[Howe’s Hunter]

Thanks to everyone for the heads-up on the large collection of Howe's cards that became available on eBay yesterday. Apparently, when I contacted the seller, I wasn't the first to reach out to him, which took him by surprise, but it let me ask a few questions that could fill in some gaps of when the cards came to market.

I reached out to the seller, and asked about his listings that all said he had rubber stamped the cards when he got them as a kid, and someone else had already stamped them by that time. That would have been Howe. So I asked exactly when would he have been a kid? His response is below....

Well, I certainly didn't think this would create such a stir. I've heard from a few collectors about this. Was he a contemporary of Burdick? I'd never heard of his name before.
When I was about 16 (1969), I had become very interested in Cleveland baseball history and wanted to collect something other than the current Topps issue. I subscribed to one of the early trading card hobby papers and got in touch with Wirt Gammon of Florida. He was one of the hobby giants in those days and I suppose he is the one who bought McCormick's collection. I bought all of the Cleveland Naps that he had which gave me almost the entire team set (he had other non-McCormicks). Because of the stamp, I figured I may as well make my own mark on them; never realizing how very popular (and expensive) they would become later on.

Previous to this, the earliest I knew of any of Howe's cards belonging to someone else then coming to my collection,was 1974 This takes it back to 1969, when at least nine of the cards moved at one time to another collector, who has held them since that time. And I had never heard of Wirt Gammon, but that would make sense for someone in the area to have gotten the collection in a big chunk, then selling them via hobby magazines and shows, with the results still showing up 42 years later.

Not much of a story, but thought I'd share. And again, with thanks to everyone for help in this project.