Vintage Baseball Glove & Mitt Info

What are vintage baseball gloves and mitts?

Generally speaking, all baseball gloves and mitts are distinguished from one another by their construction. Vintage baseball gloves are old gloves of a variety types. Split-finger gloves (commonly referred to as "Pre-War" gloves) do not have lacing between the fingers like the laced finger or "Post-War" models. The "Pre-" and "Post-" prefixes refer to, and correspond approximately with, the end of World War II. Both Pre-War and Post-War models made prior to about 1963 are button-backs. Some have an endorsement or autograph of a famous player from a vintage era stamped into the leather. A simple way of telling old baseball gloves apart by era is how the glove or mitt is secured to the hand, and the webbing or "web".

The web is the manner in which the space between the thumb and forefinger is closed to form a larger ball receiving pocket. This is done by securing the thumb to the forefinger of the glove and may be accomplished by a strand of laced extending through a tunnel made by a loop of leather and called a "tunnel loop" model, a strip of leather interconnecting the thumb and forefinger and called a "sewn-in web" model as in many of the Pre-War models, a center member protruding from the glove pocket creating a six finger appearance or a series of single, double or triple wall leather panels. Today, infield and outfield model gloves differ greatly, much more so than vintage gloves ever did. Everything we sell in our store is US made unless otherwise stated.

The term "mitt" came into vogue because many early players created their gloves from an old pair of winter mittens. By the end of the 1870s, gloves were common. In the mid-1880s, Buck Ewing, a catcher for the New York Giants, became the first to use a pillow-type, antique, catcher's vintage baseball mitt. Technically speaking these are baseball catcher's mitts having front and back walls secured at the periphery of the mitt to form a vintage mitt body. A back panel member is secured to the back wall of the mitt for substantially covering the back of the hand and sandwiching it between the mitt body and back panel. The back panel member and body of the mitt have unconnected lower edge margins defining a hand opening at the bottom of the mitt through which the hand may be inserted up into the mitt between the back panel member and the back wall. The two general types of mitts and they are defined generally by position, namely catcher and baseman mitts. There are two general constructions within each type and they are laced back and buckle-back designs. Glove Value It's all about condition!

Old Gloves make great gifts!™