Presented is a Babe Ruth autographed Brown Brothers' photograph that was taken as the Hall of Fame Inaugural Inductee was at the January 1939, funeral for New York Yankee owner Jacob Ruppert. The son of a very wealthy brewery owner, Jake Ruppert was a businessman, a colonel in the National Guard, and a New York member of the United States House of Representatives from 1899-1907. Ruppert's National Guard status gave him the nickname of "Colonel." Ruppert was the Yankee owner who purchased Ruth from the Boston Red Sox, and Ruppert led the Yankees into owning their own stadium when he built the original Yankee Stadium. Colonel Ruppert was posthumously inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2012. Ruth played his last season with the Yankees in 1934 and finished his playing career with part of a season with the Boston Braves in 1935. Ruth's desire to become the manager of the Yankees never came to pass. In 1939, he was not employed by any of the Major League teams. The 5x6.75" offered photo captures the normally jovial Ruth as his sadness at the funeral is clearly apparent. The right side of the photo appears to have been cropped. On the verso are two Brown Brothers Photography stamped identifiers, and a brief capture for the shot, which reads, "THE BABE PAYS HIS LAST RESPECTS/New York/George Herman Ruth, known by millions of baseball followers as 'The Babe' pictured in St. Patrick's Cathedral, during requiem service, for the late Col. Jake Ruppert, owner of the New York Yankees, for whom the Babe played. It was as an employee of Ruppert and the Yankees that Ruth rose to a salary of $80,000 per year, the highest ever paid to a ball player." The photograph has several folds, and some spotting and crinkling in places. The photo will grade as a Type I.