Base Ball Exclusively. No Cheap Side Lines
The Holt County Sentinel, 1910. View the original
The Sporting News pitching itself to Holt County in 1910: the base ball paper of the world, base ball exclusively, no cheap side lines. Send a two cent stamp and the Record Book comes free, containing schedules, records, etc., etc.
In the summer of 1910 The Sporting News went looking for subscribers in Holt County, Missouri, and led with its whole philosophy in six words: “Base Ball Exclusively. No Cheap Side Lines.” Other papers might dilute themselves with horse racing or pugilism or news. Not this one. “Each and every issue contains timely and expert comment from the pens of the highest authorities on the game.”
The deal itself is honest 1910 economics: “Do you want a base ball guide free? Send two-cent stamp for copy of the 1910 Edition of The Sporting News Record Book. Contains schedules, records, etc., etc.” That closing “etc., etc.” is doing a lot of quiet salesmanship, and above it all sits the masthead claim, in quotation marks the paper supplied itself: “The Base Ball Paper of the World.”
Free sample mailed on request, courtesy of Charles C. Spink & Son of St. Louis. The Spink family kept publishing The Sporting News for decades after this ad ran, and kept the title of base ball paper of the world defensible for most of a century, which is a better record than most claims printed in quotation marks can show.
| Place | Oregon, Missouri |
|---|---|
| Year | 1910 |
| Newspaper | The Holt County Sentinel |
| Posted | |
| Tags |