Glove of the Week: Nov 12 - Nov 18 (White D&M Ruth G41)

[burker72]

What an unbelievable week for gloves, headed up the Ruth…

So, first up is the Babe Ruth D&M G41 model. This glove has been covered a bit already in the forum, and deservedly so. This is the same model that Ruth himself actually used. It looks like D&M produced the G41 from ’23-’27, with the Ruth endorsement going to Spalding after that. The $2800 selling price brought up the matter of whether or not the market for gloves is cooling down. The glove jumped to $2100 right away but didn’t move much after that. I believe the other thread mentioned $4000 as a more reasonable price, and I would agree. I searched the forum, and I don’t see another G41 as having been sold in recent memory (I know there was another one at the same time, but it failed to show a good pic of the endorsement…well???) so it is hard to compare one way or another in recent memory. If there is a slump, I’d have thought it would affect lower end gloves.


11 bids $2800

A Spalding crescent padded workman's style glove earned $1175 on 17 bids. Not 100% certain, but this might have been the same one sold at the Hunt Auction recently, covered in last week’s thread.



A great J.C. Higgins Grover Cleveland Alexander model glove sold for $317 on 14 bids. A strong endorsement, patch and without ink, the glove shows very well. The seller called this a 1678 model, although the ’26 and ’27 Sears catalogs refer to a 1676 GC Alexander model – both high end gloves.



The MacGregor GC12 Willie Mays Personal Model debuted in 1966. This one sold for $260 on 14 bids. Now I know we are talking about appealing to two very different types of collectors, and as nice as this one is, I’d take the similarly priced GC Alexander any day.



Forum member Bravosin99 sold this super sharp full size Simmons American full web. This is a beautiful glove that earned $200 on 15 bids. Bravosin99 was only asking $225 on the forum, so his auction got close to his asking price. I’m pretty sure if I ran into this glove in person I’d pay between $300 and $400 if the condition is as good as it looks.



A real rarity here, a 1920s Herb Pennock model. A lefty, unknown manufacturer, and good but not great shape, despite all this the seller still earned over $600 with this one.





Here are a handful of good gloves to round out the week…
Wilson model #511 Virgil Davis Catcher’s mitt : $312 on 11 bids

Unknown manufacturer, George Kelly buckle back B15M (?) model baseball mitt. The glove has the words "George Kelly Model" in block letters on the top of the glove. Under that it has the brand name which I can't figure out. It has a picture of a setting sun. Un der that is the model number of B15M (I think): $236 on 10 bids

JC Higgins Lou Gerhrig model. The lack of a good image of the endorsement held the price down on this one: $225 on 10 bids

Wilson Roger Hornsby 10L (?) model: $89 on 10 bids

[softball66]

Thanks Burker!... always enjoy your posts and opinions on latest listings.
I happened to be going thru old glove newsletters and noticed that the May 2003 (#79) issue had headline of "Nice Ruth D&M G41 Soars on EBay."
The glove in question a fairly nice G41 Ruth sold for final bid of $5,665.
Quote from Dave Bushing saying he thought it was highest price paid for store model glove without its box and tags.
Of course that could have changed since then.
Some of those '20s gloves still sneak in like Pennock and recently Fred Toney. Keeps it interesting.
I just looked at what the owner thought was a GC12 that might have been a Mays gamer (had #24 markered in under the wrist) but the glove had no provenance at all. Just too weak to speculate.
By the way, does anyone have any idea when MacGregor quit its U.S. operations and started bringing in all its gloves from Japan? Mid to Late 1970s? We've not seen any hard information on when this happened.

[Bravosin99]

Burker-

Thanks for posting such nice compliments on the Simmons.....It was very hard for us to let the glove go and watch it only make it to 200.00....This was one of our first "older" gloves we added to our collection when we first started....We thought it would go higher at the end having over 30 watchers but it never moved anymore .....Some of the good stuff just doesn't seem to be selling as well as it used too....Thanks again, Josh

[vintagebrett]

You could have had the Hornbsy and Kelly for the same price as the Virgil Davis. Don't get me wrong, it looks really nice but the other two are bit harder to come by. I was shocked that Hornsby didn't go higher - it seems the prices on his gloves have come down. I wonder with so many nice gloves up at one time, if that didn't have an effect on the prices of some of them.

[Centerfield]

The stampings on the Pennock gloves leads me to believe that it was manufactured by Brine. Any thoughts?

[ebbets55]

Great posts guys. I just wanted to try to shed some light on two of the mystery manufacturers. Most of you know, I'm a brand guy and I love to try to identify the off-brands.

The Pennock appears to be a Bon Tober and the George Kelly setting sun glove could be a Horace Partridge as their stampings and tags have rising or setting suns on them. Both of those manufacturers line up nicely with the time period of those endorsed gloves.

I have only ever seen one other Herb Pennock glove and it was a D&M. Although the stampings were light, I believe it just said Herb Pennock as opposed to Herbert J. Pennock leading me to believe it was another manufacturer other than D&M. I would bet money on Bon Tober.

JD

[Centerfield]

I'll bet you! Look at the Joe Cronin Brine photo that's on your website and compare the company stampings on the palm to the Pennock's. Very similar. My money's on a Brine!

[Centerfield]

On second thought, looks like I'll lose the bet! Though the logo looks extremely simialr to Brine's, there appears to be "Bon Tober" stampings on the left side of the shield. This leads to the next question. Did one company manufacture for the other or were they independent?

[vintagebrett]

I'm going to go with Brine as well - I've seen a couple of Brine items and they have that shield symbol like the Pennock glove does. I think the stamping on the left side of the shield says Boston, not Bon Tober. The Tober gloves were made in Rockville, CT - I drive through it on my way to work. When I have some free time I'm going to pop into their library and see if they have any information on the company.

[Centerfield]

In that case, is it too late to retract my last statement and double down on my bet

Tough endorser to find. The leather looks like it'll clean nicely and leave an antique patina. Nice pickup for a pre-war HoF or Yankee collector.

Speaking of Yankee gloves. I have to touch on the G41 Ruth for a moment. Things are out of whack here. That's one of the nicest white Ruths to come available in some time and it only fetched $2800. Much more plentiful Mantles are reaching four digits (Mantle child-sized gloves are topping $500) and an enhanced Cy Young produced well after his career ended is already above $600. Did everyone simply assume the Ruth was going to skyrocket and decided not to bid? That's my excuse. Granted, the winner may have had a $6000 bid in there. You never know. In retrospect, I should have thrown in a $3200 or $3600 bid. I may have gotten it. And even at those prices I think it would have been a steel. $2800 is grand larceny!

[burker72]

If you told the Ruth-seller it would only land $2800 I am sure it never would have made it to eBay.

I never liked the Hutch Cy Young models. I really don't like that style of leather, there is no shape or feel to it. The Young and Simmons jobs are really nice, the "inking" actually suits the glove, since it they are in good condition. The Johnson model looks ridiculous. You have an absolute beater of a glove with a pristine endorsement, c'mon.

Nobody has talked about the Gehrig. Do you guys think it was really a Gehrig model? If you saw the auction listing you know there was a weak pic of the endorsement. There aren't any truly unique characteristics of the glove that would allow you to unequivocally call it a Gehrig glove, so who knows. The final price was so low though, even the Belknap brand Gehrig brings in $600 or more. Was it worth the chance?

[Centerfield]

It's worth a chance if you desire a Gehrig and have a few hundred dollars to lose in case it's a total bust! Perhaps the winner can clean it and end up with a nice mitt. Maybe the stamping were deep and the seller just can't take a clear photo. On the other hand, there could simply be the remnants of the "G" in Gehrig and nothing else. Gloves like that are a crap shoot... some times they pan out and sometimes they don't.

[burker72]

I am with Brett when it comes to the final pic of the gloves. I would take the Hornsby ($89) and the Kelly ($236) over the Davis catcher's mitt ($312). Among fielder's gloves, base mitts, and catcher's mitts I have to regard catcher's mitts as my least favorite, and I think based on prices, it is generally the case with the hobby. I guess in a way this is a bit of a surprise though. Catcher's gloves are very distinct, were a big part of early glove use, but there is something that keeps their prices down...

[Mike**Mize]

Back to the Pennock for a second; there my be a clue available to us with the shape of the void left by the absent label. I don't know what Bon Tober's label looks like but this shape resembles the shape occupied by the Brine label on my Brine Bill Sterdel glove on JD's site. It's the same long rectangle. Having just completed a sale which included some nice high end gloves (and also as a result of watching a number of gloves on eBay) what's starting to come into focus for me is that more and more bidders and buyers are playing the "lowball" game. Maybe it's a result of not knowing who else is invovled. I can remember a few years ago (routinely) seeing a glove that was of the kinds I felt attached to and slamming a big bid down right at the start of the auction. Things were much more jolly back then (at least for me). Now it's more like poker. Bidders hide their intentions until the last seconds. The G41 was unusual in that it got bid up as high as it did so quickly. We would all love to have that G41 in our collections. Maybe watching the value of the US dollar shrink has had an adverse effect. If you've got a market based IRA, you know what I'm talking about. We all want to pay as little as possible for what we acquire. These are different times. Still, I'm glad to report that there are still collectors out there who want good gloves and "lowball" tactics aren't the only game in town. All it would have taken for that G41 to end up at 4 or 5 grand is a couple more bright eyed collectors to whom the glove meant more than the $$$$. I was there once and every now and then I revisit that state of mind. It's a beautiful place. But apparently an expensive place to visit. Long Live Glove Collecting! We'll get through this and it's going to be fun to come out on the other side.

[burker72]

More on the Pennock. On the heel it looks like a shield graphic with a banner running across or behind the shield. On the right side of the banner the word "Supplies" looks clearly evident to me. A mfr name with the word "Supplies" doesn't come to mind right away, maybe it is a private label of some sort.