This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 11/12/2021
Controversy swirled around Jackson during the 1915 season. He had spent the winter months headlining a vaudeville show that drew curious crowds throughout the South. Joe enjoyed the theatrical life so much that he refused to report for spring training, threatening to quit baseball and begin a new career on the stage. Katie Jackson reacted poorly to that idea and filed for divorce that March (though she and Joe soon reconciled). In May, team owner Charles Somers ordered manager Joe Birmingham to move Jackson to first base to make room for rookie Elmer Smith in the outfield. Joe played 30 games at first, but the experiment ended when Joe left the lineup with a sore arm. Somers became incensed when Birmingham blamed the position switch for Jackson’s injury, and the team owner soon fired Birmingham, appointing coach Lee Fohl to succeed him. The featured keepsake was issued along with the 1915 Cracker Jack release. Although obviously soiled and in a rather deplorable condition including two interior holes, the card nonetheless is the centerpiece to the issue and is counted amongst the trophy cards of the entire first period of the century.