Can you solve the Mystery of the Medal?

dogloose

dogloose

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Just published a story on 3CushionBilliards.com entitled The Mystery of the Medal.

LINK: The Mystery of the Medal

It's a fascinating story of Dr. Benjamin E. Mays, a great American who somehow came into possession of what looks to be a 3-Cushion Billiard World Championship medal. But who won it, where the event was held and why Dr. Mays had it up until the time of his death is the mystery.

Hoping that one of our long-standing members/billiard historians can help solve the riddle. Clink the link above to check out the story and the pictures and let me know if you can shed some light on the mystery of the medal!
 
The mystery continues!

The medal was likely manufactured by Dieges and Clust, a firm known to have produced many important medals, plaques and trophies in the early 20th century. From Wikipedia:

Dieges & Clust were jewellers established in 1898 by Col. Charles J. Dieges (b. Oct. 26, 1865-d. Sept. 14, 1953) and Prosper Clust.

They produced many medals, including the Spanish–American War Medal, the 1904 Olympic Medal, The Eagle Scout medal (from 1916–1920), the Medal of Honour, and the Titanic-Carpathia Medals (at the request of "The Unsinkable" Mrs. Molly Brown). They made baseball's first Most Valuable Player Awards and many Baseball Press Pins as well as Lou Gehrig's farewell plaque. They also cast the Heisman Trophy (in New York and later Providence, Rhode Island) from its inception in 1935 through late 1979 when the company was sold to Herff Jones (a division of Carnation) on January 1, 1980.
Click to expand...

I called Herff Jones to see if they might have any records from the Dieges & Clust acquisition that might reference the championship medal Sadly... they do not. All the current employees are relatively new and barely recognized the old company. No secret boxes in the basement with the solution. No old retired guy named Gus to ask!

Sooooo.... on to the next set of clues!
 
In the spirit of not actually helping, and possibly only adding wrinkles and throwing sand, let me offer the possibility that sometimes these 'unique' items are made in duplicate for one reason or another.

To wit, my wife and I have a custom painting by a famous local New Orleans artist that was commissioned by her brother for our wedding years ago, with our names and the wedding date present on the front.

Imagine our surprise when (with the painting in storage) we were living overseas and our friend calls to say, 'I'm in a restaurant with your wedding painting hanging on the wall. Did someone break into your storage unit?'

Apparently there was another one prominently displayed in a sandwich place on St. Charles Ave., though we never found out why. Possibly it failed QA/QC upon completion and/or was being used to demonstrate the customizable nature of the paintings the artist could create, to drive sales ... who knows ...
 
IDK, but it's a cool medal. I wouldn't mind owning that bad boy.

Thanks for posting.

I just found this that states it was Willie Hoppe's medal and they are looking for value. : http://www.billiardsforum.com/pool-players/willie-hoppe Scroll down to no. 11 which was a recent post saying they knew what it was & looking for its value.

Hope this helps.

DAve
 
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Actually 12squared the mystery continues. Read the story... the post you refer to was in fact made by Mr. Loy Sartin... the gentleman who brought this challenge to 3cushionbilliards.com to help solve in the first place. His comment about Hoppe may be true... or not... as described in the story... but we have no hard evidence or independent confirmation.

Our best lead right now is around the NBA of A ... the National Billiard Association of America. That organization sponsored three cushion world championship events several times in the US before it disbanded. Hoppe did win the championship multiple times. We just don't know if this medal was actually won by Hoppe and what year. Or if it was awarded to another winner.

Hopefully someone will come across this thread (or other posts we made on Facebook) who has some way to verify the facts... a picture... news article... or ???

Thanks for posting...


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