Economic caution in the high-end baseball card and memorabilia market was nowhere in sight at Robert Edwards Auctions’ record-setting baseball card and memorabilia auction. Nothing could have prepared collectors, dealers and market watchers for the record prices at the May 3 auction.
The final prices on all Nineteenth and early Twentieth Century baseball cards and memorabilia totaled $9.07 million across 1,670 lots.
The 1914 Baltimore News Babe Ruth rookie card, in very good condition, sold for $517,000, more than twice its previous auction record price, and even more than the auction record price of the T206 Wagner in this same condition. In fact, this is the most any card has ever sold for in the history of the collecting world, outside of the famous Gretzky-McNall T206 Wagner.
This auction also featured a T206 Honus Wagner, which, regardless of its poor condition, sold for $317,250, also a world record price. The previous T206 Wagner record for this grade was $192,000 in 2007.
An 1889 Anson-Ewing Beer poster, featuring two great Nineteenth Century stars endorsing Burke Ale, sold for $188,000, setting two records: one for a baseball-related advertising poster and one for any American advertising poster.
A rediscovered 1862 Knickerbockers team photograph, discovered in late 2007 in the former home of Walter Avery, the last surviving Knickerbocker player, sold for a record $58,750.
An R306 Butter Cream Confectionary card of Babe Ruth, one of card collecting’s most legendary rarities, and which was saved in the same family since 1933, sold for $111,625.
A complete set of 1909‱911 T206 White Border tobacco cards, all PSA-graded, sold for $176,250. The Nagy example of the famous T206 Ty Cobb with Ty Cobb back, sold for $64,625, a record.
Other highlights included the 1887 Kalamazoo Bats tobacco card of John Ward, which sold for $141,000, setting a new world record for any Nineteenth Century baseball card ever sold at auction. This was one of three newly discovered 1887 Kalamazoo Bats tobacco cards of New York players consigned by a Cooperstown-area family. The three cards, which the family had thought were worth hundreds of dollars, sold for a total of $190,937.
All Babe Ruth items were red hot. Babe Ruth’s 1938 Brooklyn Dodgers cap from his coaching days sold for $70,500; Ruth’s bat dating from 1921 sold for $94,000.
A complete set of all six 1911 M110 Sporting Life cabinet cards, offered individually, sold for a total of $133,362, including $41,125 for Ty Cobb, setting another record.
Stan Musial’s 1953 Cardinals jersey sold for $44,062; a 1939 letter written by Lou Gehrig discussing his illness, with a reserve of $10,000, sold for $41,125, a record for a Gehrig letter; a newly discovered panoramic photograph of the American Negro Giants, including the legendary Rube Foster, had a reserve of $5,000, and was hammered down for $35,250.
The auction also included an impressive selection items from other sports, such as a Michael Jordan rookie jersey, which sold for $50,000.
All prices include the buyer’s premium.
For additional information, www.robertedwardauctions.com or 908-226-9900.
