With the wide eyes of a fastball hitter who guessed right, Mark E. Mitchell stared at his computer screen. The auction was for a 1930s bat used by the Pittsburgh Crawfords, one of the best baseball teams ever assembled. Bids hovered near the $300 starting price.
“The bidding was so sparse. I’m thinking this could be Josh Gibson’s bat,” said Mr. Mitchell, a dealer and appraiser of historic newspapers.
The Bradenton, Fla., man, who also collects African-American cultural artifacts, considers this battered, cracked piece of white ash that he bought for $1,126 in 2009 one of the most important items in his 4,000-piece collection.