Hi-
Personally, I do not do very well with garage and estate sales but I do quite well at flea markets and antique shops/shows. Most of my collection comes from these venues. Most of the dealers I buy from do find these items at estate and garage sales, but they have more time and patience than I do to scour the area.
Regarding flea markets and antique shops and shows, I went to three shops and two shows this weekend. I had no luck at the first two shops Saturday, but at the third I found an 1950s/60s baseball box holding 11 baseballs in their original packaging (plastic wrapping) for less than 50.00. This morning I found three 1968 Atlantic Oil uncut panel cards (including Ruth and Sayers) for 15.00, some 1907 Dartmouth magazines with a football cover and sports articles inside each issue for 1.00 each, 27 1955 Bowman football cards (crease free but with corner dings) for 40.00, two 1915 Brown baseball player snapshots for 12.00, and a scrapbook containing real photo postcards of a 1920s NH prep school for 25.00 (with basketball, track, baseball and other sports). As I was leaving I found an 1840s era chapbook with a child swinging a baseball bat in a woodcut image in the background for 10.00. That is my favorite find of the weekend. I probably overpaid for some items like the Brown player snapshots and possibly the 55 Bowmans but that is the way things go sometimes.
I completely agree you are extremely unlikely to find tobacco cards at any of these places but if you expand your collecting focus you might be surprised at what you can find. People might know general values, but they do not always understand series differences and almost never understand variations. Nonmainstream cards can also be an area to focus on as casual sellers do not always know what they have. I bought a group of about 20 1960 Leaf high numbers for 5.00 several months ago from an antique shop that had 1960 Topps commons at 2.00 each (and some priced higher). They knew Topps but might not have connected sports novelty with Leaf.
Alan
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