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CLASS
OF 87
In
the Cards
Archaeologist
Dr. Robert Fitts C87
began collecting Japanese baseball cards almost a decade ago as a diversion
from the drudgery of Ph.D. work. Today he has tens of thousands of cards
and a Web site for English-speaking collectors (www.RobsJapaneseCards.com).
He took up the
hobby when his wife, Sarah Watkins Fitts C87 G87, an attorney, was transferred
to Tokyo for a couple of years in the early 1990s. I was writing my dissertation,
which is a lonely, boring job, and needed something else to do [while
in Tokyo], he says. Until recently, there were no baseball card shops
in Japan; cards were sold sporadically in antique shops and used-toy stores.
So the hunt was very exciting. Fittss now sizable personal collection
centers on Sadaharu Oh, all-time home-run champion, who bested Hank Aarons
record in 1977 and is one of the most popular Japanese players among Americans.
Japanese
baseball began in the 1890s in Japan, when an American professor who taught
at what would become Tokyo University introduced the game, Fitts says.
It remained an amateur sport until 1936, when the first professional league
was formed. Japanese baseball cards first came out in the 1920s. None
were produced through most of the 1940s because of a paper shortage. Then
from 1948 to 1950, card production boomed despite the economic drag of
post-war reconstruction and occupation. They were cheap toys, Fitts
explains. Colorfully illustrated cards, called menkos, were used
by Japanese boys for flipping games and featured additional games on the
back.
Fittss
Web site displays cards from all eras, including a rare, $1,500 card from
1960 of Japans most popular player, Shigeo Nagashima, which hes reluctant
to sell. Most items on his site sell at much lower prices.
Fitts
now works in New York for Gotham Archaeology, consulting for developers
and construction companies that need to know if there is a chance of finding
archaeological remains on a site before they dig. But I spend most of
my time on more academic work. Hes writing a book on 19th-century New
York with a focus on the developing middle class there. Another book in
the works will introduce the star players of Japanese baseball to the
American public.
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Copyright 2001 The Pennsylvania
Gazette Last modified 3/6/01
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