Historical Hockey Memorabilia Auction Fall 2019
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 11/5/2019
Unable to claim Lord Stanley’s hardware despite two attempts throughout their tenure, the Minnesota North Stars spent a quarter century in the NHL before relocating to Dallas, advancing to the Stanley Cup finals in both 1981 and 1991. The Stars can include a number of notable alumni within their organization, including Neal Broten, Brian Bellows and Bobby Smith. We have an especially rare and desirable inaugural-season Minnesota North Stars jersey from the expansion season of 1967-68. Only seeing action during the preseason (between Sept. 16th 1967 and Oct. 5th 1967), a Gerry Cosby label with “44” sizing is affixed to the collar, with no other tagging present. Styled with the classic green-over-gold pointed-N tackle twill team crest, “24” appears over the sleeves and verso in matching material, with no nameplate present but evidence of a former example. Serving as one of the original Minnesota North Stars jerseys, this scarce example is deserving of hobby veneration. An LOA will accompany along with a COA.
As mentioned, these Wilson double-knit jerseys with Gerry Cosby tagging were worn for just the inaugural preseason games before that Stars switched to General Athletic durene jerseys for the first regular season game vs St. Louis. There are a number of differences between these first sweaters worn during the preseason and the examples that saw use throughout the regular season, with our preseason specimen sporting a tie-neck front with solid gold collar, with the upper left portion of the “N” team crest slanting downward as opposed to extending horizontally as seen on the regular-season jerseys, with a slightly rounded numeral font and thinner colour bands over the waist also specific to just the preseason jerseys. We should also note that we couldn’t find any player wearing the #24 jersey during the preseason with Minnesota, with no player listed as wearing it during the regular season. It is unknown if the game wear on the jersey (a few random marks are present, with a small hole near the right cuff and red paint transfer over the left elbow. There is also what appears to be blood staining over the front, with a bit of threading left from a circular patch over the right breast) originates from being worn during the preseason by an unknown player, or if the wear came from recycled use (as per the nameplate removal), as it’s believed that North Stars owner Walter Bush's later used these jerseys with his Midwest Jr. Stars in the mid-1970s.
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