Vintage Baseball Glove Forum

Hello,

I just discovered this great forum a few days ago, and have spent alot of time reading and learning. This forum is fantastic!

I have a Rawlings PRO1000 3T, that I bought about 2 years ago brand new. I'm curious as to it's history. The code on the glove is BEEA, which if I read it correctly on another thread is 1003. so does that mean it was manufactured in October of 2003? I'd also like to know the type of leather it was made from. When I bought it it was hard as a rock. 2 years later I still don't have it broken in 100%. Are there any other interesting facts about this glove that anyone could shed some light on?

I also purchased a Pro Preferred PROSTX23 1st Basemans mitt last year. I was dissapointed to read here that the color was painted on?? That might explain why in the pocket it has developed a "discolored" look, I guess thats where the paint has worn away. I love Rawlings gloves, I'll always buy them, but the fact that the color on a glove of this price is painted on is a bit of a dissapointment. I've also read about the fact that the leather of these gloves crack after a time. Does anyone have any info on this as far as their 1st basemans gloves go?

I'm also wondering what exactly "pro soft" Leather is for the Gold Glove series, and what the difference is between this leather and the leather they use for their "Mid Price" models (Highlight series, Sandlot series etc)

Thanks in advance to any information anyone can provide,
Mike

We might be going overboard with the painted Pro Preferred leather. 90%+ of all leather has some sort of top coat to even out color. PP’s are so light in color to start with they are naturally going to get discolored.

Rawlings used to advertise that Heart of the Hide leather came from the best 5% of hides. I don’t believe that Rawlings was actually sorting hides and using the best 5% for the HH. The tanneries were sorting hides and using the cleanest 5% of their hides because they were going to be aniline dyed and every flaw shows up.

The new HH leather is softer with some oil added; I don’t think it is even pure aniline dyed leather anymore.

bs wrote:We might be going overboard with the painted Pro Preferred leather. 90%+ of all leather has some sort of top coat to even out color. PP’s are so light in color to start with they are naturally going to get discolored.

Rawlings used to advertise that Heart of the Hide leather came from the best 5% of hides. I don’t believe that Rawlings was actually sorting hides and using the best 5% for the HH. The tanneries were sorting hides and using the cleanest 5% of their hides because they were going to be aniline dyed and every flaw shows up.

The new HH leather is softer with some oil added; I don’t think it is even pure aniline dyed leather anymore.

Thanks for the reply bs,

If it's possible I'd like to find out exactly the heritage of the leather for my HOH.... it's not oil treated (thank god) and after 2 years it's still not completely broken in. I suppose what I'm trying to find out is how close this glove's leather is to the leather used in the US made HOH's.