This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 7/10/2015
Graded MINT 9 by SGC. When Paul Simon penned the famous line, "Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio?" for Simon and Garfunkel's 1968 hit song, "Mrs. Robinson," it wasn't at first clear why the avid Yankees fan had chosen Joe D. over his own childhood hero, Mickey Mantle. Simon would soon admit on The Dick Cavett Show that it was all "about syllables... about how many beats there [were]." But this of course was an oversimplification. Years later, in a New York Times op-ed piece composed just after DiMaggio's death in March, 1999, Simon explained that he'd intended the line as a tribute to Joe's unpretentiousness as one of the last of the great American stoic heroes. In the revolutionary, counter-cultural zeitgeist of the late 60s, DiMaggio represented, to fans of both baseball and rock 'n roll alike, a set of heroic ideals--grace, dignity, stoicism--that had all but disappeared from American life (in favor of open sexuality and other liberal freedoms). Somewhat ironically, he was also the embodiment of the very ideals that would emerge from the revolutionary 60s. Transcending class and ethnic barriers, he achieved the American Dream in fairy tale-like fashion, but he did it with an almost old world, or traditional, set of values, heroic to the very end. In the vast national treasure chest of images and artifacts depicting "Joltin' Joe," none capture his essence better than his intimate 1939 Play Ball baseball card, and example of which is offered here in magnificently preserved MINT 9 condition as deemed by the cardboard authorities at SGC. Four undeniably MINT corners join near perfect MINT to MINT+ edges around an impeccably centered image of the 1939 AL Most Valuable Player against a nearly immaculate charcoal backdrop. A few pixel-sized microns of print can be observed near Joe's chin and left shoulder but in no way detract from the high-end appeal of this accurately if not somewhat conservatively graded 1939 Play Ball masterpiece that ranks as 1 of just 5 examples in its unsurpassed class at SGC with just 12 like it and 0 higher at PSA from a combined submission pool in excess of 1,300, a remarkably staggering total for the issue considering that both firms, combined, have evaluated just over 600 examples of the set's famous Ted Williams rookie. Minimally MINT in all scrutable facets and bordering on GEM MINT in a number of categories, this may very well be the single finest example in existence! Coo, coo, ca-choo!