Cards I Love Part 26 - 1915 Cracker Jacks Possum Whitted

I have always wanted to own a Cracker Jacks card.  They are an iconic set, but the majority of players that fit my collection would likely force me to take a second mortgage on my house.  I have had my eye on a few of these cards for awhile, and finally stumbled onto one this year at a reasonable price.  Less than $100.  

George Whitted is pictured as a member of the Phillies on this card, but he did play one season with the Cardinals.  More importantly, Whitted was a player and manager for the Durham Bulls during the late 1920s and into the early 1930s.  

I never thought I would own a Cracker Jacks card.  This is currently my favorite vintage card in my collection, and it's not really all that close.  

Back of the card.  

What is not to love here?  

Random Cards A Century Apart

I have been on vacation for the past week, and have enjoyed sitting around sorting out some cards and watching baseball.  I have sorted out a few thousand cards, but that's for a later post. 

I have also enjoyed checking out the baseball playoffs.  One of the best perks of my job is the fact that I get the first two to three weeks of October off.  Always nice. 

On to cards. 

While I have been sorting out all these cards, I have run across more than a few cards that I wish I had taken the time to post when I bought/traded for them.  In looking at the stack I pulled out on Tuesday, I decided that there were two cards that were clearly better than the rest of the stack, or so they seem that way for the moment. 

First card. 

I posted my first card of George "Possum" Whitted way back in August.  The Durham native primarily played for the Phillies, Pirates, and Cardinals from 1912 until 1922, so his cards are quite old and often quite expensive.  Possum also managed and played for the Durham Bulls for six years during the late 1920s and early 1930s.  

This card is from the long running Exhibits cards, which are more or less postcards with baseball players.  There are still a lot of people who like collecting them.  Personally, I have never done much with them, but I am not really in line to drop a few hundred dollars on a Cracker Jacks or Famous & Barr card of him.  Let's try one out.  

The card years on the Exhibits tend to be over multiple years.  This card is listed as a 1921 in many places, but other sites have it as a 1921-1924.  Either way, it's almost a century old, and still in relatively good condition.  The corners are soft and the dings and scratches are on the card, not on the top loader.  

I like the simplicity and the fact that this card has an actual photo of Possum.  My first card was a drawing.  

Next.  

I still do not buy directly from Topps, but I spent one day of my summer looking for different cards they have sold on their website that I have missed out on.  More of those for a later date, but know that I am not going to let the whole Aledmys thing go yet. 

Since I did not buy it from Topps, some guy on Ebay got my money instead.  Although he paid Topps for the card, so really Topps still made a bunch of money off of this card even though I bought it from someone else. 

Some other reasons why this card is here:

Who wouldn't want an Expos card? 

Have I ever told you about how St. Louis people obsess over what high school they went to?  Max Scherzer and I went to different high schools, but in the same school district.  Also a decade apart from each other.   

Max Scherzer went to Mizzou.  I did not, but I still like their sports teams. 

Max Scherzer is good. 

Max Scherzer is wearing an Expos uniform. 

After getting the Possum Whitted card, I specifically thought about how great these two random cards would look in a post together. 

My work here is done.  Off to watch baseball for the rest of the day. 

"Facts" About A Bulls Player

I have been working on finding cards of older Durham Bulls players all summer, and this past week I managed to scrounge up a really old one.  In this case, I am not only excited about the fact that the card is really really old, but I am also really excited about the player on the card.  He's a local, from Durham, and played and managed the Bulls for an extended period of time during the late 1920s and into the early 1930s.

He was also on the Cardinals for a stint, so there is that too.  Meet George "Possum" Whitted.

There are several places where you can find information on George Whitted, but I will give you a quick run down on the most important "facts":

-As a 6 month old baby, he fell out of a second story window and was not injured

-He was given the nickname of "possum" because he spent his free time roaming the forests around Durham hunting the annoying creatures

-He was also kicked by a mule as a child, but was not injured. The mule broke its legs

-Possum also hated school, which later burned down. However, he did end up playing baseball at Trinity College, which was the forerunner of Duke University.

There are others out there, but these seem to be the universally repeated "facts" about his early life around Durham.  I feel like the Chuck Norris jokes may all be based on the "real" life events of this former Major Leaguer.

As a Major Leaguer he played for the Cardinals, Phillies, Pirates, and Dodgers.  He won the World Series with the 1914 Dodgers and won the National League pennant with the 1915 Phillies.  There was a break during the middle of this career for a stint in the Army during World War I.  He would last appear in a game for the 1922 Brooklyn Dodgers before he went into managing at the Minor League level.  He started out with the Toledo Mud Hens in the first part of the 1920s, but ended the decade in the Piedmont League with the Bulls as a player/manager.

In all, he managed the Bulls for 6 seasons, and appeared in more than 400 games for them as a player.  Possum was an instant success, winning the regular season Piedmont League title in 1929, but losing in the playoffs.  The 1930 season Whitted led the Bulls to a second place finish in the Piedmont League, but the team won in the playoffs to capture the Postseason title.  Whitted would manage a few other places after the Bulls, and also ran the athletic leagues at the shipping yards in Wilmington, North Carolina during World War II. 

George would end up living out his life around North Carolina.  He died in 1962.  Interesting side note that his sister would go on to become the first female professor emeritus at Duke University.

Now, the baseball card.  Really excited about this one.

This is a 1919 W514 strip card.  This is hand cut, and while there are many who attribute these cards to other years, the Whitted card had to come from 1919 since it lists him as a Philadelphia "Quaker".  He was on the Pirates during the two other years some of these cards are listed under, which was in 1920 and 1921.  I was a little curious about the Phillies nickname here, but apparently they had played around with other nicknames at different points during their time as a franchise including the "Blue Jays".  According to the Sports Logo site this was there 1919 logo....

No use of the word Phillies, but there is a Quaker playing baseball. 

There are not many cards of Whitted, but this is the only one that I could find at a reasonable price.  A 100 year old card for less than $15, I will take it all day long.  His rookie card is in the 1914 Cracker Jacks set, so that one is not going to happen.