Card front (blank back)
This simple 21-card set came out a year after the A's move to Oakland. I assume it's numbered by uniform, with #5 visible on Joe's jersey. (The Yankees also retired it in his honor.)
DiMaggio spent 3 bittersweet years in the US Army during WWII, achieving a rank of staff sergeant but never coming close to actual combat. I can't say enough good things about Gary Bedingfield's site Baseball in Wartime and his profile of Joe includes a ton of great photos and info.
Value: This is a pretty obscure issue, but individual cards aren't particularly expensive. This DiMaggio cost around $20 on eBay, by far his cheapest card from an in-uniform year. (Reggie Jackson also has a rookie card in this set, which almost certainly costs more.)
Fakes / reprints: This is an easy set to reproduce, being black-and-white and on common card stock. It's unfortunately not an easy issue to authenticate--other than by its innate obscurity--so buy only from reputable dealers. (My eBay purchase included some provenance-checking.)
4 comments:
Nice card. He does look a bit tired, though.
I wasn't aware of that set at all. Thanks for sharing.
Just another reason I keep returning.
I have never seen DiMaggio in anything other than a Yankee uniform or a suit.
This is rather amusing.
It's an answer to the previous year's musical question: "Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio?"
Thanks. The SCD big book says a little more about the set. Boston photographer Mike Anderson printed this set and he did a follow-up in 1970, but DiMaggio left the team after 1969, so no more shots of the Oakland Clipper.
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