Many years ago, I came up with the idea for baseball caps for fictional teams. I don't remember which specific teams I had in mind, but I'm sure Henry Wiggen's New York Mammoths were one of them. I even sent along this brilliant notion to Ebbets Field Flannels, and I was disappointed when the idea was rejected. It still hurts a little!
Well, fictional baseball his here!
Granted, it's not exactly what I had in mind. I was thinking about literature, not television. And in fairness to Ebbets Field, you might argue they'd already done literature with their New York Knights gear. But that was (and is) based not on Malamud's novel, but Redford's movie. Of course, there are two problems with creating hats from literature: 1) One doesn't know exactly what the thing's supposed to look like, and 2) nobody reads anymore anyway.
Still, a Hoboken Zephyrs cap, based on a first-season Twilight Zone episode, is pretty cool. I wondered, though ... How did they know it was trimmed with red? The Twilight Zone was completely in black-and-white!
To find out, I got in touch with Jerry Cohen, the owner and founder of Ebbets Field who rejected my idea all those years ago. He gave me a detailed response this time. Or rather, two detailed responses!
Rob: If you look carefully at the trim on the jerseys there are two colors, light and dark. The letters and trim on the hat and shirt align with the light color, not the dark. The most common color combination in baseball was navy and red. The light color in the trim has to be something like red or orange, as if it were royal blue it wouldn't make sense as a darker shade than royal was never used in combination. This was my professional conclusion after looking at details of uniforms in black & white pictures for 26 years. While it is possible I am wrong, I feel this is most likely accurate, and unless someone produces evidence (color picture or actual uniform) I am going with it. Thanks, Jerry
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Rob: See attached photo. Look at the 2-tone trim on the sleeve. Then look at the lettering on the shirt and bill and trim on the hat. Those colors obviously match the lighter color on the trim, not the darker. Given the limited palette of baseball colors at the time the dark/light combination can really only be navy/red, black/orange, black/gold. I think the light shades are too dark for gold, and orange or gold without a backing color was rarely used for the main lettering. The most likely combination was navy and red trim, with red being used predominately for the lettering and caps.
Hope this helps!
Why, yes. It does help. Not that I ever doubted Mr. Cohen's attention to detail. If you've spent one-tenth as much time as I have perusing the Ebbets Field Flannels catalogs, you know what I mean.
So, more please. I probably wouldn't purchase this particular cap, because I'm not a big fan of the letter atop the same-colored stripe. Love the concept, though! When they start making Port Ruppert Mundys caps, I'm getting six!
