Pottsville Football Team c.1921

 Before they were officially the Pottsville Maroons (three years later), and before gaining admittance to the NFL (playing their first year in 1925), this Pottsville team played in what became the tough Anthracite League. This photo is said to have been hanging in the Zacko Sporting Goods store and has an address label for Russ Zacko on the lower left margin.

All players are identified in the lower margin which is always helpful when looking at early team photographs.

For a summary of the Pottsville Maroons story (and it’s a hell of a story) please see blog entries dated March 21, 2020, March 26, 2018 and March 23, 2017.

Yale Crew Cap / Kepi c.1894

 

Cap worn by Arthur Walker Bingham, Yale ’96, as part of his rowing attire. Bingham rowed class crew as a sophomore and junior. These caps were marketed for "Yachting" or "Navy" (crew), available either with a flat top or “military shape” (based on the chasseur pattern kepi), with gold embroidered wreaths  and "gold embroidered names for boat clubs". This is the only example we have come across. Crew, as followers of this blog know is another of our key interests.

This cap is labelled E.S. Osborn, a dealer in hats and caps located at 91 Church Street in New Haven. It was the oldest hat dealer in the city, Osborn taking over from N.W. Mansfield in 1879.

Bingham later became a physician, and his first appointment was at Roosevelt Hospital in NYC (now Mount Sinai) in 1901. His Roosevelt Hospital Ambulance Surgeon cap/kepi c.1901 is also part of our collection (Jacob attended Mount Sinai Medical School).

Both caps were purchased when the Bingham estate was liquidated in 2017.

Adams Academy Foot Ball Club 1884

 The players are identified and the photo titled “Foot Ball Club 1884” in the lower margin.  A number of the players on this team became very well-known and many were from historically prominent families.

Two in particular were Charles Francis Adams lll and Charles Allen Porter.

Charles Francis Adams 3^rd , center, with his foot resting on the ball, attended Harvard after leaving Adams Academy, class of ‘88 and Harvard Law ’92.  Adams proposed to Congress that the USS Constitution be restored, which it then was,  served under President Hoover as the Secretary of the Navy, and skippered the Resolute, winning the America’s Cup in 1920. He also won the King’s Cup, the Astor Cup and the Puritan Cup. The Navy destroyer USS Charles F. Adams was dedicated to him. Adams was a great grandson of John Quincy Adams the sixth US president and a great great grandson of John Adams, the second US President.

Charles Allen Porter (sitting to the right in the photo of Adams, arms crossed) also attended Harvard, class of ’88, followed by Harvard Medical School where he became a professor of Surgery and was a Chief Surgeon at Massachusetts General Hospital. At Harvard, Porter played for the varsity Football Eleven in 1886, ’87 and ’88.

I came home from Brimfield yesterday with this in hand. The photo is dirty, with some staining, a rip to the lower left and some fading to the names of the sitters. As researchers and collectors, these condition issues don’t bother us much, as it is an imposing photo and we take into account it’s age (from the early years of American football), rarity and importance. It has that great feel to it. Measures 17 ¾ x 14 ¾ including the albumin margin.

See related blog post on Adams Academy February 12, 2023

Silk Football Stocking Cap c.1890

 Towards the end of the 1880s stocking caps were manufactured not just in wool, but to a much lesser degree in silk. Spalding marketed such caps in the early 1890s and termed them “elastic” caps. A scarce cap type.

As mentioned previously in this blog, there were no standard conventions on football caps during this period and there could be a wide range of cap types even on the same team.

The pictured cap measures 12 ½” including the tassel.