Mike Brown works in Manhattan, lives in New Jersey and is a star at 216 Emory St. in Baltimore.
The little rowhouse at that address is the Babe Ruth Birthplace Museum. A few weeks ago, Brown paid a memorable visit to the museum, leaving a collection of Ruth memorabilia that would startle even the Sultan of Swat.
Brown, 55, lent the museum dozens of rare items worth tens of thousands of dollars, many of which go on display Monday, when the refurbished museum opens.
Included is a 1928 Babe Ruth baseball board game, a Ruth wristwatch bearing the slugger's image and signature and a series of Ruth comic books published shortly after his death in 1948.
The collector isn't getting paid for his trouble, nor does he want to. His reward, Brown said, simply is being part of the museum's yearlong celebration of the Babe's 100th birthday, which is Monday.
"It's my 15 minutes in the spotlight, if you will," said Brown, who runs a marketing research firm in New York. "I can imagine people walking through [the museum], stopping and saying, 'Wow, I can't believe they had Babe Ruth dolls or baseball games. . . . Never saw that before.' I'll get a big kick out of that."
Brown is among the many Ruth collectors and fans eagerly awaiting the Babe's busiest year in a long, long time.
The museum's festivities include a 100th birthday party for Ruth on Monday night at Oriole Park. The Babe would have approved of the menu: champagne, beer and hot dogs.
If guests wander over to the Babe Ruth Museum, that would be fine with executive director Mike Gibbons. For more than a year, Gibbons and other officials have been planning for the Ruth centennial and the national exposure it brings.
An extensive renovation of the museum was completed this week. The 12-foot-wide rowhouse -- Ruth's actual birthplace, which sits within the larger museum -- pain- stakingly has been restored to its condition when the home run hitter was born there, Feb. 6, 1895.
Exhibit areas have been changed. In recent years, the museum broadened its focus, becoming an archive for collectibles having to do with the Orioles and with ballplayers or teams coming from Maryland.
One-man gang
When the refurbished museum opens Monday, Ruth will be almost the whole show. His life will occupy almost every room and display case. A second-floor room is now a gallery of Ruthian fine art, including about 40 paintings and sculptures.
Downstairs, many Ruth items not seen before at the museum will shown. They include a trove of items discovered recently by relatives of former Sun sports editor Jesse Linthicum.
Linthicum covered Ruth's first spring training in 1914, with the International League Orioles. Artifacts he saved include photographs of a 19-year-old Ruth and an Orioles ticket booklet from that season with several stubs torn out.
Brown's collection of Ruth memorabilia includes rare audio recordings and original sheet music of songs about the slugger, some published as early as the 1920s. The Ruth tunes include: "Batterin Babe -- Look at Him Now," "Babe Ruth, He is a Home Run Guy," and the obscure yet classic 1928 composition, "Joosta Like Babe-A-Da Ruth."
Another new Ruth exhibit will feature the Babe in film. During his playing days, Ruth appeared in silent movies and short subjects. Since his death, his life story has been made into two motion pictures and at least one television movie. The TV movie, which aired in 1991, starred actor Stephen Lang, a Babe Ruth Museum member.
Lang contributed heavily to the movie exhibit. The museum received a box of items from the film, including uniforms and baseball gloves worn by Lang and parts of the actor's Ruthian costume, including several of the bulbous noses he wore.
"Babe's nose comes to life through Stephen Lang," Gibbons observed.
Looking for uniform, crowd
Not that the museum has it all. It would welcome the donation of a Babe Ruth Yankees uniform. The only known uniforms are at the Hall of Fame and in the hands of private collectors.
"Sure, we'd love to see one surface," said Greg Schwalenberg, the museum curator. "I'm hoping someone eventually will donate one. That would be nice."
Museum officials hope the expanded and offbeat museum exhibits will spur record attendance this year.
The museum's best year to date was 1992, the opening season for Camden Yards, when 61,000 visitors came. Last year, attendance fell to 48,000. Gibbons blames the baseball strike, which wiped out the last 50 Orioles games. He says attendance this year depends on whether major-league players and owners settle their differences in time to begin the regular season on schedule.
"If we have baseball starting Opening Day, we can do 60,000 to 70,000," Gibbons predicted. "If not, it's a different scenario."
Museum officials also hope that the Ruth centennial will increase membership. Now, about 400 Ruth fans pay annual dues ranging from $35 to $150.
That hardly puts the museum in a class with the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., which maintains 4,400 members.
