Vintage Mesh Pattern Nimble Golf Ball, Spalding
Vintage Mesh Pattern Nimble Golf Ball, Spalding
Spalding 'Nimble' Mesh Pattern Golf Ball.
A 1930's Spalding rubber core golf ball in very good condition. The ball has a square mesh or lattice pattern and is called 'Nimble'. The ball is marked 'Nimble' on both poles in red and is with a mesh pattern on the surface of the ball. Dunlop also made a rubber core golf ball called 'Nimble', but theirs was manufactured in around 1910.
The ball is approximately 1 5/8 inch in diameter (4.1 cm).
A. G. Spalding & Bros. was founded in 1876 by Albert Spalding, a baseball player and manager. They were known for their baseballs before branching out into the golf business in 1890's in the States, and Britain shortly thereafter. In Britain Spalding's main business seemed to be golf balls more than clubs. In 1898 they signed a contract with Harry Vardon. The British Open Champion was to endorse their gutta percha ball called the 'Vardon Flyer'.
The rubber core ball (the ancestor of the modern ball) began its life in the late 1890's. The first mass produced rubber core ball was by Coburn Haskell of Cleveland, Ohio. The first core balls were hand wound with elastic thread with a Gutta-percha cover, moulded with the raised square mesh pattern of their predecessor. The slight irregularities in the early wound balls made them quite lively, it was not until the invention of the automatic winding machine by John Gammeter (an engineer at Goodrich) and the change of pattern from mesh to bramble that the balls became more consistent and predictable. In later years, the 1920's, the design went back to a mesh pattern with lattice design as the ball described above.
Dimensions:
1900-1949
Circa 1930's
Rubber
very good.
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.A. G. Spalding & Bros. was founded in 1876 by Albert Spalding, a baseball player and manager. They were known for their baseballs before branching out into the golf business in 1890's in the States, and Britain shortly thereafter. In Britain Spalding's main business seemed to be golf balls more than clubs. In 1898 they signed a contract with Harry Vardon. The British Open Champion was to endorse their gutta percha ball called the 'Vardon Flyer'.The rubber core ball (the ancestor of the modern ball) began its life in the late 1890's. The first mass produced rubber core ball was by Coburn Haskell of Cleveland, Ohio. The first core balls were hand wound with elastic thread with a Gutta-percha cover, moulded with the raised square mesh pattern of their predecessor. The slight irregularities in the early wound balls made them quite lively, it was not until the invention of the automatic winding machine by John Gammeter (an engineer at Goodrich) and the change of pattern from mesh to bramble that the balls became more consistent and predictable. In later years, the 1920's, the design went back to a mesh pattern with lattice design as the ball described above.){kind=link}