1924-25 Joe Carr Signed Elks Club Pass from The Joe Carr Find....

Click the image to load the highest resolution version.

Sold on Nov 18, 2016 for:

Sign-in or Join (free & quick)

Get one of these:

Share this lot

Track Item Printable Auction Results

Sell One of These

Description

Auction Info

Guides & Info

Description

1924-25 Joe Carr Signed Elks Club Pass from The Joe Carr Find. Joe Carr's relevance to the growth of football is immeasurable. He helped elevate the ruffian sport, which was fourth in popularity to baseball, boxing and horse racing. Carr transformed the gridiron from a town game into a big city, and business, phenomenon. Before Carr took the National Football League to unprecedented heights, he was a newspaper man. That is where Carr learned the skill of promotion.

This Elk's Club pass (3.75x2.5") is signed by Carr on the name slot in 9/10 black ink. The pass was issued for 1924, and subsequently removed from the Carr family scrapbook. The scrapbook was meticulously assembled by his sister, and has paper remnants on the reverse. Full LOA from PSA/DNA. Auction LOA from James Spence Authentication.

The Joe Carr Find

Though his name may be unfamiliar to all but the true football historians, arguably no figure was more essential in raising the National Football League from its vulnerable infancy to commercial viability than the man whose personal collection is listed on the following pages. At a time when the college game was the only game that mattered, Joe Carr fought and won a seemingly unwinnable war to legitimize the pay-for-play gridiron. Though Jim Thorpe owns the distinction of the first president of the National Football League, the iconic Hall of Famer was little more than a figurehead. It was Carr whose generalship moved the needle from amateur to professional dominance.

Remarkably, this special archive narrowly averted oblivion less than a year ago when our consignor spotted a large quantity of documents being loaded into a dumpster. We can see, in the lots that follow, what a great loss that would have been to the physical history of the early professional game. This offering represents a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for the cultured football collector.

View all of [The Joe Carr Find ]