• Card series: Beginnings: 1880's
• City: Chicago
• Team: Maroons
• League: Western Association

Charles Boyd is another of the Old Judge mystery men. He appears in the 1888 card series in three poses in the uniform of the Chicago Maroons of the Western Association. He is right-handed and identified as a first-baseman. Miller, Gonsowski and Masson, in their Old Judge compendium, relate a reference from the Feb 18, 1888 Sporting News reporting the signing of Charles, of Sheffield IL, by the Maroons. A March 31 article predicted this fleet-footed (“he can beat Billy Sunday”) slugger would join the club by April 15. We find no record of Boyd making the Maroons or any other minor league team. There is a cryptic reference to a “Boyd” on the roster of the Danville, IL Browns in 1888 but there is nothing else to identify that player.

• The Old Baseball Cards website lists the Boyd card as depicting “Jake” Boyd while the Goodwin editors have him as “Charles” with the Sporting News items as support
• As ever with these “ghosts” from the early decades of the game, Ars Longa welcomes any leads on identifying Mr. Boyd