Very early contract, three pages on two adjoining sheets, 8.5 x 14, July 29, 1915. American League regular player’s contract in which Joe Gedeon agrees to play for the Washington Senators during the 1916 season, for a total salary of $2,400. Though the document is not signed by Gedeon (he played for the Salt Lake City Bees in the Pacific Coast League instead), it has been signed at the conclusion in fountain pen as a witness by Senators manager Clark Griffith. In very good to fine condition, with scattered staining.
A strong second baseman who played for the Washington Senators, New York Yankees, and St. Louis Browns, Gedeon was banned for life from organized baseball in 1921, when Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis deemed that he had ‘guilty knowledge’ of the Black Sox Scandal from White Sox shortstop Charles ‘Swede’ Risberg. Accompanied by a full letter of authenticity from PSA/DNA.
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