[thetahat]

Came a day early. KB might have a better idea but my guess is that these are from Chicago Pennant Co. and are pre-1910. Perhaps the first “series” of pennants where a single company made a general style pennant for multiple teams. ... It appears that silk screening became commercial sometime between 1907-1911. It would seem to be that if it existed, it would have been preferred to simplify things. Most of these pennants have the same batter graphic, but they were drawn and cut by hand in leather, and then details were burned in with a heated tool. Same general batter graphic but considerable variability. Someone’s job was to make these painstakingly one at a time. And I think without screenprinting, leather was the only real option. These are all pure wool? with the feel of a heavy army blanket. Moths love these, my other two have some small holes.

Also noteworthy is the size ... 13” by 42”. Extra extra large. The three I have are all different size, White Sox is 13” by 39” and Cubs is 15” by 42.5”. Bizarre. They weren’t trimmed because of the reinforced edges.

Additionally I have seen this for Red Sox, Cubs with inverted colors (compared to mine), and “Pittsburgh” (presumably Pirates). But the Holy Grail from this set is the Tigers (I don’t have it) as it has a leather Tiger head. Mark has this and so does Jeff (he posted it last week here) ... . I’ll go so far to say that the Tigers is the single best pennant in existence. Optimal combination of beauty, rarity, workmanship, and age.

Anyway here’s a pic, I already made a custom fitting holder. This was kept in a vault somewhere, barely anything but a couple minuscule nips in the wool.