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Full-length portrait of baseball legend Babe Ruth with facsimile signature "Yours truly 'Babe' Ruth," taken on July 23, 1920. Part of a series of eight photographs of Ruth in the United States Library of Congress's Prints and Photographs division

Babe Ruth autographed baseball fetches thousands

Catherine Saunders-Watson
Catherine Saunders-Watson
Full-length portrait of baseball legend Babe Ruth with facsimile signature "Yours truly 'Babe' Ruth," taken on July 23, 1920. Part of a series of eight photographs of Ruth in the United States Library of Congress's Prints and Photographs division
Full-length portrait of baseball legend Babe Ruth with facsimile signature "Yours truly ‘Babe’ Ruth," taken on July 23, 1920. Part of a series of eight photographs of Ruth in the United States Library of Congress’s Prints and Photographs division.

MANKATO, Minn. (AP) – A Minnesota man has paid more than $8,000 for a piece of sports history.

A baseball autographed by Babe Ruth in 1929 was discovered among the belongings of an elderly Wisconsin woman whose possessions were given to relatives in Janesville, Wisconsin.

Margaret Rudowsky says her late husband caught a home run ball hit by Ruth at a game in Chicago’s Comiskey Park in 1929. Her husband had Ruth sign the ball.

A man who wants to remain anonymous outbid about 20 others at a weekend auction in Mankato.

Auctioneer Willa Dailey says the Mankato man paid $7,250 for the ball, and with tax and auction fees ended up with a bill of about $8,300. The Free Press of Mankato says a California company certified the signature as authentic before the auction.

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Information from: The Free Press, http://www.mankatofreepress.com

Copyright 2010 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

AP-WS-10-19-10 0907EDT