LOT Old Heritage Auctions  /  2007 July Marketplace Auction #87071  / 

90344

1869 Buckeye Base Ball Club of Cincinnati Passes

Currency:USD Category:Sports - Cards & Fan Shop Start Price:750.00 USD Estimated At:3,000.00 - 5,000.00 USD
1869 Buckeye Base Ball Club of Cincinnati Passes
<B>1869 Buckeye Base Ball Club of Cincinnati Passes Lot of 2.</B></I> This monumentally historic pair of passes is about all that remains of this early competitor to the first professional baseball team, the Cincinnati Red Stockings. The Buckeyes, founded in 1860, actually predate the Reds, arriving on the scene a full six years before the latter team was established. Yet sadly, it was the Red Stockings that would prove to be the Buckeyes' undoing. When the Reds decided in 1869 to field an all-salaried team many of the Buckeyes players jumped ship for the money, and the mighty Buckeyes were left with no option but to fold. But records do show that the teams met twice on the field of battle in 1869 before the Buckeyes called it quits, with the Reds winning both contests by the comical scores of seventy-one to fifteen, and one-hundred three to eight. Presented here are two passes for entry to games from the Buckeyes' final season (perhaps the meetings with the Red Stockings!). Each reads, "Buckeye Base Ball Club, 1869, Admit ___ and Lady to All Games of the B.B.C. of Cincinnati" on the face, and are signed by the team Treasurer B.O.M. DeBeck on verso. According to Harry Ellard's "Base Ball in Cincinnati," B.O.M. DeBeck played third base for the 1866 Buckeyes, and must have later become an executive with the club. The passes remain in marvelous, undamaged condition, and are accompanied by a 1957 handwritten letter from the son of the Buckeye Treasurer to a writer for the Cincinnati Post. He notes that he found the passes in some old papers of his father's, and wonders if he may know "some one who is interested in the early history of baseball--amateur and prof.--in this area." Well, we think that we might know a few of those folks, so we are thrilled to be able to present what may well be the earliest baseball tickets ever offered for public sale. With the origins of professional baseball historically established as 1869 Cincinnati, to find this date and this town in print on any baseball-related artifact is a discovery on a par with King Tut's tomb, and a pair of NRMT tickets for one of the earliest baseball teams, bar none, is beyond most collectors' wildest dreams.<BR><BR><b>Shipping:</b> Requires 3rd Party Shipping (<a target="_blank" href="http://www.heritageauctions.com/common/shipping.php">view shipping information</a>)
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