The Most Important Cover

General Abner Doubleday's Family in Cooperstown

Mr. and Mrs. Frederick Ulysses Doubleday and their son Douglas Doubleday of Kalamazoo, Michigan arrive in Cooperstown Saturday June 10th or Sunday or June 11th 1939 to attend the celebration of the Cavalcade of Baseball.

The Doubledays received their credentials, tickets and badges at the Cooper Inn. Their ancestor General Abner Doubleday invented baseball here in 1839, so it was believed at the time in 1939. They attended the dedication of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum and Centennial Games at Doubleday Field. Most important was the issue of the Centennial BaseBall Stamp.

Frederick Doubleday and his sons owned an office products company and likely made the envelope. During the cancelation process the stamp was dislodged. The cover made its way to Kalamazoo without any stamp on it and there it was assessed 6-cents in postage due, double the 3-cent mailing rate. The postage due was paid and the cover was picked-up.

What a shame, but the envelope was saved to preserve the memory.

Ribbon reads :100 years of baseball 1839 /1939 in memory of Maj. Gen. Doubleday Inventor.

The Glimmerglass reported in their daily newspaper on June 12, 1939 the list of dignitaries attending the dedication and the Cavalcade of Baseball.

Mr. and Mrs. F. Ulysses Doubleday (TYPO Elysses)

Note: Doubleday was born June 26, 1819 in Ballston Spa, New York that was incorporated as a village in 1807, he grew up in Auburn, New York and attended the Cooperstown Classical and Military Academy, studying civil engineering before he was appointed to West Point in 1838. West Point from August 1838 until graduation in July 1842 ranking 24th in a class of 56. The West Point First Year Cadets were restricted from leaving the Academy and probably never visited Cooperstown in 1839.