1936-37 Jimmie Foxx Game Used & Signed Bat from The Jimmie Foxx Collection, PSA/DNA GU 9.5....

Description

1936-37 Jimmie Foxx Game Used & Signed Bat from The Jimmie Foxx Collection, PSA/DNA GU 9.5. Ironclad provenance, outstanding game use and a vintage signature establish this particular Hillerich & Bradsby R43 as one of the finest to derive from the Beast's tool kit. It is consigned to this auction by Foxx' grandson, making its hobby debut over eight decades after Double-X wielded it during his first two seasons in Boston. A key figure in the Philadelphia Athletics' second great dynasty, Foxx was the last of the Hall of Fame players to abandon Connie Mack after a bleak last-place finish in 1935, thirty-four games off the pennant pace.

He'd launch seventy-seven homers for the BoSox during the two-season production run of the provided lumber and the massive game use evident in the plenitude of ball marks, cleat divots and light grain checking suggests that some portion of them was launched from its surface. Length of thirty-five inches (35") and weight of thirty-four ounces (33.7 oz.) are correct for Foxx' ordering records. Handle is uncracked.

While its derivation from the Foxx family archives proves the exchange was never made, it appears that the bat was intended to be gifted to a buddy due to a red ink inscription on the barrel reading, "To My Good Friend Bob, I hope you always bat 1000%, Jimmie Foxx." The writing is a technical 6/10, though the red struggles a bit for contrast against the brown surface. While the identity of the recipient has been lost to history, it's fun to imagine it's Robert "Lefty" Grove, who Foxx followed from Philadelphia to Boston two years after the Hall of Fame southpaw's departure. PSA/DNA notes that they are aware of only one other signed Foxx gamer. LOA from PSA/DNA, GU 9.5. Letter of provenance from William Foxx. Full LOA from PSA/DNA.

More Information: The Jimmie Foxx Collection

He was a junior in high school when he first stepped upon a Major League diamond, making his debut at age seventeen with the 1925 Philadelphia Athletics, a team he'd shepherd through a three-season rule of the American League in the late 1920's and early 1930's. Thunderous power was The Beast's primary calling card, and he'd club sixty home runs in 1932, denied a tie for Babe Ruth's single-season record when rain-outs wiped two of them off his stat sheet. But he'd soon become the Bambino's first roommate in the 500 Home Run Clubhouse in 1940, a feat that would ensure his eventual induction into the Baseball Hall of Fame.

That milestone baseball appears within the extraordinary collection that follows, the highlight of a remarkable assembly of personally owned items from one of the prewar game's premier long ball artists. The first portion of the collection is consigned to auction by Foxx' son William, with each lot accompanied by his signed letter of provenance. The balance derives from Foxx' short-lived namesake restaurant in Galesburg, Illinois, retained for years by his business partner. Most of these items were on display for diners, while others relate to the construction thereof. Together, these two related groupings form the most significant single offering of Jimmie Foxx material to appear in a single auction.