Play ball!!
While searching through the Library of Congress' photography collection for a historic photo of baseball's opening day, this picture caught my eye because it includes an unidentified photographer, with a tripod mounted camera, recording the opening ceremonies.
Baseball photography had been on my mind since I recently acquired a copy of Baseball's Golden Age: The Photographs of Charles M. Conlon (Henry N Abrams, 1993). In some quarters, Charles Conlon is thought of as the greatest baseball photographer of all time, and the photos in this book make a strong argument for that claim. Working from 1904 to 1942, Conlon photographed some of the greatest players of baseball's golden era: Babe Ruth, Shoeless Joe Jackson, Christy Mathewson, Cy Young, Dizzy Dean and many others, some famous, some not so well known.
Working with a Graflex camera and 5x7 or later 4x5 glass plate negatives, Conlon took thousands of player portraits and team pictures for the Spalding Base Ball Guide and the Reach Base Ball Guide. He also pioneered the practice of action photography in sports, taking advantage of the faster glass plates that became available as technology advanced. Perhaps the best known of Conlon's photographs is his 1909 action shot of Ty Cobb sliding into third base.
Conlon's body of work is remarkable given the fact that photography was a spare-time pursuit. He was a full-time proof reader at the New York Evening Telegraph, not a professional photographer. Charles Conlon captured something magical about baseball during this golden age. He leaves a legacy of great baseball photographs, but his work transcends baseball. These are simply great photographs.
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I am not a Yankees fan, but if you are, you may not care to remember the 1925 season. Babe Ruth missed most of the season and the Yankees finished 29 games behind the first place Washington Senators. The only team to do worse that year was the Boston Red Sox, finishing an abysmal 49 games out of first. The Yankees sprang back from this poor showing, and 40 years would pass before the team had another below .500 season.
Photo credit: Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division LC-B2-6350-16
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