1947-1952 Baseball Player Charms - Del Ennis

Fellow collector Eric Mace (@erocmace) recently alerted me to a oddball Del Ennis item for sale on eBay.  I checked it out, negotiated a little with the seller and the item arrived a few weeks ago.  My Dad's favorite players were Ennis and Dick Sisler, and I'm gradually putting together a comprehensive collection of both player's Phillies cards and related collectibles.

I had never seen this particular Ennis item before, and I was honestly a little surprised when I initially took it out of its mailing envelope.  It's small.  It's very, very small.  I hadn't read the item's description closely in the seller's original listing, where it clearly indicates that the "charm/pin/coin" is about 3/4" x 1 1/4".  I guess I was expecting something the size of a vintage Bowman card or maybe something no bigger than a 1951 Topps Red Back card.  So that you can appreciate the smallness of this charm/pin/coin, I've pictured it here on top of Ryan Howard's 2016 Topps card.

So what is this?

The Standard Catalog of Vintage Baseball Cards actually has a listing for the set from which I believe this charm/pin/coin to be from.  Ennis appears to be the only Phillies player in the "set" and I've included the set's listing from the Catalog below.  There's no mention of the set in the online Beckett database.

Even though it's smaller than anticipated, I'm still happy to have this oddball Ennis item in my collection.  Thanks again Eric for the head's up!

1947 Homogenized Bond Bread Del Ennis (or is it?)

After all the years I've collected baseball cards, I still get excited when I come across a baseball card that I didn't know existed from a set I've never heard of before.  I'm slowly collecting all the Phillies cards of Del Ennis, who was one of my Dad's favorite baseball players.  I recently added this card to my collection, although I'm not 100% certain if it's from 1947 or 1949 or if it's a decent reprint of the original, produced at some point in the 1980s.

The card was advertised as coming from the 1947 Homogenized Bond Bread set, which is listed in the Beckett database as the 1947 Homogenized Bond set.  According to the set's entry in the Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards, the unnumbered, blank-backed set consists of 48 cards issued with Bond Bread.  The description of the set goes on to mention that the cards can be found with either rounded corners or square corners.  My Ennis card has square corners.

Doing some research on the internet, some collectors believe that the rounded corner cards were originally issued in 1947 and the square corner cards were issued later, perhaps in 1949.  Still others believe that the square corner cards were part of a massive "find" in a New York warehouse in the 1980s, resulting in a flood of these presumably 1949-ish cards joining the collecting world.  Most vintage card collectors remain highly skeptical towards these square corner cards, deeming them little more than fakes.

After reading several articles, including a helpful article here and a post from The Vintage Sportscards Blog here, my Ennis card is definitely one of the cards that were "found" in the 1980s and I can't be sure if it's an original or not.  Nevertheless, I'm happy to have the card in my collection, and I'll be on the look-out for the clearly legitimate rounded corner Del Ennis card.  The card is of particular interest to any Ennis collector as it would technically be his rookie card, pre-dating his 1948-1949 Leaf card.

* * *

Homogenize:  To treat milk so that the fat is mixed throughout instead of floating on top.  To break up the fat globules (of milk) into very fine particles especially by forcing through minute openings.

And now you know.

Image from the Palomar Skies blog

1947-1966 Exhibits Phillies

I recently completed another trade with John, a reader of this blog and a fellow Phillies baseball card collector.  Solely based on the Phillies doubles he has available and the impressive nature of his wantlists, I imagine that John's Phillies baseball card collection must be amazing.  He recently put together his Phillies wantlists from the 2000s, and I was more than happy to help him out with his pursuit of new-ish Phillies cards.

In return, I got a whole mess of old-ish Phillies cards.  Most of the older Phillies cards are in lesser condition, but John did a great job pointing out their minor flaws before shipping them along to me.  Frankly, I've become less and less condition-sensitive as I get older (and wiser) and I was thrilled to add a bunch of Phillies cards from the '50s, '60s and '70s to my collection.

Three of the cards in John's package were my first "Exhibit" cards.  I wasn't familiar with these cards, so a bit of research was in order.  According to the Standard Catalog, the Exhibit Supply Co. of Chicago released these oversized cards between 1947 and 1966, issuing some of the same cards over several years in a row in some instances.  All told, there are 336 unnumbered variations of these cards produced over the twenty-year span.

I found this handy dating chart, which helped me determine that the Del Ennis card was most likely first issued in 1947.  The "MADE IN U.S.A." on the bottom right is exactly a half inch across.  The Richie Ashburn card is actually an error variation (his first name is misspelled on the card) and was first issued in 1950.  On both the Ashburn card and the Whiz Kids team card, "MADE IN U.S.A." is exactly 7/16th of an inch across.  (Click on any of the cards to enlarge.)

I scanned the complete 336-card checklist and there appears to be at least two dozen (maybe more) Phillies in the 1947-1966 Exhibits set.  (Hopefully 14,000 Phillies will insert a comment to this post with a Phillies checklist - hint, hint.)

Thanks again for the trade John!