In the 1932 World Series, the one remembered for Babe Ruth's called shot, Lou Gehrig hit .529 with three home runs and eight runs batted in, and the Yankees swept the Cubs. Ruth got the legend. Gehrig got, among other things, a card in a small set of Famous Athletes put out by the U.S. Caramel Company of East Boston, Massachusetts.
There are 32 cards. Twenty-seven are ballplayers; the others are the golfers Bobby Jones and Gene Sarazen and the boxers Gene Tunney, Jack Dempsey and Jack Sharkey. Ruth is the last card, number 32. Gehrig is number 26, listed as Henry (Lou) Gehrig, his portrait set against a vivid red ground inside a white border.
The set is cataloged as 1932, though the evidence points later. Several references date it 1933, and the age printed for Ruth suggests early 1934. It is safest to say it was issued around 1933.
The backs made an offer. A complete set sent in to the company brought back a league baseball, and three complete sets a fielder's glove, with the cards to be returned along with the prize. Many came back punched or stamped canceled so they could not be sent in twice. The company also made sure few complete sets could exist: card #16, Fred Lindstrom, was short-printed so deliberately that only a few copies are known, and it was not identified at all until decades later.
A complete set brought a baseball. The company made sure there were very few complete sets.
Caramel cards were printed in small runs and packed against the candy, which damaged many of them before they were ever taken out. Centering is the other common problem, and the punch holes a third. With the Ruth, collectors have long counted this as his first mainstream card.
