I'm Dreaming of a Cardboard Christmas
 

The following chronicles how my Christmases would go as a child of the 80s. I'd love to hear what others my age - and those who grew up decades before as well. If this skews too much to another forum, please by all means feel free to move it.

The best memories I have of Christmas past have to do with baseball cards. As a child, the only thing that would rival the excitement Topps, Fleer or Donruss under the tree would bring me was maybe Super Mario Brothers 2 for Nintendo. At $60, it was a HUGE price tag for my family, but to this day, ask me if I'd rather play something on the PS4 or Super Mario, I'll probably go with the moustachioed plumber.

http://mycollectionofcards.com/baseb...rio_Bros_2.jpg

There is nothing quite like learning from Super Mario Brothers 2 that it is okay to play as the princess (when no one was around) because of her sustained jumping abilities.

http://mycollectionofcards.com/baseb...Untitled-2.jpg

Let's be honest, though. Christmas for me (and maybe you as well) was about baseball cards. My parents would complain about my Christmas list being all about baseball cards. Here is what one such list may look like:

1986 Donruss The Rookies complete set
1987 Donruss Barry Bonds & Bobby Bonilla rookies
1987 Fleer wax packs (these suckers were expensive! $7 a pack!)
1988 Score complete set
1988 Fleer Update complete set
1989 Fleer wax box
1991 Topps wax box
1992 Donruss wax box

Notice a certain 1986 Donruss rated rookie not being on the list. Not because I already had it, because I didn't. It was simply too expensive to even dream about.

Heck, I even had a love for 50s commons. I remember asking for 1959 Topps common cards.

Ahhhh, the possibilities! Imagine pulling a sweet 1987 Fleer Kevin Mitchell out of one of these. (I did pull an '87 Fleer Kevin Mitchell out of a vending machine from a swim park - it completely made up for the fact I had almost drowned an hour earlier.)

http://mycollectionofcards.com/baseb...2117/fleer.jpg

The list above was a pie in the sky wish list. Back in 1992, you were probably looking at $200 to get all of those items. Nowadays? About $30 total, if you aren't counting shipping.

I even asked for back issues of Beckett Monthly I did not yet have. Back then, aside from our friends (who ALL collected baseball cards) magazines like Beckett and Tuff Stuff were all we had to hold us over through the cruel off season until Spring Training. The only time my Christmas present snooping proved to be fruitful was when I found a small stack of Beckett magazines in my parent's closet. (Note to children out there: do not rummage through your parent's stuff - it could scar you for life!)

http://mycollectionofcards.com/baseb...7/becketts.jpg

No, I did not keep a pile of these for the past several decades. I picked up the spread shown above several months ago for some projects I have ideas for.

Y'all - we need a time machine and ASAP. Check out what I found inside this bad boy:

http://mycollectionofcards.com/baseb...2117/boggs.jpg

Flip to the 1952 Topps page and ....

http://mycollectionofcards.com/baseb...2117/price.jpg

1952 Topps Mickey Mantle for $3,000 in NM condition! I figured this would be a fun way to commemorate the reason we need that time machine:

http://mycollectionofcards.com/baseb...stamp-card.jpg

So many childhood memories of mine are attached to cards and Christmas. Like the time my family went to dinner and I found a sealed box of 1992 Donruss in the back seat of our car. Dad snapped at me for finding it - he rarely did this, so it stuck out. Regardless, that beautiful, mouth-watering 1992 Donruss wax box was in my mind for the next week until Christmas.

http://mycollectionofcards.com/baseb...92donruss1.jpg

My brain would dance with possibilities of what could be pulled. Forget about the 5000 personally autographed verbiage on the front - it was just background noise to me as I knew darn well hitting one of those would be less likely than winning the lottery without purchasing a ticket. It is funny to think that while Donruss got a significant quality upgrade in 1992, there was still literally nothing good to be pulled for the average Joe. Those Diamond Kings though... they were definitely beautiful!

I also remember waking up early and seeing a 1987 Donruss Barry Bonds rookie card peaking out of my stocking. To my parents, it was a piece of cardboard. To me, it was a prized possession - an artifact that somehow connected me with one of baseball's best players at the time. A status symbol.

"Tanner, do you think Bonds is good?"

"Barry Bonds?" (I say in a cool tone.)

"Yeah, I think he's good."

/pauses

"I have his ROOKIE card."

/Walks away like a boss

http://mycollectionofcards.com/baseb.../wolverine.jpg

What memories do you have of Christmas and baseball cards?

http://tanmanbaseballfan.com/2017/12...christmas.html

1981
 

The best Christmas gift I ever received was given to me by my father in 1981. It was a great suprise then, and I am still amazed by it to today. I opened the wrapping and inside was a check box. I thought, that was strange what would I (at 13 years old) want with a box of checks. When I opened it, I could not believe my eyes. It contained about 30 T206 baseball cards. Included was a Coob portrait, a Walter Johnson portrait, an Addie Joss portrait, a Chief Bender, John McGraw, etc. Many had back damage, as they were at one time pasted into a scrapbook. But I did not care - they were the first pre-war cards I ever had, and I still have them. At that time my collectoin consisted of mostly cards from the late 1960's - 1981. Then I was told to open up a present that looked like it was going to be a new baseball bat. It was a baseball bat, but not for me to use in teener ball. It was a Ty Cobb model bat. My head almost exploded at that point. My father told me he had gone to an estate sale earlier in the year, and the cards and bat were auctioned off. Best suprise and Christmas present I ever received! Memories of this have meant a lot to me over the years, as I lost my dad to cancer in 1983.

1971 Topps Football
 

Great stories, I would love to keep them going!

Mine is all about 1971 Topps FB.
Anyone who knows me, knows my fascination with the set.
It started in the autumn of that year with the neighborhood boys. First set I ever tried to get all of them...I had just turned 9 years old.
They cost a dime a pack, and I’d do chores to get a couple dimes here and there. They all went to cards. I did a lot of leaf-raking in those days ...I’d do a football field sized yard for a pack of football cards:p

I got a few packs under the tree that year. I couldn’t tell you a single thing about those days except for being obsessed with FB cards. And 46 years later, I would love it if there were more 1971 Topps FB under the tree!

( I have 15 full sets and binders compiled for 14 more sets. I am a few dozen stars from having 29 sets. I’ll keep going too...)

Super Mario 2 was my favorite. And if you used anyone other than the princess, you are a fool. She was the Bo Jackson of the Mario series.

Hey Rich,

thanks for that wonderful story. I can relate somewhat as I'm currently losing my father to cancer, and despite not having any hobby-related card stories between us, I'll never forget the endless early mornings he would take me and others to far and away locales for hockey tournaments. My father also taught me that integrity trumps all - something I try desperately to follow often falling short - as the man I was lucky enough to be raised by is, and always will be, a hard act to follow.

So do you still have the Cobb bat as well?


Happy Holidays my friends!!

Brent

Rich, as a father of 3 boys, your story broke my heart. You were robbed of years of having him in your life. But from that short story, it sounds like he was an amazing father who loved you very much. A legacy is seeds we plant in a garden we don't get to watch grow. It sounds like he left a wonderful legacy.

Man, great stories by all. Love reading about these types of things. So much better than scammers, thiefs, etc., what we usually read about on these boards.

Here's my Christmas story...

It was 1987, and I was 12 years old. I hadn't collected any type of cards prior to this Christmas. I watched and listened to baseball with my dad, but I was into video games and the such.

So that Christmas Eve, my grandmother gave me a 1987 Topps complete set (the green box at Christmas). She and I sat there and opened it, and we started going through all of the cards. We'd read the stats on the back, see where they were from, find players from my team (the Rangers).

We spent time going through that set, even after Christmas when we'd be at their house eating or visiting. I loved that box of cards. It was like my carbine action 200 shot range model air rifle. I finally broke down and put that set into a binder so I could flip through it more easily. But I never got rid of that box. I still have it to this day.

Fast forward to 2010, and my grandmother passed away in February of that year. My wife and I have a picture of her displayed in our cabinet in our living room. Right beside that picture is that 1987 Topps box. It's empty because the set is still in my closet in the notebook. But I still have both to this day, and I don't ever plan on getting rid of them, even though they're only worth about $5.

Oh, and Super Mario Bros. 2 is one of my favorite all-time games simply because that's what we'd sit around and play at Christmas at my grandmother's house when it came out.

My mom bought my brother and I our first few packs of 1986 Topps. We didn't get any more until Christmas the following year, which is when things really snowballed with each of us getting 1-2 boxes of 1987 Topps packs. After that we were hooked.

I remember my grandma used to get me a set of baseball cards each Christmas for a few years. Still have them somewhere. Off the top of my head I know one set was 91 score.

I also remember those 87 topps. My mom often got me a pack on the way to school. I picked up a couple wax boxes for me and my youngest boy to open when he gets a little older.

Man, Super Mario 2 made my year in 1988. And yes, you needed the princess for the quicksand world.

Thanks for the kind words. He was an amazing father who supported me in sports and hobbies. Yes, losing your father at the age of 15 is not easy for a boy. But I have held onto the memories and lessons he taught me before he passed. We really were best friends. This time of year always makes me think of him and that special Christmas. I like to think that what we lacked in overall years together, we made up in quality time that we spent together.

bat
 

Hi Brent,

Thanks for the kind words. And, yes I still have the bat. There is more to that part of the story. My dad, who was a lifelong Brooklyn Dodgers fan, somehow got Pee Wee Reese's address at the Louisville Slugger company who he worked for back in the early 1980s and sent him a letter after acquiring the bat asking about whether it was a store model or a game used bat. Pee Wee actually wrote my dad back, with information from an old time company employee about the bat - he thought it was a store model except one word did not correspond with the records from that time period for Cobb store models. I have never looked into it further, as I am not a bat collector. I have always just thought it was cool to have a bat from the period that was the size and length of the model Cobb used at some point in his great career. I also still have my dad's original letter to Reese, and Reese's letter back that he signed. Priceless to me . . . .

Merry Christmas to all!!!


Happy Holidays my friends!!

1968 Topps BB for Christmas
 

I had just started buying my first BB cards back in the spring of 1968 when I was 9 years old. So, for Christmas later that year, I get one of those Topps Fun Packs from Santa and it had 1968 Topps BB high number packs. I don't remember if they were in one-card packs or the typical 5-card packs, but I was so excited! Phil Roof, Manny Jiminez and the A's Team were some I remember getting. Funny, but that was the only Christmas I ever got BB cards when I was a kid.

I'm gonna swap this around a little. These days, my youngest daughter (just turned 22 and still in school) asks me to submit her a list of cards I am looking for. I collecti so many sets, it's pretty easy. Plus I try and keep them to commons and under $10 each.

Anyhow, for the past three years I direct her to a bunch of cards that are listed in some private sites (off eBay), give her a list of items, and then I do not check the site(s) again. Come Christmas, she comes through.

Do I do most of the work? Sure. But the real treat is her knowing she is getting me what I really enjoy.

I love reading your stories - thanks everyone for sharing!

It was a great opening act to follow. Nice thread.

Donruss...
 

I remember getting a box of 1992 Donruss for Christmas back in 1991. Exciting times. Those Diamond Kings were (still are) great looking cards.