Jay Publishing question

[Harford20]

AustinMike,
I have Red Sox team photos from 1957-1962. I believe the 1957-1959 sets I have (mainly for Ted Williams) are likely Team Issue sets as these photos have ONLY the name of the player. They are still 5"x7" and the photo seems to match some later Jay Publishing cards, but I cannot confirm these should be called Jay Publishing Photos. These all have a block format (as noted in the first photo attached).

In late 1959, (at least for the Red Sox), I can confirm Jay Publishing photos as the team name was added. With this, the font also changed. This was consistent from 1959-1961, and then as you noted, the font again changed again in 1962.

I have studied the Pirates and Yankees Jay photos as well (Mantle and Clemente). The "true" Jay Publishing photos have fonts consistent with the Red Sox fonts that I have.

I have to say, I have never seen the font on the photos that you have posted.

Dave

As a quick side note, the Mantle cropping on the 1957-1960 photos is ridiculous. The cropping of these can be easily missed if you are not looking carefully.

[AustinMike]

Dave, thanks for the input! It's interesting to see the difference in how other team sets were issued. I have Yankee photo sets without a team name, but they are team issued sets that are larger than the Jay photos. Is 1957 the first year that the Red Sox issued photo sets? I have a set of Yankees photos that I believe was issued in 1956 but I've also seen sets with the same photos listed on eBay with an issue date of 1955.

[hcv123]

Don't have a scan(s) handy - I have had many Pirate team sets from 1956-1968. Painstakingly researched their year's. Can't contribute right now to op question, but can say the team photos existed from at least 1956. I believe also some of the real early ones - 1956, 57? May have only had the player name on them.

[Harford20]

AustinMike,
The Red Sox started Team issue photos in 1940. These can be found for nearly every year since that time (1940, 1941, 1942, 1943, 1946, 1947, 1948, 1949, 1950, 1952, 1953, 1954). These are "Red Sox Photo Packs" and look much different that the "Jay-type" photos. These were usually about 7" x9" in size and sepia tone. Again many of the photos were re-used from year to year. As far as I can find, the Red Sox did not do the Jay-type until 1957 (although it actually may have been late 1956 or pre-season 1957). I have not found much variation within the 1957 set (as for example, there are 4 different combinations of players in the actual 1960 Red Sox Jay Publishing photo packs, as players and even the manager changed in 1960). Below I have posted a 1941 and 1946 Ted from the Photo packs.

Dave

[AustinMike]

Harford20, gotcha. The Yankees also had team sets going back to at least the '40s. I only collect the Yankee team sets from 1951 and after, although the earliest I've found in this time period is a 1953 team issued set.

[mikesplace30]

There are three sets from 1962 Jay publishing that have the two font styles. As you know the Yankees are one with the Giants and Twins the others. I don't know the explanation for this smaller font .

[Rich Klein]

The owner of Jay Publishing perished in a plane crash in 1965. That is why the sets stop at that year

Rich