[CarltonHendricks]

Hello Bryan, Welcome to Net54. I’m not aware of a forum such as Net54Baseball.com that focus’ on vintage football equipment, or even just vintage memorabilia in general. As far as I know this site has more posts about those subjects than anywhere. It’s mostly baseball here but football pops up occasionally, as well as other sports.

However there are a few non auction sites that sell vintage football equipment and memorabilia, along with other sports…I list a few key ones below. If you’re new to vintage football collecting just seeing what’s out there is educational. You’re going to want to become familiar with all the different eras and styles of equipment.

http://www.sportsantiques.com/pg12brimstory.htm#*Part 1*
If you’re completely new to it all there’s a lot to learn…The first intercolligient football game was in 1869 between Princeton and Rutgers…It was more a soccer game than what we have today…then over the next ten years the game quickly changed from soccer to rugby to classic American football, see link above for closer look….no helmets were worn till the 1890’s starting with what’s now called a “four spoke head harness”…Then came what’s called the “rain cap” helmet…then the “dog ear” style helmet…then the “Princeton” style and so on…These were ahead of the 1930’s Rockne style helmets that are more well known as classic leather helmets…















There’s also a style from the 30’s called an “executioner” that has leather face guard and that is quite rare and has become quite sought after.
Then you have your rubber nose guards from the 1895-1905 era….and you have your union suits worn from about the mid 1880’s till about 1910…and the different variations of it….then you have the different kinds of cleats worn that changed over time….jerseys, and all the styles…

Then if you’re get into the memorabilia you’ve got trophies, plaques, statues, silver, prints and all the variations from the wood cut engraving to the chromolithograph, paintings, posters, games, toys, etc etc…And all those areas have many sub-variations....So there’s a lot to learn about!























http://www.sportsantiques.com/johngbook.htm
The number one book on the subject is ANTIQUE SPORTS UNIFORMS & EQUIPMENT 1840-1940 Baseball Football Basketball by Dan Hauser, Ed Turner, and John Gennantonio, You can find it on eBay and Amazon…and if you want an autographed copy I can hook you up with one of the co-authors John Gennantonio, send me a PM for his contact. You can preview the book in the link above.

Many sports auctions will have some vintage football equipment but the auctions that seem to have the most would be Leland’s, Hunt, and Legendary…and of course eBay.

As for shows, the once a year National Sports Collectors Convention would be the most target rich of any….It’s held in a different city every year….I’ve covered the National for my website SportsAntiques.com since 2003, minus 2010 and 2012…and posted tons of photos of what was there….see links below

http://www.sportsantiques.com/03NatStory.htm
http://www.sportsantiques.com/04NatStory.htm
http://www.sportsantiques.com/05NatSCCMain.htm
http://www.sportsantiques.com/2006national.htm
http://www.sportsantiques.com/2007NA...tionalmain.htm
http://www.sportsantiques.com/2008natmain.htm
http://www.sportsantiques.com/09natstorypg1.htm
http://www.sportsantiques.com/2011_nat_carlton_buys.htm

Dealers Sites
http://www.antiquesportsshop.com/index.html
http://www.antiqueathlete.com/
http://bobmccannsports.com/

All this should keep you busy for a while...good luck and Merry Christmas.
-Carlton