Card Spotlight 7-16-10

1916 Ferguson Bakery Felt Pennants BF2 #13 - Joe Jackson

The definition of "card" is sometimes stretched in the eyes of the hobbyist. It usually means a flat object made out of cardboard or some type of paper product. Today, with all the different types of "cards" floating around, the definition has expended to include almost anything with a player's picture or information on it.

Before cards were the norm, player's images were on everything from pins to cigar rings. One of the most natural places for a player's picture would be a pennant. After all, pennants go with sports like smiley faces go with the color yellow.

Pennants have fallen out of favor in the past few decades, but they are still around as a collectible. Sometimes you have to look hard to find them, but they are there, lurking in the shadows of most sports shops.

The pennants produced in the early part of the twentieth century stand out as some of the most unique examples of trading card history, without technically being a trading card. There are fewer examples of Joe Jackson items that were actually produced when he was playing. Part of that reason was due to the limited amount of sets produced during Jackson's career.

This felt pennant is only one of ten known issues (not including company name variations) released during his playing time with the Chicago White Sox. This pennant is the only one of those ten not to be made out of a paper product, so this may be the most unique Joe Jackson collectible released during his tenure with the White Sox.