Baseball signed by inaugural HOF class sells for record amount
It's difficult to put a price on history, but apparently not impossible.
A baseball signed by 11 of the 12 members of the inaugural Baseball Hall of Fame class of 1939, including Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, Cy Young, and Walter Johnson, sold on Saturday night for $623,369.
The ball was previously owned by former MLB third baseman Marv Owen, who collected the signatures on the day of the induction ceremony. He stored it in a fur-lined glove in a safe deposit box until his death in 1991, preserving the signatures for those 52 years.
"The sheer greatness of this ball is simply unrivaled," SCP Auctions president David Kohler said in a statement, according to Darren Rovell of ESPN. "Its historical importance compounded by the impeccable provenance and state of preservation elevate it to singular status as the most important and valuable autographed baseball in the world."
Lou Gehrig is the only inaugural Hall of Famer whose signature is not on the ball, as he missed the induction ceremony due to illness and was famously diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) just days later.
While Saturday's sale topped the previous record for the most expensive signed baseball - one autographed by Ruth sold for $388,375 in 2012 - it wasn't the highest-priced baseball of all time. Mark McGwire's then-record-setting 70th home run ball from the 1998 season was purchased by comic book writer Todd McFarlane for $3 million in January 1999.