This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 3/10/2017
O’Rourke was a versatile performer in the field and a reliable .300 hitter at the plate. Thereafter, as his playing days wound down, O’Rourke assumed the role of baseball executive, particularly in his native Connecticut, where he established a thriving minor league. O’Rourke was also a figure of some cultural significance, rising to prominence in an era when anti-Irish prejudice still flourished in many quarters. Unlike the stereotypical brawling, hard-drinking wastrel of King Kelly stripe, O’Rourke was a sober, well-educated ballplayer whose dignified bearing both on and off the diamond was punctuated only by a proclivity for grandiloquence. In time, these rhetorical flights of fancy, which amused and bewildered his contemporaries, gave rise to the moniker by which Jim O’Rourke is known to this day: Orator. The featured keepsake is 1 of just 5 total copies on record with SGC. The card appears to be skinned from its original backing with some remnants of paper mounting on the reverse. The obverse of the card offers a nice overall image as well a slight bit of staining and a what appears to be a slight trim to the bottom. All of this said this vintage relic retains a terrific overall appeal for this exceptionally rare card.