For Fans of Baseball History...

[JetsIn06]

Baseball Digest Archives from 1945-Present Online

There goes my day.

[Ksyrup]

Things like this make me feel much better about letting go of a bunch of shit I had collected as a kid. Once I went off to school and then got married, I just couldn't justify keeping boxes and boxes of magazines, newspapers, and other assorted items.

[JetsIn06]

Originally Posted by Ksyrup

Things like this make me feel much better about letting go of a bunch of shit I had collected as a kid. Once I went off to school and then got married, I just couldn't justify keeping boxes and boxes of magazines, newspapers, and other assorted items.

Agreed. I used to subscribe to Baseball Weekly that was put out by USA Today. I don't think it's even available anymore, but I used to keep all of them. I have no idea where they are now, probably sitting in the basement of my parents house with other random shit.

But this archive is just incredible. Looking at some of the stuff like "Calculator Baseball" advertisements is really cool.

• From the May 1960 issue: Love this baseball necktie ad.
• December 1961: Wait, forget the necktie — I’d rather have this bedspread and rug.
• July 1966: You’ve got to love an ad whose first two words are “Blow yourself…”
• December 1969: Kangaroo leather, choice of the pros.
• April 1973: Does anyone have any of these mini-sport kits?
• August 1973: I always wanted one of these magnetic team standings boards when I was a kid.
• August 1974: Is there anyone who didn’t have a team wastebasket back in the day?
That’s what Bruce came up with. Unfortunately, it’s not quite enough to suffice as a lead entry, so I had to do some actual work myself — incredible, I know — to pad out the rest of today’s entry:
• March 1970: this eyeglass holder ad appeared only eight pages away from this one. Must’ve been a headytime for the four-eyes set.
• June 1972: What as the deal with that early-’70s ad trope of using all-lowercase headlines? And hey, speaking of lowercase letters, check out the Cubs pennant shown on on this page. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that wordmark before.
• June 1974: Oh man, how great do these watches look?
• July 1980: Look closely at the cover photo — looks like Steve Trout has a slight rip in one of his socks. As for the ads, does anyone out there have any experience with Calculator Baseball?
• March 1985: I realize sex appeal can occasionally play a small role in advertising, but c’mon. (Meanwhile, check out the cover photo’s awesome view of Minnesota’s logo-emblazoned stirrups.)

I found this through the blog "Uni Watch" and here are a few things they pointed out.

[BYU 14]

I love that site, I am a huge fan of the deadball era and have gone to the library a couple of times and spent hours scrolling through old Baseball articles from around the turn of the century from different Newspapers.

[MikeVic]

Ok honestly, I'm curious about calculator baseball... any experience with it here?

[molson]

Damn, every cover from 87-89 looks familiar.

The April issue used to be a huge deal - you'd get all the team schedules and rosters in one place. We're so spoiled today....

[Galaril]

Originally Posted by JetsIn06

Baseball Digest Archives from 1945-Present Online

There goes my day.

This is great. Nowif they only had the Basketball Regsiter or NFL Football stuff instead of baseball I would be in heaven since I also threw all those old mags out and need one to do a sports board game replay for the teams recaps/reviews.

[JetsIn06]

Originally Posted by BYU 14

I love that site, I am a huge fan of the deadball era and have gone to the library a couple of times and spent hours scrolling through old Baseball articles from around the turn of the century from different Newspapers.

BYU..another good place to check if you haven't already is the New York Times archive. I was under the impression you had to pay, but a TON of articles are for free and I actually haven't encountered one from the deadball era at least that they asked me to pay for.

One of the most interesting things to read about is the United States League that lasted about a month. I've done a lot of research online and there really isn't much there. But looking through the NYT archive for one night got me names, dates, team names, players, box scores, etc for the month or two that the league lasted. Also, a ton of great stuff on the Federal League as well.