Antiques Roadshow

GUEST

Well, I got the ball from my father, who acquired it from his grandfather when my dad was ten. He had gone to West Virginia with his family on a vacation, the only time he saw his grandfather, the only time he met his grandfather, in fact, wearing his Little League uniform and hat. And his grandfather went into the back of the Dairy Queen he owned, brought this ball out, gave it to my grandmother and said, "This is for your baseball player."

APPRAISER

Do you know what team this is?

GUEST

The Boston Red Sox. We believe it's 1915.

APPRAISER

Okay, well, you're exactly right.

GUEST

Okay.

APPRAISER

Babe Ruth was in his second year with the Boston Red Sox, and also on the ball is Tris Speaker, another Hall-of-Famer. There are some other Hall-of-Famers and notables on the team such as Harry Hooper and Herb Pennock. And there's another real notable name also on the baseball, Carl Mays. Carl Mays was a pitcher on the squad, along with Babe Ruth. And he's the only pitcher in the history of baseball in the Majors to kill another man with a baseball by pitching, which was in 1920. It was unfortunate. This is Babe Ruth's first World Series team where he gets his first World Series ring. And he wouldn't get one with the New York Yankees for many years later. A Boston World Series team signed baseball from 1915, which incidentally is the third World Series win ever for the Boston Red Sox is pretty rare and scarce.

GUEST

Right.

APPRAISER

Another thing I notice on here too is that the Babe Ruth signature is a full signature. What I've seen on the three other known 1915 Boston Red Sox baseballs is that Ruth's signature is a "B." signature. And you get a lot of printed signatures on the balls too. But this is the only one that I've seen that's got a full signature, which makes it pretty nice. It's also one of the highest conditioned balls that I've seen from this period of time. The threading on this official American League ball is blue and red, which was standard from the beginning of the American League all the way till about 1934.

GUEST

Okay.

APPRAISER

Then they started making the stitches all red. I think a fair auction estimate for this would be $25,000 and up.

GUEST

Okay. Great. So if I was going to keep the ball and insure it, what would you recommend?

APPRAISER

I would insure this ball at $35,000.

GUEST

Okay. Thank you.