21 Old-Timey Baseball Cards To Get You In The Mood For America’s Pastime

A blast from the past

Baseball season is upon us once more and it is easy to get wrapped up in recent history and present day controversies. While we dither about electronic strike zones, whether or not the Astros cheated their way into a title or if the shift is true to the spirit of the game it is sometimes easy to forget that the game of baseball is old. Really, really old.

Baseball cards have been around since the mid-19th century and were often shipped in packs of cigarettes and later packs of gum.

In the spirit of the newly minted 2021 baseball season, here are twenty one old-timey baseball cards that remind us how old America’s Pastime truly is.

1.

Stemmyer was a pitcher for the Boston Beaneaters, the team that would eventually go on to become the Atlanta Braves after multiple iterations. They were in Boston from 1871 until 1952 but after the creation of the American League rival, the Boston Red Sox, the franchise never returned to prominence in the Boston area. This is a classic card from 1887 that shipped with Old Judge Cigarettes.