No Chilling Out for Williams Family

Lou Gehrig's retirement, the founding of baseball's Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., and the Yankees fourth consecutive World Series championship make 1939 ring loudly in the minds of memorabilia collectors. Arguably the most famous vintage baseball memorabilia item -- the uniform Gehrig wore when he proclaimed that he was "the luckiest man on the face of the earth" -- comes from this year. It was purchased several years ago for a reported $400,000 in a Leland's auction by a Japanese real estate developer. The uniform is reportedly displayed in the executive's U.S. office. For decades, the Gehrig uniform was owned by Barry Halper, who was given the treasure by Eleanor Gehrig, the Iron Horse's widow.

Josh Evans of Leland's said another great piece from 1939 became "one of the first great pieces" he ever owned -- a 1939 pin presented to Gehrig that year at the All-Star game. The pin with Gehrig's name on the back eventually sold at auction for about $30,000, Evans recalled. (Frank Crosetti's '39 pin would sell more recently for about $2,500.) The Gehrig pin came from an elderly man who came into Leland's then-Manhattan office. "I started to drool over it and made him an offer," Evans recalled. The man left to get another opinion and the next thing Evans knew he's getting a phone call from a local coin dealer, who didn't know Evans had seen the piece. The coin dealer thought Evans' offer was fair. All Evans knew is that if the piece were available nothing would stop him from buying it. He'd buy it either from the man himself or from the coin dealer.

In 1997, a collection of correspondence from 1939 either from Gehrig or his physicians at the Mayo Clinic concerning his health condition, were sold. Of course, ALS subsequently became known as Lou Gehrig's Disease. Other, more widely held collectibles from the 1939 Yankees are in the marketplace and are still sought. . . .

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