Legacy of Earning Power : Babe Ruth: Dead 41 years, he lives on in endorsements that bring heirs hundreds of thousands.

Imagine the potential Babe Ruth would have in today’s every-athlete-has-a-sneaker-deal endorsement market.

He could rival Bo Jackson--”Babe knows baseball. . . . Babe knows hot dogs”--hawk Hertz with Arnie and O. J., look lumpy in his Hanes with Boomer Esiason, pitch Slimfast diets with Lasorda and take sides in the Miller Lite “Less filling! Tastes Great!” debate.

As it is, Ruth is not doing shabbily. Forty-one years after his death, Ruth’s name and visage are licensed to more than 100 companies and products--banks, car companies, retailers, trading card firms, teddy bears, and a maker of trapping knives--avidly trying to profit from his powerful, mythic and mischievous appeal.

The Bambino is earning wealth for his heirs that, given his own commercial bent, surely wouldn’t have surprised the man who did not break stride when told his $80,000 salary exceeded President Hoover’s.

In an era in which celebrity worship is at its height, stars such as the Babe cannot commit the ultimate no-no of endorsement deals: getting in trouble. Though the Babe was known to imbibe, smoke and carouse, his conduct is now impeccable. Through the selective filter of hero worship, the Babe’s image is as clean as Orel Hershiser’s.

Add to that trend the expanding market for baseball memorabilia, and it’s easy to see why the most popular player in the sport’s history remains its most durable commercial symbol.

So, whether he endorses IBM personal computers, sneakers, free checking for senior citizens at a Philadelphia bank, Zenith power supplies or the Hewlett-Packard sales force, Babe Ruth stands for whatever the paying company desires.

“The legend of Babe Ruth is a very tangible thing,” said Mark Roesler, president of Curtis Management Group, the Babe’s Indianapolis-based licensing agent. “Babe’s image as the ultimate power hitter, the ultimate superstar isn’t going to change. (Roger) Maris hit 61 homers, but the Babe’s image will never change. He’s achieved his place in history. Current players have not.”

Roesler said that fees paid to the Ruth family, including his surviving daughter, Julia Ruth Stevens, and his two daughters’ children, and Babe Ruth Baseball Inc., were estimated at $400,000 for 1989 and are expected to grow to at least $1 million in 1990. Roesler said that before Curtis took control of the Ruth marketing from Babe Ruth Baseball in 1984, annual fees amounted to less than $100.

How would the Babe do if he returned in the pot-bellied flesh?

Not badly, but he’d have more competition in a more active market. And he would risk being a disaster to those who would hire him as their spokesman if his personal excesses were as probed and criticized as those of today’s stars.

But if he controlled himself, he might outdo everybody.

Said Daisy Sinclair, casting director for the Ogilvy & Mather advertising agency: “I can’t think of a category around that he wouldn’t fit into, except Weight Watchers. He could do ads for vitamins because looking at him, you wonder how he could do what he did.”

When Ruth was the highest-paid player in baseball, the endorsement game was small. He got around more than any other star, endorsing a hat, a brand of cigar--he puffed on them in the showroom window of the factory--chewing tobacco, long johns, shoes, a watch and autographed balls given away by Texaco.

He also backed the short-lived Babe Ruth’s Home Run Candy, which lost a legal fight with the makers of the Baby Ruth candy bar--named not for the Babe, but for Grover Cleveland’s daughter, Ruth--and a Manhattan haberdashery, Babe Ruth’s for Men, that shut its doors in six months.

“Commercialization was so much less then,” said Robert Creamer, author of “Babe: The Legend Comes to Life,” the definitive 1974 biography of Ruth.

“Now, it strikes me as something weird that a man dead 40 years can be a live property. But it’s obvious that he’s a recognizable personality and a plus-person--that is, someone you’d like to see here now.”

Plenty of marketers evidently think the Babe is worth the price of seeing him, if not in person, in two dimensions. You want the Babe for a one-time ad in a newspaper? That will be $500. You want to put the Babe in a national print campaign? Pay $15,000, please. Now you want the Babe in a national multi-media campaign? Well, that will be $100,000.

What do marketers want from Babe Ruth?

--Power: For a Sears Business Centers campaign, the retailer paid about $10,000 to feature Ruth in its “heavy hitters” advertising series to sell several makes of personal computers. The ads--with retouched photos of the Babe holding or using PCs--noted that the products were “marked down to prices in your ballpark. All heavy hitters . . . Not bad, huh, Babe?”

--History: For the marketers at United Valley Bank in Philadelphia, Ruth’s image, teamed with that of teammate Lou Gehrig, provided a touchstone for its target group: depositors 55 and older.

“If you’re old enough to remember them, you can forget about paying for checking,” said the slogan, above a posed shot of Ruth and Gehrig before the Yankee Stadium backstop.

--Inspiration: The Carlson Marketing Group’s motivation division used Ruth’s image and his words--”Baseball is a great teacher”--on a poster to gussy up a baseball-oriented incentive program designed for computer sales forces.

--Dependability: Owens-Corning Fiberglas Corp. featured a photo of Ruth’s “called shot” in the 1932 World Series against Chicago Cub pitcher Charlie Root to illustrate reliability.

“A promise made, a promise kept,” read the ad.

Chattanooga cutlery maker Jim Frost produces a series of commemorative trapping knives named for Ruth, Gehrig and Ty Cobb. They are encased in walnut music boxes that play “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.”

Said Frost: “This is the era of name recognition, and we’ve gone this route to promote our merchandise. On the Ruth knife, we have an etching of him on the blade and an authorization slip that tells some of his history. We limit production to 3,000 pieces.”

Curtis Management Group has carved a specialty out of marketing celebrities. Besides Ruth, Gehrig and Cobb, Curtis’ sports clientele--featuring 27 Hall of Famers--includes Honus Wagner, Roberto Clemente, Casey Stengel, Bob Feller, Vince Lombardi, Jim Thorpe and Jesse Owens. Its entertainment- and historical-figure roster features James Dean, Fred Astaire, Humphrey Bogart, Mark Twain and Amelia Earhart.

Hardly a baseball legend wanted by marketers is out of Curtis’ realm.

Said Jeff Stevens, merchandising director of the Baseball Hall of Fame: “If something we’re doing is beyond the scope of the agreement the Hall of Famers have directly with the Hall for products we sell in our gift shop or through our catalogue, we go to Curtis. In fact, we’re doing a series of 1991 calendars that use only Curtis clients.”

Curtis has been especially active in the last year, increasing its stable of baseball clients to about 30 former players.

The year just past was the biggest yet for Lou Gehrig licensing, because of the 50th anniversary of his emotional retirement from baseball and Major League Baseball’s dedication of the season to the ALS Foundation, which raises funds to research a cure for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig’s Disease.

Eighty-seven companies are “Iron Horse” licensees, many for products tied to the U.S. Postal Service’s issue of a Gehrig stamp last June.

Some estates restrict what the legends can sell.

In Ruth’s case, his daughters have barred liquor and tobacco ads.

In Gehrig’s case, said Roesler: “We respect Eleanor Gehrig’s wish not to use Lou Gehrig for fund-raising purposes. He’s not licensed for any ALS research group except the one at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center (the Eleanor and Lou Gehrig ALS Center), though we allowed the ALS Foundation to do a few specific things this year.”

Eleanor Gehrig left her estate and the rights to market her husband to the medical center, which derived a six-figure licensing income this year.

Properties such as Ruth and Gehrig, valuable in life and death, are protected. Curtis has 18 infringement suits pending, including a protracted action against Macmillan Publishing Co. over an engagement calendar that Curtis alleges illegally used a photograph of Ruth; and two against card collector firms for alleged unauthorized use of the images of 10 of its players on card sets.

Celebrity representatives are gaining more protection because of new state laws that grant the dead stars’ exclusive licensing rights to their heirs for a specified number of years. For example, California’s 1985 law grants the heirs licensing rights for 50 years after a celebrity’s death; Oklahoma’s term is 100 years, Nevada’s 50 and Tennessee’s 10.

Even when the 50-year bell tolls on Babe Ruth in 1998, there are other legal ways to protect his name and likeness. Curtis has secured trademark protection in categories such as paper goods, gifts, apparel and footwear that will protect the family’s rights as long as their legacy’s name and image stay in continual use.

So as long as the Ruth legend remains a never-dying part of the magic and lore of baseball, it seems clear that marketers will turn to him when they want to ally their product or message with his ever-living mystique.

“You look at today’s players: most have professional credibility, but not the extra spark of charisma,” said Marty Blackman, who advises corporations on the use of personalities in commercials. “But when you look for a spokesman, you want professional credibility, which Ruth had with his hitting and home runs; and charisma, which he really had. He’s one of those people who rose to the top and just stayed there.”