the way the thumb seam curves back and dies into the wrist strap instead of the heel. That is good research on your part.

Thanks Mike. I just came across the catalog recently, otherwise I had no idea that they made one, either. I've never seen a Ken-Wel with that feature. I wonder if they were only made that way for a short time.

Thanks to this old post and JD's website I finally found some info on a glove I've had for a long time. It has a very faint, small W Berger signature, but except for No-Rip Thumb and Patent Applied For, the rest of the stampings are gone. Anyway, it looks like it was made by D&M in 1932. It has the same type thumb seam protector as the Goldsmith.