O/T but may be somewhat helpful

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Posted By: Ricky Y

46 years young...single and residing is SF Bay area...work for a university auxiliary that focuses on helping to obtain research grants and contracts for faculty. Born in a US Naval base in Japan and moved to US as a child and immediately hooked on baseball cards. As a teen bought cards from a Sporting News Ad and subscribed to Trader Speaks and SCD. Went away from the hobby for awhile..but within the last few years rekindled my interest. Current focus is on collecting pre war baseball cards by type and exhibit cards of hall of famers...joining this board has been a blast so far! I've acquired some great cards from some members in the brief time I've been here.

Ricky

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Posted By: Martin Neal

I'm Martin Neal, 52, father of 5, 3 girls and two boys. I was born near Greensboro, North Carolina, did prep school in Greenwich, Ct. and I required 8 years to finish college. Partied and played rugby the whole time. At eighteen, I hitchhiked across the country to join the United Farm Workers union, picketed Safeways and picked asparagus in the Imperial valley (Calexeco,Ca). I can't believe my parents would let me go. Too young to really understand the danger. Worked as a commercial fisherman, scalloping, shrimping, beach seining and long net hauling. Spent a while working in Yuganik bay, Kodiak island. I lived in St. Thomas for a couple of years before getting married. I have owned a few video stores and currently am a realtor and build houses. I coach an excel league basketball team. I played full court twice a week until a couple of years ago (knees).
I can't seem to focus on anything except vintage baseball cards. I was lucky to acquire about 125 t206s back in the eightees and really got serious in 2002. I am slowly trying to put together both the t206 (minus the big 4) and the t205 set. In a weak moment last year, I sold most of my Cobbs and pretty nice Matty portrait to a board member. I do want to say that I am grateful to the board for providing a great source of information and I am planning to attend a National one of these years mainly so I can meet some of you guys and gals.

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Posted By: Larrie Dean

Hello All:

My nane is Larrie, I am 64 and I acquired my first cards in the early 1950s...no my crystal ball was not very clear and I did not save my Mantle Rookies.

I am happily married to a wonderful lady who tolerates my "card habit"
so long as I sell enough to pay for my habit! We have five children...ages 27 to 32 and 4 grandchildren. My career was in higher education...first international education, and then, health-related education. I was an Associate Dean of a School of Allied Health and a Professor of Health Administration. Sports card collecting was my thearpy...my mental health activity. Other hobbies include stamp collecting and collecting of Lions Multiple District pins...I have been a member of Lions International for 32 years. Although my first 30 years were spent in Northern New York Virginia has been home for the past 33 years. We love to travel (45 states and 20 plus countries so far).

My card collecting interest was initally high quality pre-1973(everything)! Over the years I have obtained hundreds of "in-person" autographs...I enjoy meeting the players, and no, I have not paid for their autographs. About a decade ago I developed an interest in the T206s and now focus on Pre-WWII cards.

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Posted By: DSGreen

My name is David and I am 30 years old. I live on the SC/GA border with my wonderful wife and three children (son recently turned 6, daughter just turned 1, and the third is due in April). I am a behavioral psychologist who works primarily with individuals diagnosed with developmental disabilities. I've been collecting since I was a kid but became serious about pre-war cards while in graduate school. I am a huge Braves fan and my collecting, at this time, centers around that. My current collecting goal is to obtain a type card from every year that the Braves organization fielded a team. It is in memory of my grandfather (the reason I love this game), who passed away last year.

I am currently working on a website for this portion of my collection but it isn't complete just yet. You can take a look at it here:
Forever A Brave Collection

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Posted By: Al C.risafulli

This is a fascinating thread, you're all so interesting. Thought I'd chime in.

I'm Al. I'm 37 years old, married with three kids (11 year old son, 8 year old daughter, 6 year old son). For fun I coach youth basketball and baseball, go to NJ Nets games, watch the Yankees, and hang with my family.

Baseball has always been very important in my family; I started collecting cards in 1977, buying packs and trying to complete sets. In 1979 or so, I started collecting what we called "oldies" - the kids in my neighborhood and I started looking for the oldest cards we could find. I fell in love with 1951 Bowmans and T206s at that time, my first T206 purchase was the attached Waddell, bought for a dollar. I would buy the vintage cards and then sit with my grandfather and he would tell me stories about the players. My grandfather was a baseball fanatic who coached in Hudson County, NJ in the 40s and 50s (probably early 60s, too). From what I'm told, he would choose the kids who were least skilled for his team, then win the league championship with them every year.

Anyway, I collected pretty intensely until about 1985, then I discovered girls and music and whatnot. I got married right after college in 1991, and in the middle of a recession with no job, I sold most of my cards so that we could eat. I promised myself that someday I'd be in a financial position that I could start collecting them again.

In the early 90s, I ran my own punk rock record label while I worked in marketing in the wireless industry during the day. Gradually I became more interested in marketing, and as my career grew I slowly re-entered the hobby. A couple of years ago I started buying cards on eBay, and as an outgrowth of that I discovered the hobby message boards, which helped take a solitary hobby and make it more of a social thing for me. Today I work for a small ad agency in New Jersey (and am lucky enough to have several awesome clients who are part of the hobby), and collect HOFers, 1938 Goudeys, W502s, T205s, and now Henry Johnson backs. I've also got a website where you can see some of my collection, and where I keep a hobby blog: www.swingbattaswing.com



-Al

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Posted By: Rob NYC

stands up
Hi. My name is Rob. I'm 38. I live in New York City and I am still happy. I work as a data center resource manager over in New Jersey. I've been doing prewar cards for almost over a year now. What first started out as a hobby became an addiction.
sits down
stands back up
Thank you.
bows
sits down

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Posted By: Jeff Mohler

As you can see from my creative log in, my name is Jeff Mohler. I live in Lancaster, PA (home of the e93 set). I am one of the many lawyers on the board, specializing primarily in real estate law.

Like many here, I collected cards in my pre-teen years back in the 1970's and early 80's. I rediscovered cards about a year and a half ago when Joseph, my oldest child, got into baseball. My first pre-war card was an SGC 30 T206 Bresnahan w/bat.

So far, one of my biggest thrills was attending a local estate auction about a year ago where "three baseball cards" were advertised. They turned out to be three blank backed Pinkerton postcards. I posted my find on the board, but I think some of the members were a little suspicious of a newbie who picked up something like that.

I have been married for eleven years to my wife Rachel and have three wonderful children, Joseph (8), Emma (6) and Abigail(2).

I hope to be at the Reading/Philly show and meet some of you there. Other than Keith O'Leary, I haven't met anyone else on the board yet.

Jeff

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Posted By: peter chao

Dear Guys,

I'm a newbie and I'm impressed by the amount of hobby information I can glean from the postings.

I'm 50 and a trial attorney in the SF Bay Area and my proudest achievement in life is finishing my 1957 Topps set. At least I have my priorities straight in life. Laugh out loud. My wife doesn't quite share my priorities but sometimes you just have to be in the hobby to understand.

I only have one 1933 Goudey card, Ott holding a bat. But my plans are to after the entire set. Thanks guys, for all the great information you provide me on the hobby.

Peter

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Posted By: peter chao

Guys,

I've been the last post on this thread for a while. I can't believe that there is only about a hundred or so people that frequent this forum.

That means the rest of you guys want to fly under the radar. If you guys insist that's fine with me, but I for one would like some biographical information on the rest of you.

It's been interesting so far, so I doubt if you other guys would disappoint. So far, it seems like I haven't come across any women collectors on this forum. Is it true that only guys are crazy enough to collect prewar.

Peter

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Posted By: James Feagin

A little bio and a picture! I'm a sprite 31 years of age, have been married for 3 1/2 years and have a beautiful baby girl named Elena (5 months). I have collected in one fashion or another for 23 of those 31 years. My collection really has no direction, and I like it as such. I'm a writer for Huggins and Scott auctions and I lovr it. It combines three of my passions; baseball cards, research, and writing. I also am a music fan (indie, punk, shoegaze, noise-pop, darkwave, and 1960's doo wop). Politically, I tend to be more of a "conservative liberatarian", although I voted Democrat and Green party during the mid-terms. I am a 1999 graduate of Towson University in Towson, Maryland, with a major in Mass Communications. I completed one year of post-graduate education. I love the Baltimore Orioles and Arkansas Razorbacks. I also enjoy art, Jan Van Eyck is a favorite of mine. Additionally, I'm also an active Mormon (Latter-day Saint) and have found much peace and knowledge in those teachings. I served as a missionary in Texas for two years (from whence this picture is derived). I also love slow-pitch softball, baseball and flag football. Here is a picture of me as a missionary in the beautiful West Texas Panhandle town of Dumas (pop. 12,000, 60 miles North of Amarillo).

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Posted By: peter chao

James,

Great picture, I especially like the water tower (I guess) in the background with Dumas Demons. Let me take another guess, you probably thought about being a minister at one time. For some reason this forum attracts a lot of ministers and lawyers. Hmmmmmmmmmm...is there a psychiatrist out there that can give an educated guess as to why that might be true.

Peter

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Posted By: Jimi

I'm a 28 year old collector out of Apple Valley in Ohio. I am a 4th grade language arts teacher to 70 wonderful kids in Mount Vernon, OH. My wife teaches 8th grade language arts in the same district. My daughter just turned 2 years old over the weekend, and my wife is expecting another daughter in April. I'm also a percussion instructor during the marching band season, track coach in the spring, softball player in the summer, and oh yeah, I collect cards!

My collection is constantly changing. Unlike many of you, I can't seem to ever stay collecting the same thing. I collect anything from N162s, N28s, to all the Topps cards from 1952 - 2006 including variations, sets for my daughter, and tobacco cards. I met several of you like Leon, Bill Cornell, Bob Marquette (tbob), Brett Hardeman, and many more at the Chicago convention last year. Brett and his papa were kind enough to ask me to be a featured collector in their OLD CARDBOARD magazine in their 6th issue, so if you want to read up on me, I'm in there on p. 10. My good buddy, Bryan Long, also an N54 member keeps me itching for more vintage. It's very cool to have an old childhood friend to talk about our new cards with!

Cool posting!

Jimi

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Posted By: peter chao

Jimi,

Your collecting Topps from 1952-2006 as well as pre-war. That just about covers everything. How do you keep up with all the new issues...and where does all the money come from...you must have a printing press at home. Laugh out loud. As long as you love the hobby...that's all that matters.

Peter

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Posted By: Jimi

Well, the problem is, I can't ever decide what I want the most. I start collecting prewar, but miss the ease of getting a Topps card for a set, until I realize that I can't get the SP or high #....then I'm back to prewar. I only collect the regular Topps issues, plus the variations and sometimes Topps Traded or other Topps issue from any given year. I certainly do not keep up with UV stuff other than looking up the newest regular Topps issue.

Jimi