This thread offers some great stories... Thanks
Opening packs as a youngster was my favorite pastime - even better than playing ball or snow sledding during the off-season.
My most memorable pack to open occurred in 1957 - the year I first discovered baseball cards at Jordan's Variety store in North Deering (Portland), Maine. My family and I were on our return trip home from visiting my grandparents in far-away Bangor (about 125 miles which required 3-4 hours in those days of poor roads and an occasional flat tire). Toward the end of the journey my mother recalled having earlier purchased some cards for me and reached into her purse - pulling out a pair of one-cent Topps packs. One of the two contained card #1 Ted Williams, Boston's greatest ballplayer. Who the other one was, I do not recall which any 8-year-old-Red-Sox-fan-who-is-crazy-about-baseball-cards can understand!
From 1957 until 1964, however, the season's first pack(s) of cards opened and enjoyment experienced are still fresh in mind - as is the smell of that pink gum. Seeing cards devoted exclusively to checklisting in 1961 (and team cards with statistics to study) as well as multi-player cards of favorites and League Leader cards for the first time - these all rank especially high on my list of early hobby memories.
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