1910 Chicago Cubs Team Signed Book Presented to President William Howard Taft.. ...

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Gifted just two months after baseball history's first Presidential first pitch!

1910 Chicago Cubs Team Signed Book Presented to President William Howard Taft.
It was our twenty-seventh Commander in Chief that started one of the most American traditions that exists--the Presidential first pitch. On Opening Day, April 14, 1910, more than 14,000 fans gathered at National Park in Washington, D.C. to watch their hometown Senators open the American League season as they hosted the mighty Philadelphia Athletics. The box seats had been auctioned to the highest bidder, and were packed with an array of politicians and other dignitaries, most notably President Taft and Vice President James Sherman, who surprised fans by taking seats in the first row rather than in the "presidential box" above the grandstand.
After the opposing managers were introduced to the President, umpire Billy Evans delivered a baseball to Taft, who made a strong throw to the Senators' Opening Day starter on the mound, the iconic Walter Johnson. Taft would return the following year to repeat the ceremony, but would miss his final opportunity in 1912 to attend to funeral of a close friend killed in the Titanic disaster. But Woodrow Wilson would succeed Taft in 1913 and keep the tradition alive, thus effectively codifying this special rite of spring.
We suspect that this unprecedented show of support for our national pastime on Opening Day, 1910 was the inspiration for the creation of this special relic, the black leather cover embossed in gold with the "Touching Second" title and the name of the President. The opening blank page bears the handwritten dedication:
"Presented to the Honorable William Howard Taft, the Republic's foremost fan, by the Authors [autographs of John J. Evers and Hugh S. Fullerton] and the Publishers, June 1910."
The following two pages hold the bold black fountain pen signatures of twenty-eight members of the National League Champion Chicago Cubs, adding to the eventual Hall of Fame credentials of author Johnny Evers his double-play associates Frank Chance and Joe Tinker, as well as twenty-five-game winner Mordecai "Three Finger" Brown. Other notables include Johnny Kling, Harry Steinfeldt, Jimmy Sheckard, Solly Hofman and Frank Schulte--the balance of the starting team.
There is also one welcome exception to the Cubs theme, a full-page photographic image of Honus Wagner near the center of the book flawlessly autographed by the Old Dutchman in his rare "John H. Wagner" format. Spine is worn and slightly loose, but the contents of the book are effectively unchanged more than a century after its encounter with some true legends of the Dead Ball Era, and the originator of the Presidential first pitch. Full LOA from PSA/DNA.