Baseball For Everyone; A Treasury of Baseball Lore and Instruction for Fans and Players. Line Illustrations by Lenny Hollreiser. .

New York: Whittlesey House, 1948. First edition. Heavy-handed pencil inscription erased from front fly, covers rubbed; good copy in a nice supplied dust jacket, price-clipped.. 8vo, 224pp; red cloth. An unremarkable copy of the Yankee Clipper's instructional guide to the game of baseball, yet distinguished by the presence, loosely inserted, of a small slip of paper to which is affixed a rare example of DiMaggio's autograph from the 1940s. DiMaggio's ink signature is mounted between clipped photos of the great Yankee; along the bottom edge the original owner has written: "Joe DiMaggio -BB Player - given me - Nov. 1941." On the other side of the paper are pencil autographs of four members of the 1941 St. Louis Cardinals: pitchers Ira Hutchinson and Sam Nahem, shortstop Marty Marion, and second baseman Eddie Lake, all noted as having been obtained at a 1941 game between the Cardinals and the Brooklyn Dodgers -- (why couldn't he have gotten Stan Musial?). In his later years, when his signature had changed, DiMaggio signed thousands of autographs, often as a paid service. Examples of his early autograph from this vintage are distinctly uncommon; this one dates from the year when DiMaggio hit safely in 56 consecutive games, a streak that has proved to be among the most durable in all sports. He was named World Series MVP after the Yankees defeated the Brooklyn Dodgers in five games.