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Old 07-24-2018, 04:46 PM
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Domer05 Domer05 is offline
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It could be WinCraft. And you are correct that WinCraft's origins date back to 1961; however, I find it unlikely based upon my preliminary research into them that they were set-up to manufacture MLB pennants, and for an out of market team no less, within a year of opening.

I do plan to cover WinCraft and a related pennant maker from the same Minnesota town, ASCO, in a future post. But, since you bring WinCraft up, I found an article describing their beginnings as being rather humble. It began as a three person operation doing business above a bar in Winona, MN. What's more, they principally made pom poms and celluloid buttons for local high schools. No mention of pennants or other felt novelties.

Given these modest beginnings, I think it unlikely they made your pennant. As far as I know, WinCraft didn't start making felt pennants until the late 1970s after they merged with ASCO, another Winona-based company that had been making pennants since the late 1940s.

Again, my research is not complete so I could be wrong on all this. Still, I can offer no better answer as to what "WC" might have stood for. I'm curious if other pennants from the early 1960s bore that same mark, or it was limited to just Giant pennants....

And as to ADFLAG, you are correct as to the maker of those three Giants pennants you displayed. It looks like ADFLAG secreted their name in their original artwork throughout the 1950s, but stopped doing so by the mid-1960s. The "Chavez Ravine" stadium pennants below are very similar to your Candlestick one and were made around the same time by ADFLAG as their answer to Trench's Dodger Stadium pennants. One's even dated 1965. Like your Candlestick pennant, neither has a maker's mark. So, for some reason they just discarded this practice by mid-decade. Shortly thereafter it looks like they may have gotten out of the pennant business to focus on more profitable product lines.
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