The Baseball Reliquary Presents
NOT EXACTLY COOPERSTOWN
Exhibition: August
8—September 29, 2011 Location: Burbank
Central Library Address: 110 N. Glenoaks
Blvd., Burbank, California
Information: (626) 791-7647 or
terymar@earthlink.net
In its ongoing mission of traversing the
Southern California landscape to present a wide
variety of baseball exhibitions and programs,
the Baseball Reliquary returns to beautiful
downtown Burbank with
Not
Exactly Cooperstown, an exhibition which
features new and recently-acquired artifacts and
artworks, along with some perennial favorites.
Not
Exactly Cooperstown will run from August
8-September 29, 2011 at the Burbank Central
Library, 110 N. Glenoaks Blvd., Burbank,
California.
Highlights of the exhibition include the
first public display of one-eyed umpire Max
McLeary’s legendary mask, with the Frontier
League baseball still lodged between its bars
that broke his nose, gave him a concussion, and
led to one of the greatest stories in baseball
history; a singed toupee worn by the late Ron
Santo, the power-hitting third baseman and
long-time radio announcer for the Chicago Cubs,
which caught fire on a cold night in April 2003
at New York’s Shea Stadium when he stood up in
the announcer’s booth for the National Anthem
and got too close to an overhead electric
heater; and some of the grooviest threads to
ever appear on a professional baseball diamond,
a psychedelic peace-and-love jersey featuring
peace symbols, flowers, spacey swirls, and Great
Britain’s Union Jack flag, worn by players on
the Stockton Ports of the Class-A California
League for a 2010 promotion, “Salute to the
Beatles Night.”
Other artifacts on view include a box of
baseballs bearing the forged signature of Mother
Teresa, seized in 2000 as part of the FBI’s
undercover “Operation Bullpen” raid and later
donated to the Baseball Reliquary to alert the
general public to the prevalence of counterfeit
and fraudulent memorabilia in the hobby
marketplace; a humanitarian award given to Ty
Cobb in 1950 by the Royston, Georgia Chamber of
Commerce along with a handwritten letter by
pitcher Carl Mays which provides the sordid
details of an on-field confrontation with Cobb
that nearly ended Mays’s career; a collection of
relics from the legendary House of David
barnstorming baseball teams; and paintings
depicting the most valuable baseball card in
history, the Honus Wagner T-206 tobacco card,
along with a selection of artist-designed and
defaced baseball cards, sans the bubble gum of
course.
And to top things off, the Baseball
Reliquary presents a shrine to one of its newest
inductees to the Shrine of the Eternals, the
organization’s alternative and
anti-establishment hall of fame: Ted Giannoulas,
a.k.a. the San Diego Chicken.
On display is the Chicken’s head from a
game-worn costume, a variety of props including
the infamous eye chart to better assist umpires
in their chosen profession, photos and
memorabilia, and the Chicken’s Shrine of the
Eternals inductee plaque.
As is the case with most Baseball
Reliquary exhibitions,
Not
Exactly Cooperstown features an excellent
selection of artworks, courtesy of Ben
Sakoguchi, Greg Jezewski, Paul Kuhrman, and
William Scaff.
Also on view is a new work, “Got Cheery
Optimism?,” from Stephen Seemayer’s
L.A. Blue
Bum series, which is depicted on the
artist’s Web site at
www.labluebum.com.
Library hours for the exhibition are
Monday-Thursday, 9:30 am-9:00 pm; Friday, 9:30
am-6:00 pm; Saturday, 10:00 am-6:00 pm; closed
Sunday.
For further information, contact the
Baseball Reliquary by phone at (626) 791-7647 or
by e-mail at terymar@earthlink.net.
For directions, phone the Burbank Central
Library at (818) 238-5600 during library hours.
Not Exactly Cooperstown is made possible, in part, by a grant to the
Baseball Reliquary from the Los Angeles County
Board of Supervisors through the Los Angeles
County Arts Commission.
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