Mount Rushmore of Industry Icons
 

I write a blog for a local card shop, and in conjunction with the owner (who has considerable pull in the industry), we are developing the Mount Rushmore of Sports Card Industry Icons. (Unless otherwise told it's allowed by Leon, I won't mention the shop or the blog so as to not seem like I am advertising.) We are endeavoring to find the 4 most influential people on the sports card industry.

Criteria:
- Impact on Sports Card Collecting
- Long-term importance to the industry
- An innovator within the industry
- Brings favorable attention to the industry
- Favorable view from the industry
- Personal Passion towards the industry
- Did they expand the market
- Industry Icon

Our research thus far has uncovered a wide range of nominees:
- Sy Berger
- Jim Beckett
- Mickey Mantle
- David Hall
- Pierre Omidyar
- Richard McWilliam
- Jefferson Burdick
- Mike Berkus
- Honus Wagner
- Mr Mint
- Michael Jordan
- Don West
- Wayne Gretzky
- Larry Fritsch
- Bill Mastro

I'm asking for some more nominees here as Net54 is far and away the most knowledgeable group of people in the sports card world and I am hoping to uncover some more deserving nominees. For example, I wouldn't have given Gretzky a shot, until the argument was made that his greatest contribution was actually his purchase of the Wagner, which highlighted the value of vintage cards on a world stage and legitimized third party grading (although we all know how that one ended).

Are there others you think are deserving of this honor? After compiling a list of nominees, we will whittle them down to a final list for voting.

Thanks in advance!

Kit Young
 

Kit Young

Never mind.

Interesting. My first thought, given what I understand to be what you're asking, is that players have no place on the list.

I think Burdick and Mr. Mint are slam dunks. After that it gets hard. I think Beckett, Berger, and Fritsch are solid options, and I think Enos Goudey at least deserves a mention, if not consideration. The Mastro argument will be a good one, but one I steer clear of.

Gotta have the industry "B's" on there...Burdick for his cataloging, Berger for his innovation of products and Beckett for making collecting a popular hobby to the masses.

The 4th one is a little tougher...am torn between Mantle who was such a hero to so many and a hobby ambassador to early card shows drawing people in to rediscover their youth...and Fritsch who made those cards of our youth readily available by mail via his catalogs long before card shows were popular....toss a coin or have 5 on the mountain.



Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk

Pioneer Buck Barker.

Just to piss people off I will nominate Brett H. from PWCC.

Sells how many tens upon tens of thousands of cards a year. Has tried to create financial metrics for the collecting industry. Personally not a huge fan but hard to deny the impact PWCC has had.

Lionel Carter probably deserve at least a mention here, too.

Looks like the criteria is very skewed towards people who did stuff more recently. That's a bit limiting.
To me …
The certain ones
- Sy Berger
- Jim Beckett
- Jefferson Burdick


And,
Enos Goudey - Most of the 30's sets were from Boston area gum companies, and nearly all of those had some connection to Goudey.

Lionel Carter


The maybes
- David Hall
- Richard McWilliam
- Mike Berkus
- Larry Fritsch


And

Renata Galasso
Michael Aronstein
Michael Schechter
Andrew Peck

Plus maybe a few hundred other people...…..

I don't think athletes belong. Yes, they're important because the hobby is mostly about promotional items they're on, but few had any real involvement besides posing for a photo.

And the no list
- Pierre Omidyar
- Mr Mint
- Don West

They were all involved, although Omidyar probably didn't plan on being involved - just ended up in a decent place.
But It's debatable whether their influence was positive or not.


And the "you must be kidding" list

- Bill Mastro

I'd add Fritsch, Michael Aronstein and Renata Galasso to the list on nominees. I think all merit consideration.



Alan Rosen treated me like dirt in my limited dealings with him. But he was influential.

1) Bob Lemke - primary contributor to the Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards; custom baseball cards, hobby legend
2) Jefferson Burdick - cataloguer

possibly also Lew Lipset (although there are mixed feelings about his demeanor) and Michael Aronstein (aka TCMA) and Larry Fritsch

And I agree, no athletes should make the list, despite their importance.

Yeah, the term "favorable" is going to vary greatly between individuals in this exercise.

Lionel Carter....
 

is a slam dunk. Players have no business on this "mountain".

Mr. Carter is an icon.

Peace, Mike

This would be my exact list.

Some wonderful nominations we hadn't gotten yet, and some that we'd received previously but will give more credence to given their support here. Please keep them coming!

If Leon allows, when we finalize nominations, I will post a link to the poll for voting.

Barry Halper? :D:D:D:D

Bob Lemke...how could I forget to mention him? He was a prince and a tireless contributor to many projects. He was the anti-Mr Mint

Frank Nagy should be in consideration as well.

Actually Bob and Mr. Mint did quite a lot of communications. He was not the anti Mr. Mint

Rich

We should make a ballot (poll) and post it. The Net54 Collector's HOF. Inaugural class of 4, then voting every January for 1 inductee.

I agree about nominations and have no issue with any of this.The history of the hobby is an enjoyable subject.
It reminds me of, about 40 yrs ago, when I volunteered at the Houston Zoo reptile department. It was a great department back then (don't know anything about today). One main reason it was great is that the curator of the museum was a herpetologist. Go figure.
To me, The first 3 hobbyists (already mentioned) as shoe ins are Burdick, Berger and Beckett.
And I would vote to make it the Mt. Rushmore of the top 5. :) (if there were a vote.) That way more can be on it.

ps...I like Conor's idea right above here too.

I like a HOF idea but, if you could, please wait until after January 7th so as to not take the wind out of the sails of this project!

I agree that the 3 B's are on my list. The other person involved is on the fence about Burdick (we have had many a fight about this) but Berger and Beckett seem to be absolute certainties. I do think Burdick will pull it out, and then the 4th spot is anyone's guess. We'll see!

The plan is to accept nominations through December 3rd. Next Monday there will be a blog post introducing the idea formally to the masses. On December 3rd we will have a culled list of nominees (knowing that, even though there are many nominees, not everyone can make the final list). That final list will be made into a poll with voting open for 4 weeks and closing on December 31st. On January 7th the Mount Rushmore will be formally announced.

Per Leon's blessing above I will post links when applicable in order to direct folks to the voting.

During the voting I also plan on running several blog posts featuring debate and discussion, so if you feel passionately for (or against) a certain nominee, feel free to elaborate, and I will contact you for permission to include it in a post.

Thanks everyone -- keep 'em coming!

Jacob Warren Bowman
Sy Berger
Jefferson Burdick
James Beckett

Ted Z for T206 (and probably lots of other stuff). Love reading his posts.

Burdick
Berger
Lemke
Lifson

Some of the names on the original list are an abomination

Nice to see that what my dad, Mike Aronstein was able to achieve during his time in the hobby still resonates. Thank you to the guys who have already mentioned his name here in this thread.

You can listen to Keith Olbermann speak fondly of my dad during his speech at the inaugural meeting of the SABR Baseball Card Committee at the link below. Some stories about a quarter of the way through, then at the end during the Q&A:

https://sabr.app.box.com/s/kxgpod56h...b882u4npvipmao

Jefferson Burdick
Lew Lipset
Wharton Tigre
Buck Barker

Beckett and the auctioneers don’t belong on the same level as these people.

Bob Lemke.

I think there should be a greater emphasis on hobby pioneers like Burdick and Barker, who were involved purely for the knowledge and the love of collecting, than for some of the people who got into the business solely to make money. Maybe the latter group made some important contributions to the industry, but they don't seem Rushmore-worthy to me.

If he hasn't been mentioned, David Hall. Like him or hate him, PSA has revolutionized collecting for a large percentage of the hobby. PS I see he was listed, so I agree with that choice.

While I don't think that he belongs on that list, Dmitri Young is a player-collector who does tick a lot of the boxes.

https://www.psacard.com/articles/art...league-players

https://www.sportscollectorsdaily.co...gs-huge-money/

Lionel Carter for sure.

My two cents...
 

Gloria Rothstein

I think I ordered sets in the 1950's from a mail order dealer called : Woody Gelman ???

I agree with the 3 Bs. Woody Gelman would be my #4, the first real mail order dealer long before Fritsch. I can't believe no mentions until page 4.

Mickey Mantle who was a jerk to collectors at card shows for years? No way. I would put him with Mastro and Mr. Mint in the group the have no business on a Mount Rushmore of the hobby.

How about Dennis Purdy who. through his magazine VCBC, tried to point out some of the bad actors in the hobby? Anybody remember his articles about the slimy Alan Hager?

His article on Dan Desmond and card alteration was priceless and profoundly disturbing.

could only name two
 

as I'm pretty particular about whose image I would put on a rock that was interesting enough just as a rock.....

J Burdick
E W Tigre

"Mt Rushmore"
 

Reading through all these posts here, what is certainly apparent to me is that we need more than "Mt Rushmore",
with respect to contenders which have enriched this hobby.
I could think of at least a dozen (or more) worthy candidates, whose images should be sculptured on a mountain.
This then begs the next question....which mountain ?

I would recommend the "mile-high" mountain in northern Maine, Mt. Katahdin. It rises 5267 feet above sea level.

It's tree line ends at approx. 3000 feet. The rest of this mountain is sheer rock. So, we can carve out a number of
"hobby heroes" on it.


TED Z

T206 Reference
.

While not contributing a name
 

I would agree that no players should be on the list.

There may be a demand for their cards because they were players, but there is also demand every year for that one weird card that gets out and causes a frenzy of people who think it will remain hot in five years.

Can't see putting Billy "#>¢% Face" Ripkin on any list just because his card was hot at one time. If you can't do one, you shouldn't do any.

Mr McCollum you are wrong, the Bill Ripken F Face card should be on every list. Can you even consider yourself a baseball card collector without owning a copy?:D

John D. Wagner
 

Burdick and Carter for sure. And I would recommend considering John D. Wagner, a pioneer of baseball card collecting, as well as through the mail autograph-on-card (including T206s!) seeking:

Originally posted by Leon: "The John D Wagner Hobby Letters - 1930s on..."
http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=207944

<img src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8781/29461321632_4573e2aba2_b.jpg" width="973" height="560" alt="SnoEnv"></a>

<img src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8031/29571014995_af30941ddf_b.jpg" width="471" height="763" alt="Snodgrass Batting Auto SGC A"></a>

<img src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8081/28945493074_eab4dc4a83_b.jpg" width="836" height="763" alt="Leifield_AUTO_BURDICK_SGC_JSA_A">

Goodwin Goldfaden
 

Ted Koch was a person I learned a lot from and he said that he used to buy things from Goodie Goldfaden way back when. So as a person who used to sell by mail order, I guess he could be nominated.

David

Henry— I agree that those are the top two by far.

Not Rushmore, but definitely HOF Dick Perez

Hobby Publishing Icons
 

I've always admired the guys who published these hobby publications - John Stommen founder of SCD; Dan Dischley, The Trader Speaks and Frank and Vivian Barning, Baseball Hobby News -not to mention several others.

Learned alot from:
 

I remember learning a lot about the hobby in the mid 90s from:

Barry Sloate- The East Coast Guru!

Mark Macrae- The West Coast Guru!

Well
 

Definitely agree - no athletes on the list and Burdick, Berger and Beckett are shoe ins - #4 is super tough - there have been so many great nominees mentioned here I don't know how to pick 1!

I agree wholeheartedly. I have never personally known anyone in the hobby with more knowledge and genuine joy and willingness to share it.

Burdick, Lipset, Lemke & Beckett

but shout-out to three Net54 Members I've learned a lot from:

Barry Sloate
Ted Zanidakis
Leon Luckey

Thanks gentlemen

Lots of people mentioned were in what I figured as "hundreds of others"


Certainly if Beckett is in, Dennis Eckes should be as well.

I like the eventual hall of fame idea, The GBSCC did something like that for a while, I'm not sure if they still do. If I remember correctly it was a yearly award.


One of the stamp groups I'm in does something similar, at the yearly meeting they have someone sign the roll of distinguished philatelists. Considering some of the names on there, it's a major honor.


Going with a very modern look at things, I'd have to consider Scot Reader, Ted Z, and Pat R. Some of what they've done would be impressive in any hobby, and I think that someday their sort of more detailed look at complex sets will become more common.

(and I'm sure I've missed a few people doing similar things with different sets)

I can't believe that everyone has over looked Leon Luckey.

I believe that the Net54 board has lifted the card market to where it is today. With its wealth of knowledge it had stirred up the hobby. Without Leon, there would not be a Net54 board.

Lots of great and extremely deserving names listed. A few important names that have had immense positive impact on the field that I don’t think have come up yet:

Keith Olbermann,
Bert Sugar,
Brian Brusokas,
Michael O’Keeffe (writers wing!),
Bruce Yeko,
and definitely Charles Bray.

Few were as important to the field in the earliest days of the organized hobby (from the 1930s to the 1960s!) as Charles Bray. This is just off the top of my head. I’m sure there are many others that are extremely worthy of note by any criteria. I especially agree that the hobby publishers such as Dan Dischley and John Stommen (and in more modern high-tech times: Leon Luckey!) are among the most important contributors to the field, providing a way for collectors to communicate with one another, more easily learn about collecting, and just in general playing a huge role in helping the hobby be accessible and to grow.

Rushmore worthy
 

My Mom and all the other moms out there who despite the cards all over the basement and multiple DEFCON 1 threats......NEVER THREW AWAY MY BASEBALL CARDS! Thanks Mom!!!!

This is reminiscent of the Card Collectors' Hall of Fame, which Irv Lerner and some others created in the early 1970s. I wrote a post about it in May 2017, here: http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?p=1666561. I've pasted in that post below, including the nine people who were selected in the Hall of Fame's only two years of existence.

*********************
n 1970, prominent collector Irv Lerner, with the help of Bob Jaspersen (editor of Sport Fan) and Dick Reuss (co-founder of the Detroit convention that same year), published "Who's Who in Card Collecting", which listed names, addresses, and short bios of any collectors who wanted to be included. One feature of this book was a "Card Collectors' Hall of Fame", with elaborate rules for voting in new members each year. Six Hall of Fame members were listed in that first 1970 editon: Jefferson Burdick, Walter Corson, Charles Bray, Preston Orem, E. C. Wharton-Tigar, and Robert J. Payne. In the 1971 second edition of the "Who's Who", Lerner listed three new inductees: Buck Barker, Lionel Carter, and John D. Wagner. That was the last edition of the "Who's Who" to be published, and those were the last additions to the Hall of Fame.

Last year, I posted a longish article that Dick Reuss wrote in 1970 about the Card Collectors' Hall of Fame, and in the comments Leon posted the first few pages of "Who's Who in Card Collecting" (though not the pages about the Hall of Fame). That post is here: http://net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=218788. As I also mentioned in the comments, George Vrechek had written an article in 2011 about collector directories, including Lerner's "Who's Who" and its Hall of Fame, in which he provided brief summary bios of Lerner's nine inductees. That article is here: http://www.oldbaseball.com/refs/Coll...36_to_1971.pdf

Since I wrote that post early last year, several of the nine Hall of Fame members have been the subjects of my and Leon's hobby history posts. I wrote a lengthy post about Preston Orem, here:

http://net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=228930

And a similarly lengthy post about Walter Corson, here:

http://net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=232220

I've also posted many articles by Lionel Carter, including his obituary of Jefferson Burdick (published in Card Collector's Bulletin in 1963, and in revised form in Sport Hobbyist in 1973), and his obituary of Bob Jaspersen and Buck Barker, published first in SCD and then in revised form in the program for the 1983 National:

http://net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=224897
http://net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=219926

Leon has continued to post the hobby letters of John D. Wagner in this thread:

http://net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=207944

And just yesterday he revived this 2013 thread where he posted letters that E. C. Wharton-Tigar wrote to Buck Barker:

http://net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=166215

Around the same time that Leon started the Wagner letters thread almost two years ago, I posted an article about Wagner that appeared in the 1982 Sport Americana Baseball Card Price Guide (aka the Beckett annual guide):

http://net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=207915

Also, in the recent REA auction I won Wagner's copies of the 1939 American Card Catalog and the first 30 issues of Card Collector's Bulletin (1939-1944), outbidding Leon, and from those I've been posting a lot of interesting articles by Burdick, plus some by Bray from when he took over the bimonthly card auctions in CCB.

All this has made me think of the Card Collectors' Hall of Fame, and so I thought I would post the full pages about it from the 1971 "Who's Who in Card Collecting", including the bios of the nine inductees. All of these guys except for Edward Payne (who was a postcard collector) were very influential in the history of the baseball card hobby, and anybody writing about that history should know about them. Plus, the whole idea of such a Hall of Fame now seems like kind of a quaint relic of a bygone time in the hobby, when some people who had collected T206s as kids were still active collectors.

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The question really should be posed: Jefferson Burdick and what other three hobby icons should be on Mt. Rushmore? Burdick is in a class of his own.

And for those kind enough to mention my name, I might be worthy of raking the leaves that fall on Mt. Rushmore, but that's about it.

That's the responsible thing to do to prevent forest fires.

Amazing contributions. I have to admit that at first I thought the “old” card company founders wouldn’t stand a chance, as Frank Fleer and Enos Goudey were really just gum men. But we’ve gotten a good number of Jacob Warren Bowman nominations here and elsewhere and I am ashamed to say that I had no idea he was also behind Gum Inc/Play Ball prior to Bowman. Being the man behind two largely successful and influential card sets seems like it would carry weight. I’m still reading up about his history.

NOT Everyone

Mt
 

The floor... you gotta keep the floor clean

Lein luckey and barry sloat

Thanks for the kind words but assuredly I am raking leaves with Barry on this one. And I agree with Barry, there is Burdick at the pinnacle and then everyone else.

I agree that no players should be on the list.

I have a very controversial one to add that I think we are leaving out.

David Hall

Many hate what the success of PSA has done with the hobby, myself included. However, I don't think the impact can be argued as to the build in values due to it creating a huge investment and prospecting market. Could anyone have argued that a 1982 Champ Summers could someday sell for multiples of hundreds of dollars if I put it in a plastic case as long as I don't put too many more in one?

long time hobbist
 

Gar Miller

Mr. Mint, Alan Rosen.

He's certainly a controversial choice. But love him or hate him, Mr. Mint probably unearthed more amazing material (including 40+ pack-fresh 52 Mantles) for the hobby than anyone else.

Wherever those Mantles are today, I guarantee you they are the cornerstone of each and every one of those personal collections.

Frank Nagy, Lionel Carter, Larry Fritsch and a host of a lot more that contributed to the growth of the hobby.

John

Octavio-The real Mt Rushmore has four great presidents. Are Barry and Leon in your top four hobby contributors ever, or are you drastically (very drastically) expanding the number of subjects for the hobby version?

I think you have to nominate Jeff Burdick by acclamation. The other choices are tougher. I tend to favor recognizing innovation, and while they're not popular, for better or worse David Hall is largely responsible for the market penetration of TPG and that guy in Chicago, unless I am mistaken, pioneered the high end sportscard/memorabilia auction house.

We may need a larger mountain.;)

Also, and I wasn't collecting when he was first active, but my sense is that Alan Rosen played a huge role in the transformation of collecting from pure hobby to, shall we say, hobby with financial overtones.

Wharton Tigre is clearly the number two person. Buck Barker is number three. The Alan Rosens and the David Halls of the world don’t come close. BTW, David Hall didn’t start card grading, Alan Hager did.

Haha...Alan Hager threatened to sue me back in the olden days of Usenet.

But we can thank all of the moms who did throw away baseball cards for making them so valuable today.

I am completely shocked that nobody mentioned the guy who invented paper - Cai Lun. An argument can also be made for the Egyptians, but I don’t recall any cards being printed on papyrus. :D

Cai Lun, isn’t that Bruce Jenner’s new name?

On a more serious note, I think Lawrence Ritter also made a huge contribution with The Glory Of Their Times book/interview tapes.

Candidates for the HOF (although it would be better if somebody just wrote a book about all of this).

John Stommen and Dan Dishley. I remember hobby papers when I was a kid, they were done on the cheap and mailed out in this haphazard fashion. Terrible. Stommen and Dishley changed all that.

There are a lot of pioneers: You have to start with Burdick, the daddy of them all, but there are a number of guys, "Greatest Generation" types, whom most people wouldn't remember, like Buck Barker, Frank Nagy, Wirt Gammon and Elwood Scharf, who were the heart of collecting when it was pretty much underground. They always had time for novice collectors. "Come over," Nagy would say, "Come and look at my junk."

Ernie Harwell, who saved EVERYTHING, and then donated it to a library.

Lew Lipset published a smart newsletter and a reference book. He has most likely forgotten more about cards than the rest of us will ever know.

Goody Goldfadden probably had the longest running retail shop, which should count for plenty, and...

How about Brian Brusokas, the FBI agent who helped clean up the "hobby" in the 21st century.

It would be a good idea to keep out jocks and the shameless self promoters who made a lot of money but didn't add much to the conversation.
lumberjack

OK, it's unanimous that Jefferson Burdick gets the # 1 spot on whatever mountain we sculpture his image on.

In another category (that of producing trading cards)…. J. Warren Bowman, and his genius behind the Bowman Gum Co. (initially GUM, Inc.), George Moll,
deserve a huge tribute.
They replaced Goudey in 1938 - 1942 as the foremost producer of Sports and Non-Sports cards in the country. And of course, they revived the hobby after
WWII by producing quality cards in 1948 thru 1953.

George Moll operated an Advertising Agency (Abington, Pennsylvania). He employed 12 artists who designed all the Sports & Non-Sports card that Bowman
produced from 1938 to 1955.


TED Z

T206 Reference
.

Archive.

Archive must be included in the list.