At this summer's National Sports Collector's Convention in Cleveland we were approached by a friendly potential consignor seeking information on their massive photo album. Though we immediately recognized the large University of Michigan logo on the cover, we were ill-prepared to discover the trove of fascinating content within. Featuring images captured between 1907-14, the first of approximately 50 double-sided pages in the album contained mostly personal photos of life in and around the Michigan campus. As our team flipped through the 12" x 18" pages it soon became obvious that whoever created the album held a keen interest in athletics. We continued leafing through the content and were intrigued to find several amateur and/or collegiate baseball and football related original team photos, large photos of individual University of Michigan baseball players – and then the real gems surfaced. Astonishingly, one of the pages contained an original 7.5" x 9.5" team photo depicting the 1912 University of Michigan baseball team at their practice field, complete with head coach Branch Rickey. Perhaps even more exciting was a full-length 4.5" x 7.5" original photo of Coach Rickey in his New York Highlanders uniform that sat next to the team photo. An incredible discovery! On the very next page was yet another 7.5" x 9.5" original photo of the 1912 team, this time with all players in uniform, at the ballpark, with their equipment displayed. Consistent with the previous team photo, coach Rickey appeared with his men, a caption reading "Varsity Base Ball Squad 1912" along the bottom. Deeper into the album we found numerous 2.25" x 3" snapshots of the team, many of which feature Branch Rickey during practice, and in various situations while traveling to away contests. Somewhat out of breath at this point we THEN came to find over a collection of snapshots from spring training with the 1913 Cleveland Naps in Pensacola, FL. Mixed within this group rested a fabulous 3.5" x 4.25" never-before-seen 1912-dated photo of Nap Lajoie, Hal Chase, and Vean Gregg, with a young boy. Other highlights from the album include what appears to be an RPPC depicting the Class D 1908 Canton Chinks, a 7" x 9" team photo of the 1911 University of Michigan football squad, an 8" x 10" action photo from a game featuring the 1913 Federal League's Cleveland Green Sox, and two approx. 7.25" x 9.5" photos of the long-forgotten sport of auto polo, both bearing credit stamping from photographer Louis Van Oeyen on reverse. Ultimately, the album was consigned to Love of the Game and we are excited to offer this historic trove here in our Summer 2024 Premier Auction. All photos listed above are included with the album, along with hundreds of additional photos and a few postcards, many of which are non-sports related. Please note many of the individual pages have become separated from their binding and remain loosely placed inside the album.