Callaway 9 — Baseball Club, Callaway, Nebraska

Solomon D. Butcher & Son, documentarians of the Nebraska frontier, photographed the town nine of Callaway for this real photo postcard. Players in flannels marked with the team name and their suited managers pose on the town's plank walks, a bat and catcher's gear at their feet. The reverse, mailed in 1907, carries a personal invitation to the Custer County Fair addressed to a correspondent in Iowa. The artifact thus unites boosterism in local sport, a specific civic occasion, and the commercial work of a foundational plains photography studio.