Set of four playing cards individually signed in fountain pen, “‘Babe’ Ruth,” who presented these cards to Clifton, New Jersey silk manufacturer Harry L. Doherty, co-owner of The Henry Doherty Silk Company and founder of the semi-pro baseball team The Doherty Silk Sox, an amateur ballclub that competed against professional baseball teams like New York Giants, St. Louis Cardinals, Philadelphia Phillies, and New York Yankees during the 1920s. The cards, representing all four suits, are adhered to their original presentation mount, which bears the calligraphic inscription, “Best regards from…Jesse Jesse Club, June 2, 1927,” and is framed sans glass to an overall size of 12.75 x 12.75. In overall fine condition.
Accompanied by a letter of provenance from Doherty’s great-grandson, which reads: “The ‘Jesse James Club’ playing cards have been in the Doherty family's possession since 1927 when they were presented as a gift to my great-grandfather from Babe Ruth. My great-grandfather, Harry Doherty, owned the Doherty Silk Mill in Clifton, NJ. An avid baseball fan, he built the Doherty Oval field behind the mill and sponsored the Doherty Silk Sox, a semi-pro baseball team. The Doherty Silk Sox played numerous exhibition games against pro teams including the Boston Red Sox and the New York Yankees. It is said that Babe Ruth enjoyed playing on the Doherty Oval and would receive $5 directly from my great-grandfather for every home run he hit in the Oval. According to my grandfather, Fred Doherty, my great-grandfather, Harry, and Babe Ruth became friends and would occasionally play poker together. When the Doherty Silk Sox team stopped playing in 1927, these playing cards were signed and given to my great grandfather as a gift and ‘thank you’ for the all-Sunday baseball games.”
From 1915 to 1927, the Doherty Silk Sox baseball team enticed thousands to the Doherty Oval, a state-of-the-art baseball stadium located behind the Doherty Silk Company mill on Main Avenue and near the Erie Railroad tracks, which attracted no shortage of bouncing homerun balls. Local popularity for the club grew quickly, and when Sunday blue laws restricted baseball from being played in Philadelphia and New York, major clubs like the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees trekked to New Jersey to play profitable exhibition matches against the competitive Silk Sox. Ruth played at the Oval on at least four occasions: twice as a member of the Red Sox and twice as a New York Yankee. On April 29, 1923, five months before Ruth helped the Yankees attain their first-ever World Series championship, he smacked a mammoth ninth-inning blast out of Doherty Oval in a victory over the Silk Sox. So immense was the home run, that the stadium’s full crowd of 10,000 rushed the field to congratulate the base-rounding Ruth, who was subsequently rescued and ushered to safety by the Oval police.
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