Collector Larry Berman recently purchased a piece of hockey history so important he didn’t feel right about keeping it.
The 1948 letter from New York Rangers executive Frank Boucher was an invitation to the team’s training camp at Saranac Lake, N.Y. The recipient was prospect Herb Carnegie. A highly skilled black player, Carnegie could have been the first to play in the NHL had he come to terms with the team.
That letter, part of a collection of Carnegie items recently sold at auction by his daughter, is now in the Hockey Hall of Fame after Berman turned it over to appreciative officials there.
You can read more about it—and Carnegie’s interesting life—here.
Here’s an item I’ve never seen before.
Just prior to his final season in 1979, Thurman Munson agreed to do a roast in his honor. Held in his hometown of Canton, OH, it was a local charity fundraiser and several Yankees past and present were in attendance.
A program singed by a few of those guests is on eBay right now.
Hobby veterans are remembering Mike Kushner, a long-time dealer who passed away last week. The owner of Howell Baseball, Kushner was a fixture at shows for many years and also promoted them in the 1980s and 90s.
The good-humored New Jersey resident was fondly recalled for his “wall of autographed baseballs” that he would build at shows—one occasionally came down with a loud crash when someone bumped the table where it was placed.
He was 74.
Dr. James Beckett, who founded the Beckett Publications empire before selling and retiring from business side of the hobby quite a few years ago, is bringing his voice back to the hobby through a podcast.
He’s already done a few episodes of “Sports Card Insights.”
You follow them here.
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