Dec 01, 2011 - Sale 2263

Sale 2263 - Lot 173

Price Realized: $ 6,000
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 1,500 - $ 2,500
(LINCOLN, ABRAHAM.) [Maurer, Louis; artist?] The National Game. Three "Outs" and One "Run." Abraham Winning the Ball. Lithograph, 12 x 16 1/4 inches; toning, minor edge wear, small crease in lower left margin, minor dampstaining in image area, 6 closed tears repaired with tape, the longest being 3 1/4 inches. New York: Currier & Ives, 1860
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Additional Details

Lincoln is depicted as a victorious baseball player, holding a ball and a railroad tie as a bat, while defeated candidates Bell, Douglas, and Breckinridge look on. 1860 was the year baseball really stepped forward as the national sport, and this was Currier & Ives's first baseball-themed print.
Though the copy in the Library of Congress has made this a well-known image, it is surprisingly scarce on the market. Another copy sold at Swann on 31 March 2011, lot 194, and realized $9,000--believed to be the highest auction price ever for an uncolored Currier and Ives. The resulting publicity drew out this example, which was found being used as backing paper for a framed family photograph. No other copies have been found at auction or in WorldCat. Peters, Currier & Ives, 1660 and pages 86-87; Reilly 1860-42.