RMY Auctions’ July 2025 sale features a museum-worthy piece of hobby history: the only known vintage example of the photograph used to produce Mickey Mantle’s iconic 1954 Red Heart Dog Food baseball card.
This crystal-clear 4.75″ x 7″ image captures a young Mantle posed at the ballpark with his bat in hand. The photograph likely comes directly off the original negative, and while it lacks a date stamp, experts at PSA examined it and agreed it’s vintage to the 1950s and almost certainly a Type 1.
This exact image also appeared in the 1953 Volume 1, Number 2 issue of Baseball Life Magazine, giving it another documented use outside of its famous cardboard incarnation.
The card it helped create, Mantle’s 1954 Red Heart issue, is a favorite among collectors, especially in high grade. Most Mint examples of the card trace back to hobby pioneer Bruce Yeko, who in the 1960s and ’70s sold Red Heart stock directly sourced from the company, including a stack of Mantles once priced at just 25 cents each (eventually, he raised prices to $1).
Unique pieces like this are what make the hobby so exciting. Just when you think you’ve seen it all, something incredible and unexpected turns up to keep things feeling fresh.
Happy collecting!
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