Interview

 Question #1: What do you do dealing with the uniforms?Answer #1:  I am assuming your asking about my job. As a curator I use many artifacts, not just uniforms, to help me tell baseball stories. Regarding uniforms specifically, they are wonderful artifacts that immediately "connect" with the museum goer. They are familiar with uniforms, what they mean, who wears them, etc. Question #3: In your opinion, what is the most interesting piece of a uniform in the Hall of Fame's collection?Answer #3:  Sorry, but there are so many that are interesting, I can't choose just one. Question #4: Why have the Yankee's uniform not changed over the years? Wouldn't that be bad for selling jerseys?Answer #4:  In the first few decades of the 20th century, the Yankees actually did change their uniforms quite a bit. However, by the mid-1920s, their changes have been very few and, generally very subtle. At the same time, the club began to dominate the game. I can only guess that with their newfound success, they figured "Why change a good thing?" Some modern teams do change their uniform styles, or adopt "alternate" uniforms, and one reason this is done is to increase souvenir sales. My guess is that the Yankees would receive quite a backlash from loyal supporters if they tried to do this. Besides, their souvenir sales have done quite well anyway. Question #5: The Twins are my favorite team. Do you have any of their uniforms? Which one is your favorite? Do you have any pictures you could send me?Answer #5:  We have quite a number of uniform artifacts from the Twins, though I wish we had some from more recent seasons. One that might be of interest is the Twins jersey worn by Minnesota native Dave Winfield when he collected his 3,000th big league hit, September 16, 1993. Question #6: What is the biggest milestone in the history of baseball uniforms ?Answer #6:  Pinpointing one "milestone" in the long history of baseball uniforms is really an impossible task. However, you may wish to take a look at an online exhibit we created a number of years ago that can shed some light on this and many of your other questions. It's called "Dressed to the Nines: A History of the Baseball Uniform" and you can find it at:__[] __ Question #7: How did you land your job at the Hall of Fame? Was it hard to come by?Answer #7:   About a dozen years ago there was an opening at the Hall of Fame for someone to manage their website. I applied for the position and was lucky enough to get it. I have since moved to the curatorial department and am now Senior Curator. Question #8: Do you specialize specifically in uniforms?Answer #8:  No. I work with all sorts of subjects, artifacts, and research projects. I do love uniforms, but all sorts of other baseball artifacts are great, too. Question #9: What is something really interesting about the history of baseball uniforms?  Answer #9:  <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><span style="color: rgb(1, 0, 255);"> Again, I'd suggest you take a look at "Dressed to the Nines: A History of the Baseball Uniform." I tried to include lots of interesting uniform-related stories in that exhibit, so hopefully you can find something worthwhile there.
 * || Question #2: How many uniforms does the Hall of Fame have in its collection?Answer #2:<span class="525145016-13052009" style="outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; outline-color: initial; line-height: 1.2em;">  This is, alas, a surprisingly difficult question to answer. Usually, entire uniforms are not donated to us. Instead, it is usually just jerseys. However, sometime we get jerseys and pants. It is easier, though still not completely straightforward, to determine the number of uniform-related artifacts we have in our collection. That number would count socks separately from jerseys, jerseys separately from pants, pants separately from caps. That number I would estimate (and it is just an estimate) at around 3,000.

I have checked out Dressed to the Nines, and it is something I suggest if you are interested in learning more about the history of baseball uniforms. There is a timeline, and much more. <span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 255);"> ||  ||