Wall to wall baseball

Hudson Falls couple is covering all the bases

By Ken Tingley
Sports Editor, The Post-Star, Glens Falls, N.Y., May 30, 1996

Hudson Falls – Chuck Catalfamo is in his late 40’s a successful building contractor making a good living in a n adult world with adult responsibilities and adult problems, He is a grown man in every sense of the word, yet you don’t have to look far to find his youth.

It is an overwhelming presence up in the second-floor office of the home Chuck built for himself, his wife, Anne, and their two daughters. It’s where his two worlds merge.

On one side of the room is a neat, professional-looking office with several desks, file cabinets and all the office tools of a successful building contractor. On the other is a collection of baseball memorabilia, photographs and memories that began 28 years ago when he was signed to a minor league contract by the New York Mets. His first roommate was a skinny kid from Texas, Today Nolan Ryan is a future baseball Hall of Famer. Chuck had a sore arm, never pitched much, and was back in the North Country after two seasons – his baseball career over but not forgotten.

Chuck’s minor league Mets uniform hangs in a cabinet on display. So are photographs of chuck and the you Nolan in their minor league uniforms in Marion, Va., the Mets rookie league team then in the Appalachian League. There’s loads of other baseball memorabilia too.

About a year and a half ago, Chuck found himself alone in the office late one afternoon. He pulled out the rare Exhibit baseball cards he had kept since he was a kid, since even before his stint in the minors.

The black and white photos are bigger than conventional cards – 3 1/2 inches wide, 5 1/4 inches tall &Mac173;– and he found himself shuffling through the photos of Dave "Boo" Ferris, Brooks Robinson, Whitey Ford and Yogi Berra.

"Age doesn’t matter to me," Chuck said, "I’m like a little kid,"

He thought about displaying the old cards in the office – like so many other things – when something clicked.

He started duplicating the old cards on his copy machine into strips of five of six on a sheet of paper and then pasting them along the top of his office wall as a wallpaper border.

Anne came up one day and like it.

It was a nice touch to a room with a serious ports theme.
She said it would make a neat wallpaper border.
Light bulb.

An idea had been born.

"I urged him to do it," Anne said, "and I’m usually not like that."

"When Anne got excited," Chuck said, "I knew we were on to something."
Eighteen months later, Chuck’s decorative dabblings and Anne’s idea to pursue it as a business has resulted in the A.J. Exhibit Corporation, and Chuck an Anne are poised to sell their first rolls of wallpaper covering or border to the general public.

They have come up with five different series of wall coverings. Each of the five rolls has photographs of six different major league players that duplicate the Exhibit baseball cards of the era. There are two series from the 1930’s and three from the 1960’s. The Catalfamos figure to charge about $18 per roll, or all five roll from $75.

For the last decade, the sports memorabilia market has thrived. But no one had ever come up with the idea for a wall covering of major league baseball stars, at least not that the Catalfamos have heard about.

But it wasn’t easy.

The Catalfamos’ original research revealed that the Exhibit baseball card company had long been out of business, and acquiring the rights to the cards would not be hard, but they also found out they would have to get permission from each major leaguer to use their likeness.

The next thing the Catalfamos knew, they were on the phone talking to Yogi Berra, Phil Rizzuto, Whitey Ford, Bob Feller, Sandy Koufax and a couple dozen other former major league stars and Hall of Famers.

"That was the fun part," Anne admitted. "Yogi’s wife called and said she wanted more samples. Then Yogi called an said he lost his contract, then Phil Rizzuto called and said he lost his contract and check."

It also was confusing. Especially when Anne had to turn the phone over to her daughter because she couldn’t figure out what some guy named "Moose" wanted. It was former major leaguer "Moose" Skowron wanting to sign up.

Licensing the players meant cutting them in on royalties for the all covering as well as paying them money up front.

They also had to get the company licensed through major league properties and that meant more money up front. When they came up with the idea to do a Hall of Fame version of the wall covering, they had to deal with a management firm that handled the likeness of deceased Hall of Famers and that of course meant more money up front.
"We finally said, ‘What the heck,’ we’ll take some of our savings and put it into it, " Chuck said.

Today they have 28 players licensed and are taking on more, yet they still believe that wall covering has a vast earning potential.

Getting the wall covering made was another ordeal that took months to work out before a company in Atlanta was found that could handle all facets of the product.
"When I look back, we haven’t done that bad," Anne said. "This is the only thing I have ever spent this much time on,"

For most of the previous 26 years of their marriage, Anne had been mother and housewife while also helping out Chuck with his office work. But nothing had captured her fancy like this.
"She’s kind of going through her second childhood, too," Chuck said. "Now she’s the one who wants to do this all."

But in the middle of the plans Anne go sick and was diagnosed with a brain tumor.

Twice she went through operations – the first in March 1991 in New York City, and the second in June 1992 in Chicago.

"It was really a very large tumor, and it’s really a miracle because so many times they can’t even operate," Anne said. But now she has a clean bill of health and is looking forward to getting the wallpaper off the ground.

"We have some large corporations that are interested," Anne said.

The product will make its debut in August when it is advertised in a memorabilia magazine for purchase through mail order. They will also take orders locally.

"I’ve always been very comfortable with it, "Anne said. "I think it will really sell. I still do. I’d like to see us selling it worldwide and I’d like to see it become our main business,"

"We’ve always taken risks in business," Chuck said.
Sort of like going from first to third on a single to left or slipping the fastball by the other team’s cleanup hitter.

The Catalfamos are hoping they can hit a home run.

(For more information on the A.J. Exhibit Corp. and their wallpaper covering, they can be reached at 1-800-727-8894 or 747-9355).