{"id":199,"date":"2018-08-02T15:39:41","date_gmt":"2018-08-02T20:39:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/haughtcorner.com\/?page_id=199"},"modified":"2023-05-30T11:12:13","modified_gmt":"2023-05-30T16:12:13","slug":"uniforms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/haughtcorner.com\/?p=199","title":{"rendered":"Uniforms. Well, jerseys."},"content":{"rendered":"

 <\/p>\n

I’m a jersey guy.<\/p>\n

Not a Jersey Guy, like my friends Neil Besougloff and Wayne Krenchicki, who embody what Jersey Guys are all about.<\/p>\n

I’m talking about sports jerseys. Baseball jerseys, especially.<\/p>\n

The Baltimore Colts were the first team I followed as a little kid, and they<\/p>\n

\"Unitas\"
John Unitas<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

had fabulous blue jerseys. John Unitas was and is the picture of what a quarterback should look like on the field, and it’s impossible to forget the image of #19 in that beautiful blue jersey and white helmet with the horseshoes on the side, taking a seven-step drop, cradling the ball by his right ear, getting ready to cut up a defense.<\/p>\n

And Lenny Moore, #24, looked even faster and more graceful with that blue top and “spatted” white tape on his cleats.<\/p>\n

Jim Parker (#77) and Gino Marchetti (#89) looked even bigger than the massive men they were when they put on those blue jerseys with the UCLA shoulder loops of blue and white.<\/p>\n

In baseball, the Cincinnati Reds’ sleeveless flannel jerseys of 1961-1966 vintage are the gold standard — the most beautiful baseball uniforms ever.<\/p>\n

\"Pinson\"
Vada Pinson 1961<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I’ve been hooked ever since. And although I am not a collector in the strictest sense of the word, I do have a fairly large number of jerseys — most of which are game-worn — around 300 or so. (Hey, the “real” collectors sometimes have four or five times that many. I am a slacker by comparison.)<\/p>\n

My jersey “thing” began in 1977 when I visited Cincinnati. I wanted a “real” Reds jersey so much I could almost taste it. I loved the uniforms the Big Red Machine wore, although I knew there was no chance of landing one.<\/p>\n

Still I headed downtown to shop and hope. I randomly parked on Fourth Street, across from Koch Sporting Goods. And in the window was an authentic Ken Griffey jersey for sale.<\/p>\n

I somehow managed to avoid being hit by a car as I sprinted across the street. And a<\/p>\n

\"Nolan
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Original 1977 Reds jersey<\/h6>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

few minutes later, I walked out with an order for four Reds jerseys (two home, two road; gotta have spares for laundry day). The jerseys were $45 apiece; doesn’t sound like much today, but I was making about $3\/hr then.<\/p>\n

The rest is history.<\/p>\n

I ordered a number of jerseys from Koch’s during the next few years, and eventually worked there in the mid-1980s. One of my duties was — of course — keeping inventory on our pro jerseys and making up retail orders for them, as well as taking care of the Reds’ and Bengals’ repair or callup jerseys.<\/p>\n

I learned a great deal then, which helped a lot later.<\/p>\n

Not much happened for a while after that; there were kids to raise. But later, I got started again — this time with San Francisco Giants jerseys — and I was building things up for what I eventually hoped would be a personal Hall of Fame or man cave.<\/p>\n

I also bought a sewing machine at Goodwill for $15, and taught myself how to sew. I bought a heat press, material, and started making or altering my own jerseys.<\/p>\n

Eventually I retired and we moved back to Cincinnati, and our house has a nice<\/p>\n

\"Giantswall\"
A portion of the Giants section of my man cave<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

basement that I appropriated to display this stuff and have a work area to create more.<\/p>\n

In this space I will show you what I have, and occasionally how I go about acquiring and modifying jerseys. I hope you find it interesting and\/or amusing.<\/p>\n

The Man Cave: A Quick Tour<\/a><\/p>\n

Bill Henderson’s Dream Shop<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  I’m a jersey guy. Not a Jersey Guy, like my friends Neil Besougloff and Wayne Krenchicki, who embody what Jersey Guys are all about. I’m talking about sports jerseys. Baseball jerseys, especially. The Baltimore […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-199","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-haughts-thoughts"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t