Harvey Martin's Red Baker Cue

[scdiveteam]

Hi,

A collector friend of mine visited our shop last week and had some great stuff all from an historical perspective.

Here is a pic of the Red Baker cue that was used many times over the years as a movie and telvison prop in Hollywood.

Pretty Cool Indeed.

Rick

Here is Stupendous and Jay admiring this cool antique cue.

 

[yubber]

Red baker Martin cue

Thanks for sharing.

At the risk of souding ignorant who is Red Baker and do you have any more info about the cue?
Do you have any more pics of the cue that you could post.

Thanks

Alan

 

[scdiveteam]

Thanks for sharing.

At the risk of souding ignorant who is Red Baker and do you have any more info about the cue?
Do you have any more pics of the cue that you could post.

Thanks

Alan

Hi,

My friend, 88 year old cue maker and pantograph artist Stew Mortson was great friends with Red and Harvey and I have heard a lot about them and this cue. The collector who owns the cue was in town and stoped by my shop to see the "Armageddon Art Cue" and brought some goodies.

Red was a great billiards & pool player who could beat top pros in money games on a regular basis. He competed with the likes Greenleaf, Mosconi, Cochran and Hoppe and many others but was a barber in North Hollywood and was well connected woth a lot of people. A real character.

Harvey Martin made this cue for him and it was played with by John Wayne and Marlena Detrich in a movie, Jack Klugman in the Twilight Zone and was also in the original Mission Impossible TV series featuring a pool game.

Red also did many stand-in appearance in Hollywood productions where they needed someone to make a pool shot on film. This cue is the most filmed cue in the world for movies and televison.

Rick

Here is something I got off the internet from a billiards program from the 1960s:

HAROLD BAKER - BURBANK CALIFORINA
Harold "Red" Baker has been a top pocket billiards and 3 cushion player for over thirty years and many who know him only from his appearances in pocket tournaments may be surprised to learn of his prowess at three-cushions. West Coast billiard players, however, are well aware of his three-cushion ability. He has finished among the leaders in several strong Southern California tournaments and for many years has anchored the Elks team from Burbank which has won the State Championship several times. In this year's Southern California Sectional he averaged a respectable .720. He defeated Hynes in reguliar play and then defeated him again in a play-off for first place in the Southern California Sectional
Baker is on close terms with many in the Hollywood movie colony and is often called in as a billiard consultant and stand-in. Close-ups of his hands have appeared in many television and movie sequences.
He is now co-manager with Tiff Payne of a fine billiard room in North Hollywood.

 

[yubber]

Reds martin

Thanks for all the info. Its really cool to hear all this. I have my fathers Martin cue that he aquired sometime in the 30s (not from Martin). Its a little different than many of the Martins you see, but still has the Martin trademarks. My dad played in Santa Monica at the Mecca. The owner there was a friend of Martin and had one of the ivory handled cues. Many of the players there had Martins that they kept in the hall in drawers.

I need to get pics of my dads cue and post.

Thanks for all the info.

Alan

 

[Lexicologist71]

In the case, is that a Ray Schuler Ray Ceulemanns model cue?

 

[Scarwegian]

Harold Red Baker

In 1967, I purchased my first real good cue (still have that beauty) a new Palmer #3, 1st catalog for $ 75.00 including a case.

Red showed me a few cues that day, and settled on the best I could afford at the time. We, a few pool friends, called it Red Baker's place in North Hollywood, he was the best we had seen up to that point and assumed he owned it....but really had no idea who the owners were.

Great days in the San Fernando Valley...........

Rick

 

[Busboy]

Very cool :grin-square:

 

[Bigb'scues]

Top pic is from "A Game Of Pool" with cue in Klugmans hands.