1878-1981 Near-Complete Run of Reach, Spalding and TSN Baseball Guides (150)

Bidding

This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 4/3/2025

Presented is a remarkable accumulation of Reach, Spalding and The Sporting News Baseball Guides, an array that stretches for nearly a century and features a stunning run of hardbound Guides, all of which provides an unparalleled historical archive of the National Pastime. The Guides are approximately 5-by-7 inches, with some modest variations over the years and page counts that ranged from a couple hundred pages even before the turn of the century to 500-600 pages or even more from well before the First World War. The majority of the offered Guides are elegantly preserved and showcased in attractive light-brown hardbound editions from 1878-1956, providing a wonderful, uniform presentation. The hardbound editions can have some of the expected dirt and staining, with the issue covers ranging from Good to Very Good and some below, while inside pages are generally closer to Excellent or better. The overall condition of covers and inside pages improves a bit around 1942 to the end of the run in 1981. An Ex-Mt example from 1878 headlines this unprecedented assortment that is missing only 1937 in the middle of the Great Depression. As might be expected, there can be some extraneous pen and pencil markings, and about a half-dozen or so of the hardbound versions have covers missing altogether. In addition to the main grouping, there is a second, lower grade of unbound guides from 1902-49. Given the enormous scope of the offering, shipping charges will be substantial.