Unpossible Autograph Friday- An Early Christmas Present

(Every Friday, I profile a former Oriole who has passed away. I've substituted the word unpossible for impossible as an homage to a line from "The Simpsons". Young Ralph Wiggum, who is a few pennies short of a dollar, says "Me fail English? That's unpossible.")

My dad gave me a Christmas present a little early this year; he has been one of the very few people who have regularly gifted me baseball cards over the years and I always look forward to what he has for me. I was blown away when I opened my gift and it contained three of the four remaining Orioles autographs that I needed for my collection. My need list is down to only 1! I have to spread these bad boys out since I've been searching for them for so long, and I will feature one each week over the next three weeks to savor their awesomeness.

Up first is Lou Jackson since this is only the second example of his autograph I've ever seen and the first I've seen in person. I also think that his signature is the most rare of the trio. The previous autograph of Lou's that I had seen was a signed 1959 Topps Cubs card on ebay that the seller wanted $1000 for, which is significantly out of my price range. If it was his 1964 Topps Orioles card (the only Orioles card of his that was released during his lifetime) I might have considered taking out a second mortgage, but not for the Cubs card.

Lou played in only 34 MLB games over three seasons. 30 of those appearances came with the Cubs in 1958-59, and the other four came for the Orioles in 1964. Lou bounced around the minors after his time in Chicago and he came to Baltimore after the O's selected him from the Milwaukee Braves in the 1963 Rule 5 draft. Following Spring Training, he broke camp with the O's but wasn't able to regularly crack the lineup, so was sent to the AAA Rochester Red Wings in mid-May, spending the ensuing season and a half with them. After the 1965 season ended, Lou signed a deal to play professionally in the Japan for the Sankei Atoms (now the Tokyo Yakult Swallows) and spent the 1966-68 seasons there. He developed some serious health problems while in Japan, possibly due to his alcohol abuse, and died in Tokyo in May 1969 of pancreatitis. He was only 33 years old when he passed away.  

Obviously, Lou's passing away at such a young age in a foreign country over forty years ago is the main reason his autograph is so hard to track down. Adding to that issue is that he was only featured on the two cards I mentioned above during his lifetime. He was posthumously featured as an Oriole in this TCMA set and the Orioles Crown set, but he quite obviously, never signed either of them.

RIP Lou.

Thank you dad for this amazing autograph to add to my collection.