Featured Welcome to the "Steele Box"

It was surprising to see what was in the box. I am glad to be able to share some of it.

 

Item #24:

Here are a few of the many Base Ball related receipts from the 1880's and 1890's. The one that struck me the most is that the baker in town was also the person responsible for taking care of the base ball grounds.

 

Item #25:

I know this is a ephemera section this forum but because this was also in the box, actually in a small box on top of the "Steele Box" I wanted to post it here. It could be Ephemera related since it was used to print on paper.

This is a engraving block with a date of Dec 7th, 1798. If you can make is out you will see that it says Mount Vernon on it. It also has a reference to someone named Gilmore and last if you look closely at the signature it says "G. Washington". It clearly looks to be the signature of the first president of the United States.

Although it's not the original paper that had the original signature it still is interesting so it made me want to find out more. That's when I reached out to the George Washington Library / Mount Vernon museum. I sent them pics, and they were absolutely glad to help.

(NOTE: Please know that I reversed the image on my computer so that you could read what it says)



It took a few weeks for them to get back to me and here is what they found. I think it's fascinating...


Dear Mark,


We think we have an answer of sorts for you on the copper plate you inquired about. We theorized that the plates were likely all print plates from the same publication, and my colleague Samantha Snyder was able to identify the book they were used to produce:


First hundred years of Sussex National Bank of Newton, New Jersey : a brief sketch of a century of service.. Sussex, N.J.?: unknown, 1918.


Samantha was able to download a few pages from the book to confirm that the images were included, which are attached. Unfortunately, I have not been able to download an e-version of the full publication, but you may be able to view it from this link with a subscription to ancestry.com: https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/11260/

There aren’t whole lot of hard copies available out there—according to Worldcat, just about a dozen in various formats: https://www.worldcat.org/title/firs...6485672/editions?editionsView=true&referer=br


Now, about the plate that purports to reproduce a bill from George Washington. The assessment of our team here was that the bill was probably a forgery. GW’s most famous forger was a man named Robert Spring, and forging checks was something he commonly did. By way of example, my colleague Dawn Bonner found this: https://www.raabcollection.com/geor...d-great-washington-forger-classic-hand-robert

We also know from this letter that GW was in Philadelphia on 7 December 1798, not at Mount Vernon as it says on the note: https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/06-03-02-0169

That, and the fact that the name Robert Gilmer is not mentioned in GW’s financial papers, Indicates that this was indeed a forgery. Thing is, the First hundred years of Sussex National Bank book does not give any indication that the author(s) considered the note a forgery. And, if you compare the pictures you sent to the auction forgery, you may notice some significant differences. Still, given the evidence available, and the fact that Spring’s forging skills improved with practice, it seems clear that the original note from which the print plate was made was forged, probably by Spring later in his “career.” (Interestingly, the editors of the Franklin Papers identified a Robert Gilmer here as a 19th-century autograph collector, so perhaps Spring created the document for Gilmer as some sort of weird novelty souvenir.)


Anyway, I hope all this answers the bigger questions you may have had about these plates. Let me know if any additional information about these items comes your way. I’d be curious to know if the Morford family still has the original document in their possession.


Best,

Dana


Dana John Stefanelli, Ph.D.

Curator of Special Collections

______________________________________

The Fred W. Smith National Library

for the Study of George Washington

Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association

P.O. Box 3600, Mount Vernon, Virginia 22121

O: 703.667.3632 | F: 703.799.8651

mountvernon.org/library

 

So many interesting historical items. A treat to see them and follow your research. Thank you for sharing them.

 

Item #26:

These two ledgers are a pair in a sense. One has an agreement in it (the smaller of the two) where the primary team members had to sign and abide by. The second ledger has a list of games played throughout multiple seasons and years.

I have not taken photos of all of the pages. I can at some point but for now I have taken photo's of a few that I wanted to point a few things out on.

Pages show teams like the...
Blue Stocking
Red Stocking
Black Diamonds

Does anyone here know about "Diamonds Diamonds".

 

Item #27:

This is a broadside that was used in a book by Lynn Sherr and American broadcast journalist who worked for ABC. The book she wrote and included this handbill in is called "America the Beautiful - The Stirring True Story Behind Our Nation's Favorite Song".

The broadside is a trip from Newton, NJ to Coney Island. The broadside refers to "the Newton Steamer Company" which in fact is the fire company that Charles Steel belonged to in 1881 in Newton.

Below the broadside you will see the tickets that he used and you can tell for the most part what route they traveled to get there and how, the Delaware Lackawanna & Western Railroad and then on to the Iron Steamboat Co. to get to Coney Island.

 

Great thread, thanks for sharing all these treasures, and keep them coming!

 

You're welcome Jerry.

 

Meant to say does anyone know about the "Black Diamonds"? I'm not sure if it was a team or league?

 

Item #27:

1879 Inman Line United States and Royal Mail Steamers Schedule & Cabin Plans. It appears that this was on the of the larger lines which competed with the White Star Line at the time. As you know the White Star Line was best know for one of the most famous ships in the world, the Titanic.

I found this one interesting because of what it shows inside once you open up the folded schedule.

 

I don't know, but found this old auction result for ephemera related to the Newton, New Jersey Base Ball Association. Thought you might be interested if you haven't run across it...

https://www.milehighcardco.com/1880s_90s_Newton__NJ_Baseball_Club_Related_Items_G-LOT21685.aspx

 

Apologies for failing to notice the earlier hashtag referral (thanks, INH).
Actually, though, we don't have much of anything to tell about the baseball material -- much of it is some pretty obscure and specialized local history, and any new documentation of 19th Century amateur and semi-pro ball would be a significant addition to those fragmentary records -- but for sure there are plenty of baseball memorabilia collectors who would be very keen on obtaining the books and ephemera in mforder's cache.

Fig, good eye spotting that nine-years-old Mile High auction. We're somewhat surprised that lot sold for as low a price as it did. But "ya never know at auction" -- timing is everything. We think mforder's stuff would do a little better now.

The Jacob C Morse stuff in Item #21 is intriguing for us since it might maybe possibly perhaps be related to a recent major discovery in our tiny niche of antique tabletop baseball games (additional footnote: Morse is the author of the 1888 volume, Sphere and Ash: The History of Baseball). And by the way, mforder, yes, Open Range is the best western made in at least the last thirty years or more.

 

Hi ya Fig, I did find that BUT I was debating on bidding on it. Stupid me, I thought it was still running. Oops...

 

Thank you Fig for sharing and TY BaseBall Games for adding your info, I hope something here benefits folks. I am now even more so more intrigued. This board and the people involved in it are absolutely a huge help in determining what I have. Some say folks elsewhere are saying to me break it up and sell it but I simply don't have the heart to do that.

 

Item #28:

Baseball letters..... (my apologies if some of these were previously posted.)

 

Item #28 (more):

Baseball letters..... (my apologies if some of these were previously posted.)

 

Item #28 (and more):

Baseball letters..... (my apologies if some of these were previously posted.)

 

Please know that the letter from th Entre Nous Club is from a person who actually played professional baseball later in his career... https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/c/cogandi01.shtml