In an exclusive arrangement with John Rogers of Rogers Photo Archives, MEARS Auctions is proud to announce that our firm has been chosen to market the entire football contents of the 81-year old Chicago Sun Times photo archive. A hand picked selection of the finest images from the collection of vintage football photography will be proudly featured in the January 19th thru 28th Super Bowl Auction Event held at www.mearsonlineauctions.com. Only 1,000+ lots of rare, unpublished, one of a kind, and never before seen football photos will be featured in this one time hobby sale. These lots represent the best of the best of the archives. When the particular images selected for the auction are gone, that is it.
Although the photos are quite historic in their own right, the origin of their lineage is also quite interesting. Originally established in 1844 as the Chicago Evening Journal, the paper changed its name in 1929 and became the Daily Illustrated Times. Considered progressive by period standards, the Times used a tabloid format, (still popular today), with lots of photographs. The paper was renamed when purchased in 1947 by department store heir Marshall Field III, who used the Times printing presses to distribute his Chicago Sun newspaper. The combined papers became known as the Chicago Sun Times.
Collectors have observed the growing market and rising prices associated with vintage photography. The archives of the San Francisco Examiner and Detroit News have been auctioned, with great fanfare from hobbyist and investors. For the January 19th thru 28th Auction, this is the first and only time this hand picked selection of the finest images of the Sun Times football photo archives will be made available to the collecting public.
“100’s of man hours have gone into the selection process while choosing images for our January Auction,” explained Troy R. Kinunen, President of MEARS Auctions. “Although the collection contained over 35,000+ images, only the very best were selected for inclusion in our sale. This equaled to less than one-half percent of the total photo volume. Believe me, the quality of these football lots included in this sale have been unmatched in previous photo auctions. The remaining collection still has great images for the collectors, but the selected auction lots stand above as the emphasis was on clarity, contrast, color/toning, and overall high-eye appeal of each subject. For each player offered, the finest available photo(s) were selected for this auction. For some players, such as George Gipp, there are no other surviving photos other than what is offered in this sale. I cannot stress how rare and historically important this collection of football images are,” states Kinunen.
The entire collection of 35,000+ photos, all unpicked and intact as archived by the Sun Times, will be marketed by MEARS Auctions. MEARS will continue to sell the remaining inventory through various other sources, which will include the companies Ebay arm, username: mearsauctions.
“It was clear to me that MEARS Auctions was my number one choice for marketing the football images,” says photo expert John Rogers. “Troy Kinunen and his firm has clearly been the industry leader in the evaluation and marketing of football memorabilia over the past several years,” states Rogers. “MEARS was also selected as they will be in involved with the digital cataloging of the football collection. The new MEARS Research center and support staff was the perfect venue for processing 35,000+ football photos,” Rogers explained.
To state that vintage football photography is rare is an understatement. Regarding the Sun Times photo archives, many images were taken by staff photographers, and are exclusive to this archive. This may be your only chance to own these specific images.
Regarding the lots selected for the January auction, besides the visual and artistic aspects, the content emphasis focused on HOF players, college and professional stars, Heisman candidates, specific colleges such as Notre Dame and Michigan, and finally, images that were just plain interesting, such as the image of a 13 year old Bart Starr dress in the local VFW football team uniform.
The auction is scheduled for January 19th thru 28th. Interested parties may register for the auction at https://www.mearsonlineauctions.com/adduser.aspx.
Any additional questions may be directed to troy@mearsonline.com.