Since Mickey has been the primary focus of my collection, I am a little frustrated that I can not share more of it with you at the moment - hopefully that will change soon when the house remodeling is finished.
If I may add my 2 cents to the question of Mantle's enduring popularity (which has already been addressed beautifully by others on this forum and more extensively in a countless number of columns, documentaries and books).
Aside from his natural baseball abilities (explosive power from both sides of the plate -longest HR's ever recorded, world class sprinter speed - as a rookie 3.1 sec from home to first from the right-side of the plate and 2.9 sec from the left), if you saw him play in the '50's you just wanted to be him! Not only hit and run like him, but look like him, walk like him, talk like him. It remains a form of hero worship that is difficult to explain to those who as young boys did not experience it first hand and is still a mystery to those of us that did.
This is one of my favorite photos - a Type I taken on Sept.14, 1950 in his Joplin uniform and used by the press as he was about to start a 2 week travel run with the Yankees which began on Sept 20. On the back of the photo , in addition to the photographer's name, written in pencil "to the Yankees".
Another Type I from June of 1951, shortly before Mickey was sent down to the KC Blues which clearly shows the effect of the enormous pressure he was under during his first 3 months in the majors.
Last edited by Frozen in Time; 03-17-2014 at 03:44 PM.
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11-02-2011, 12:24 PM
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