Perdy
 

I just read Perdy's article about Hager while looking through my old VCBC's. If anyone is interested, the article was in the Jan/Feb 1997 issue #9. Apparently, there was another article in Issue #7 (pgs 94-95) detailing Accugrade/ASA. There were too many accusations (with proof) to go into a lot of detail...but he isn't someone with which I would want to do biz with....

I remember that there was actual "buzz' about Hagar's book coming out and as soon as it did, the best anyone said was "well, it has nice pictures". As far as doing business with him or giving him one cent (even if it is on a dime planchet), I'd rather be trapped in a closet with a rabid badger.

I think you mean Doubleheaders catalogs - when Mike and Wayne Varner were partners, and the Howards pamphlets that arrived in my mailbox every week or so. Also, I was always "fond" of the Dolloff ads which warned that the cards were nowhere near the person on the other end of the phone so they couldn't tell you about the real condition of their overpriced commons - never understood their business model.

Or two rats in a sock!

Glad I held on to all my VCBCs. I still refer to many of the great articles including Barry's classic on Rare Baseball Books. Dennis wasn't shy about taking on the bad guys, Hager and his ilk.

Always enjoyed his rants about I believe the name was Richard Galasso.

Thanks Tom. It was my favorite one, too.

Last I knew Alan Hager lives outside Orlando. I visited his house years ago and bought about 10 x 1926 Spalding football cards. They were actually in PSA holders. He told me that he bought the entire 1926 Spalding Ad back group (all sports) from Robet Edward Auctions (all sports). He told me REA did not realize that the Ad Backs were different and much rare than the Bio/Stat backs and didn't advertise them that way so he spent thousands and bought them all.
This was the basis for my PSA Registry set. I actually went to his house and bought the cards. He did tell me that it was he that invented the 10-point grading system that PSA uses. He was getting paid royalties by PSA for its use for a period of time. He pulled some of the cards off Ebay and forgot to close the auction. A week later someone one bid on one of the cards and he tried to offer me a ASA-8 for my PSA-8 and to trade back. He said he couldn't afford anymore negative feedbacks (wink). I didn't think that was a fair trade since he could have run into his basement and put anything into a ASA holder. No matter what anyone says on this board - here is a perfect example of why third party authentication (although faulty at times) is better than nothing.

Hager?
 

Besides buying a few overgraded ASA or Accugrade cards, I had the misfortune of winning several pre-war lots in one of his auctions around 20 years ago. Some lots were badly overgraded and I had to return them. One lot that was EX to EX-MT had multiple creases that apparently had been ironed to minimize them. When I returned the items, Hager and his wife made threats and insulting remarks. She even said that they are the experts of the industry, so there's no way I should dare to question their descriptions of the cards. I later read an article he wrote where he claimed to 'doctor' cards and increased their values dramatically. Probably they were graded by ASA. What an ego!

He invented graded cards like Al Gore invented the internet!

Ron R