SABR member Tom Shieber confirms rare 1925 footage of Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig
From SABR member Tom Shieber at Baseball Researcher on March 24, 2014:
A few months ago, I learned of the stunning archival holdings at the University of South Carolina’s Moving Image Research Collections. Thanks to the invaluable help of Production Manager Ben Singleton, I had the chance to review some amazing baseball footage, part of the Fox Movietone News outtakes that were donated to USC back in the early 1980s.
When you think about it, this collection of footage is doubly rare. Certainly, very few people have seen the film today. But, since this footage didn’t make the cut for the original Movietone News reels shot in the 1920s and ’30s, it is likely that few beyond a handful of editors actually saw this footage back in the day.
Given my interest in baseball history, I was entranced by most every frame I viewed, but I was especially fascinated by some footage marked A7378 to A7382. The date associated with the footage was noted as June 1, 1925, but my experience researching some other footage in the collection taught me that these dates did not necessarily correspond with the date the film was shot.
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Thanks to Ben Singleton at University of South Carolina’s Moving Image Research Collections, here’s a portion of the historic footage discussed above. The first scene is Ruth’s sixth-inning at bat that, by comparing to the play-by-play data, helped confirm the date of June 1, 1925. The second scene shows Ruth outside the Yankees dugout prior to the game. The final scene shows Ruth in the dugout, with Lou Gehrig in the background at far left. (Also on the bench, but at the right side of the frame, is Yankees center fielder Earle Combs). Enjoy.
Read the full article and watch the video clip here: http://baseballresearcher.blogspot.com/2014/03/some-very-fortunate-footage.html
Related link: Capturing a piece of Yankees history (New York Times)
Originally published: March 26, 2014. Last Updated: March 26, 2014.