What was your first T card?
 

I thought this may be an interesting idea for a thread.

What was your first T card? Do you remember when/where you got it or how much you paid?

My first T card was a Piedmont backed T206 of Mickey Doolan (batting). I bought it sight unseen out of an SCD add from Sports Cards Plus for I believe $25-$30. This would have been in the 1992-94 time frame. I remember the card was advertised as EX-MT and years later SGC graded it a 40 (VG 3).

First - T206 Bradley w/ bat (SC350 back). Cleveland across the chest, bat on the shoulder and a the high collar. $5. That led to the 25 card team set which led to completing the 520. The Monster was strong.
Latest - upgraded that Bradley with a better back! Slightly more than $5.

The card that got me started on my journey to pre-war was a T206 Chance Red Portrait w/ Polar Bear reverse in poor condition. I remember it was $28.00 on E-Bay. This was probably back in 2004-ish.

Wish I still had it, but it's been replaced :)

Bill

My last name is Mullen. Got a T206 Mullen when I was about 13 years old for $20. Fast forward 20 years and I said to myself "I should try to put the entire set together". Took me 7 years and I have 521.

I can't remember the exact card but it was a T206. When I joined the forum 11 years ago I got addicted to them. Weirdly I have had a love/hate relationship with T206s. I have started collecting them seriously 3 different times and every time I get up to between 50-100 cards I decide I don't like them and sell them off. Now whenever I think about buying one or even going for a back run I tell myself no.

My budget is fairly modest compared to some on here, so my first wasn’t
anything crazy. $83.33 last September.

https://d1htnxwo4o0jhw.cloudfront.ne.../355625178.jpg

Coincidentally, this is my most recent purchase:

https://caimages.collectors.com/psai...l.jpg?v=416480

For me my 1st (T) card was this T205 Zack Wheat. My records show a date of Nov 2005- $40. Just after I read a book about history’s of Brooklyn baseball.

early 90's in high school.. Gavvy Cravath

Four of these five cards, all picked up at the same time in 1981 at the first table I encountered at the first card show I ever attended in 1981. The total price was $11.00, so the T-card portion was either $8 or $9. Don't remember which of the five had the $3 price tag...would be interesting to know which card was considered just a little more desirable.

Obviously this purchase fueled my prewar collecting fire.


Brian

This was my first T card ever - not this exact card, but a much more beat up version. I got it via trade with a friend when I was about 10 (so probably around 1984); remember going to a friend’s house with binders and shoe boxes of cards, trading, then riding bikes, etc.

Anyway, I traded for this bc I thought it was the coolest, being so small and old. From that time, I have always strongly favored vintage and especially T206.

Sometime in the mid to late 1970s, I replied to an ad from Ralph Nozaki, who was looking for error and variation cards. I sent him a 1962 Topps Reniff variation that I didn't care about, and requested a T206 in return. I would've been happy with any common.

He sent me a beautiful VG Mathewson white cap.

My first T card was a Bob Ewing Piedmont back that I got for 8$ at the chantilly show in 2010. It now sits in a sgc 1 holder, I dont think I'll ever get rid of it. It and a really beat T205 Harry Lord were my intro to Prewar at a young age.

1977. I heard about a guy in a neighboring town who had a set of T206 for sale. I borrowed $1000 from my dad and drove to see him. He had the set--I suppose it was a 520--but wanted $2000. I couldn't talk him down, but he offered to sell me a few dupes for a buck each. All I had was $100 bills and he had no change, so he gave me Jake Beckley.

I started with a star. Picked it up from a board member.

Early 1970's, a West Coast dealer whose name I don't recall (and I also don't recall how I heard about him) was selling T218 boxers for twenty five cents each and T206's for fifty cents. I sent him a dollar, got two T218's (James Jeffries and Jack Johnson!), and the T206 pictured on the right. Not a bad deal. I haven't needed to replace it in the fifty-plus years since.:D

The other card, a 1961 Ralph Houk, is literally the first baseball card I ever owned.

Alan

T206 Mathewson. I paid $20 for it in 1985.

Hannibal's own!

My first was Kisinger, purchased for $1 from board member Gary Nucherino a heck of a long time ago. I was just a kid.

The second was the Frank Smith two teams variation, purchased for a few bucks from the awesome old Hall's Nostalgia less than a year later.

First T card
 

I had just finished building a nice 1955 Topps set (an easy build) back in 2018 and started to covet prewar instead of the set, so I brought the cards to a local show and traded for a T206 yellow WaJo portrait PSA 2 and a T213 red Cobb portrait Coupon back. I was hooked, even though I did not realize what I had begun and the journey I'd choose to explore in the years to follow.

Back in 1998-ish, I went to an antique store and spotted four T-206’s in a display case. I bought all four. I ended up trading one years ago, but still have the other three. Eventually, they went to SGC for grading.

I think it was a Hoblitzell. That was like half a century ago... and I'm pretty sure it was less than a buck in VG/EX condition. T206

My first
 

My first one was a T205 Chance with a corner chewed off by a mouse. I don't have it anymore, have no idea when I traded it away, and would buy it in a second if I ever saw it again. I picked it up at a Chicago show around the time Sandberg rookies exploded, and I had a stack of them that I accumulated when I knew he was going to be pretty good. I was looking to trade some for a 1969 Reggie RC, saw the Chance, and I was addicted.

first T card
 

My first T card was a T201 Mecca, can't recall which. I liked the set enough
that I completed it:)

Trent King

In the late 70's dad got sent by Caterpillar to Miami to diagnose some marine engine problems. We were all excited to spend 2 weeks in Miami in a beachfront motel on Cat's dime. On the drive from Illinois to Miami we stopped in Georgia at an antique "Bargain Barn".

The old man had thousands of baseball cards, with several hundred T 206 cards. I was only about 12-13 and bought 2 of them for a total of $5, McGinnity and Casey Piedmont backs.

A couple years later we went back to Florida, and I saved up for 2 years to buy him out. Dad stopped at that bargain barn, but the old man had died and his son liquidated it all.

That same summer, I also bought the Phillippe Sweet Caporal at a Steamboat Days flea market in Peoria for a few bucks.

It wasn't until Beckett put out his Sport American annual guide that I knew what a T 206 was, all I knew was they were old and cool.

My first T card was a T206 Herbie Moran, Providence. This explains my username. It was in late '82 and I had caught the collecting bug. The Beckett & Eckes price guide was like a bible to me. I subscribed to Sports Collectors Digest and one of the advertisers was Wayne Miller, the "T206 King". So where better to get my first T206? I sent away for a common of his choice in G-VG condition. I think it was $2 or $3. When it arrived I remember being a little disappointed it wasn't a major leaguer, although I thought the King did me a solid since at the time the minor leaguers were thought to be slightly more valuable.
I still have the card and am now working on my 3rd attempt at the Monster. I'm at 508 and actually think I may get there. Thanks King for the start.

I bought this Matty sight unseen out of a hobby publication back in 1980 or so. I don't remember what I paid but I'm guessing around $25. I was planning to build a Hall of Fame player collection using as many career-era cards as possible but I soon realized that was a task bigger than my resources, even then. Nonetheless, I was enthralled by the idea of owning a card that had been in some kid's collection in 1911. I cherished it for years and it's still my favorite of all the cards I've owned.

I had it graded and sold it a couple of years ago. It's one of two cards I've ever sent in to be slabbed.

Attachment 645513

Billy Purtell Broad Leaf 350, bought by accident in a small "lot" in Hillsville , VA, sat on my desk 6 months, before I finally looked it up. When I realized what it was , I was as hooked as a cocaine addict.

An Addie Joss portrait, which came with a deal involving primarily '50s vintage cards.

First was a Dark Cap Matty. It's still my favorite T206

Sent from my SM-G998U using Tapatalk

At the original Sports Corner store in Montvale NJ
 

a T206 McGinnity and maybe Marquard for common prices since they were priced that way and I knew they were HOFers and thus had to be better than commons.

Can't think of when they left me but they are long gone

Rich

Miller Huggins hands at mouth T206 from a White Plains show when I was ten. I think I paid $15 for it. Still have it tucked away.

My first T card was this T206 Hannifan about 25 years ago from a Kit Young catalog. Thus began my Jersey City collection and prewar at the same time.



.

For me it was a T206 Fred Clarke holding bat. I saw an ad in the back of a magazine around 1982 when I was 10. You send them $3 and a SASE and they'll send you one T206. You pick the team, they pick the player. I picked the Pirates because, hey, Honus Wagner, right? Ended up with a HOFer.

Wish I still had it, but I sold it in my teens when girls became more important than baseball cards

T206 Tris Speaker that was pretty darn rough. Long go, but looking to replace it in the coming days.

I got my first pre-War card circa 1990 in a trade with Bill Huggins (RIP Bill), before Huggins & Scott Auctions came into being, at his House of Cards store in a MD suburb of DC. I traded Bill some some pristine 1960 Topps cards (from my childhood collection that, thankfully, Mom didn't toss out after I left home) for a T207 Recruit of Walter Johnson.

T206 Otto Knabe
 

My first was a T206 Otto Knabe which I bought from Jim Elder of Odessa, FL for 50 cents in 1973. I bought four for $2 but he only had one available so I got a credit for $1.50. I was 13 years old and my Dad would tease me that I would never see the $1.50 again!

T206 Bresnahan portrait from the Larry Fritsch museum in Cooperstown

T202 Hassan Lord and Tannehill with an unnamed Joe Jackson pictured. Picked it up in 2023.

Thanks for all the responses so far. The history of peoples collections are often as interesting to me as the items themselves.

CY Young Sweet Caporal 350 Subject Back was my 1st. It was purchased at the Lambertville/Golden Nugget Flea Market in NJ @ 1980 for $16.00, the rest were purchased all same backs at the same Flea Market during multiple visits within a year

In 1972 I bought my first—as part of a lot of 1100+ T205 and T206’s. All were collected by him in NYC in 1909-1912. He lived on a farm outside of Max, N.D.
I had to force $20 on him for the entire lot. He wanted to just give them to me.

Doc powers with a cut clean across the middle.

Great color and loved the card.

Helped me grow a love for pre war cards.

Picked it up from a board member and he was awesome enough to include a common (Davis) with a back stamp!

A T206 Johnny Bates was my first. I traded it quite a few years ago.

1909 e-90 caramel ty cobb sgc 2 (probably slightly overgraded to be honest)

bought in jan of 2022

one of my favorite cards.

my daughter ordered a t-shirt of the card that i wear to shows, kind of funny
when people compliment me on the t-shirt and then i pull the card out of my case. kind of stuns them a bit, in a good, fun way.

Five T3's for 75 cents
 

[FONT="Georgia"]The year was either 1963 or '64 and I (a young teen) attended with my family a Maine country auction one Saturday evening in North Yarmouth. We attended fairly regularly for the entertainment value and the possibility of obtaining some treasure for the proverbial song. But, to that date, no baseball cards had ever been offered.

This night, five big old cards came up for bid. As I had no American Card Catalog for reference until 1966 or '67, I only knew they were old cards and definitely worth all I had to spend: 75 cents. The bidding started at 25 cents (my bid) and it appeared I would have a real bargain ... until another upped me by a quarter. I came back with 6 bits and won the lot.

Best card was a Turkey Red (T3) of Wildfire Schulte and that's the one I consider my "first" T card.

That card went, together with the balance of my childhood collection, to Frank Nagy - who got me re-started in collecting within days of that sale!

That's very cool, Steve. I was either 2 or 3 yrs old when you attended the auction.
The first T card I remember buying (might have had a few others but don't remember them) was a T205 Johnson in a PSA 7 holder. I am pretty sure I paid Scott B about 1650 for it....That was in around 2000 or so....

This one, Polar Bear back, and barely still in one piece thanks to a bit of tape.

I hung out at Halls Nostalgia for a while, and liked the T206s. At the time they put them in a part of a plastic page on a 3x with some stats.

One day they said they had a card for me. A T206, and only 20 cents instead of the 1.50 for the nice ones.

I soon bought more somewhat nicer ones.
https://www.net54baseball.com/pictur...pictureid=4729

My first T card was a T206 portrait of Walter Johnson (no pic right now). The card was a throw in when I was buying a nice looking Koufax rookie. Got hooked on T cards...

My uncle died when I was 7. He had 4 daughters and I was his only godson so his wife gave me all his baseball cards. He had shoeboxes full of small cards ( I now know they were all T205 and T206 cards) and weird square cards with Goudey on them. I was only interested in current topps cards at the time. I remember using the Goudey cards in my spokes on my bike to make it sound "cool". My mom threw them all away when I went to college. My youngest daughter got into the 2002 Topps T cards. Hit on a t206 Bradley buyback insert. It brought back memories of my uncle and I did some research. I now have about 100 t206 cards and add a couple of cards a year to my collection.

My uncle died when I was 7. He had 4 daughters and I was his only godson so his wife gave me all his baseball cards. He had shoeboxes full of small cards ( I now know they were all T205 and T206 cards) and weird square cards with Goudey on them. I was only interested in current topps cards at the time. I remember using the Goudey cards in my spokes on my bike to make it sound "cool". My mom threw them all away when I went to college. My youngest daughter got into the 2002 Topps T cards. Hit on a t206 Bradley buyback insert. It brought back memories of my uncle and I did some research. I now have about 100 t206 cards and add a couple of cards a year to my collection.

Not many of us can say we put Goudey cards in our bicycle spokes!

Probably sometime in the late 1980's, my dad picked up our first T206. And yes, it was because of the 'stache.

Red background Ty Cobb, with Polar Bear back. Answered an ad in the back of TSN requesting Gar Miller's "for sale" list, and bought that card for $5 (plus a Play Ball Bill Dickey and Red Ruffing for a buck apiece and a W512 Ruth for $5).

That was 1971, when I was 10. Rick Salamon gave me several T206 beaters a few years later. I didn't get back to The Monster until 2018 and I'm now up to 507 graded, 205 more raw.

But that Cobb remains my favorite.


Sent from my SM-S921U using Tapatalk

Purchased early 80's at a show with my dad for $2. I believe at the same show I got ripped off on a fake n95 mayo lave cross. I think that was $3.

Seems like the going price for cards of top tier HOF pitchers in lower condition in the T206 set were going for $2 to $3 during the early 1980's, since that was the price I paid for the two I showed previously in this thread. I like the look of your Matty!

Brian

https://photos.imageevent.com/exhibi...on%20ready.jpg

Got it around 1977-78 from Mike Berkus at an Anaheim show. Slabbed decades later.

Picked it up as a raw card at a National couple of decades ago. The dealer had about ten Cobbs sitting there, all ungraded. If only......

I thought Irv Young was Cy Young and bought a real banged up card for $8 in the early 80s at a show on Long Island.

My first was a T206 Oscar Stanage (SC) in the early eighties on a card shop on Lincoln in Anaheim, CA. My Dad bought it for me for $9, and I have been working on a back run for the past few years. I need a Tolstoi and a Broadleaf. I will call it a day after the Tolstoi.

Funny thing is I work in the area and frequently pass by the location which is an insurance company now.

I bought this on eBay and nearly had a heart attack when I won it. I didn't even know what the OC on the flip meant.


https://live.staticflickr.com/3143/2...2832a7b0_z.jpg

Maybe "Outstanding Condition"?

T206 Matty dark cap was my first T-card. I sold the original years ago. But it has been replaced with another example.

I got an E98 Irv Young in my first group of 5 prewar cards, and for 20+ years I just took it for granted that it was a card of Cy Young. The name on the bottom misled me (and buyers are to this day still forking out big bucks for its Cy designation).

I have to admit, I still consider it a Cy Young card...it says so right there on front, and he pitched for Cleveland from 1909 to 1911, so I have the right to do so!


Brian

Another member of the Dark Cap Matty first T206 card club. Any more out there?

Brian

I wish! It’s one of the set’s - or any set’s - most beautiful subjects. Perhaps one day I’ll own one as it was a big part in inspiring me to collect the set.

That's what Kevin Mize told me!

Mathewson white cap, closely followed by a T205 Cobb.

Well hello all,

I just started about 2 weeks ago now collecting the T206. I was very excited just like everyone else and I feel the excitement got to me just buying anything to have my first one. I know I over paid for Scott card but we all make mistakes when collecting.

Since then I have slowed down and see If I could find good deals. Hard to find good raw cards on eBay at a good price. Most threads I read buying common cards should be around $25 -> $35. Well haven't seen those deals yet or undless I'm searching in the wrong place.

Well these are 2 first cards in Dec 2024.

I love the smell and how they feel in your hand. Can't believe I finally have two of these cards. Always seen them in books when I was small and thought to myself I could never afford them.

Yep.

If I counted right, that puts us Dark Caps up 5-3 over the White Caps.

He isn't identified as a Super Print for nothing. The Dark Cap image (obviously a manifestation of Christy's evil side) evidently lures in unsuspecting individuals to a lifetime of prewar card collecting.

Brian

One day while visiting a small baseball card stand in an outlet mall, I saw a few T206 cards and I couldn’t believe it. I remembered the set of reprints and thought how cool it would be to own a real one. The prices being somewhere between $15-$25 for a few beat up commoners. A few were more expensive, but given my limited cash flow, I asked to see a couple of the ‘cheaper’ ones. Up until that point, I don’t think I had ever paid more than $10, maybe $15 for a card. So to shell out over $20 for a card, a much smaller sized card at that, was a really big deal. I didn’t recognize any of the players, so I narrowed in on one I thought was in decent condition, had good color and an interesting look to it. I thought, if I’m going to pay this much for a card, I might as well get the best looking one I could afford. I bought my first T206 card that summer afternoon – Larry Schafly, Newark, which is a minor league commoner. I went back a few weeks later and bought a Donnie Bush T206 card as well as a thick screw down case that still holds both cards to this day
https://www.t206blog.com/wp-content/...wo-250x300.jpg

These 3...

I THINK that I have told this story here before...

I was 15 years old, but already a 10-Year Hobby Veteran when my Grandpa passed. We were helping Grandma clean out some of his stuff when I found these in Grandpa's "Sock Drawer"!

I knew that my Grandpa smoked Piedmonts in his day, but I never knew he had ANY cards, let alone these...

I learned about T cards from Frank Slocum's book, which my Dad had and we used to look at together. When I was ~9 or so, my Dad got me one for Christmas, this thin Livingston with a Sweet Cap red back. It was probably $8 or so, which at the time we considered a lot for a single baseball card. We had a lot of fun together learning about the players of different periods, picking up new type cards and slowly rebuilding the 60's/70's sets he had built as a child. 1 tobacco card became 2, and 2 became 3, and now I'm at ~25,000 tobacco cards according to my inventory sheets. Decades later, I still show him all my new tobacco cards as we squint at factory numbers.

I own a magnifying glass mainly to read tobacco card factory numbers. I squint less now.

Brian

I bought this T202 at the age of 16 in 1980. Still is my favorite set. Love the pictures and write up.

I put together a 56 and 57 set but other than those sets I pretty much have spent my card money on Pre War cards.

Lee