1961 Post Cereal Cards With Box
 

Several months ago, I posted on the memorabilia side a picture of my c.1950 Kellogg's Corn Flakes back panel with the uncut Washington Nationals sun visor. That post elicited some wonderful similar cereal issues with the box intact, including an incredible 1940s Kellogg's Pep complete box with the celebrity rings offer containing an image of the Babe Ruth ring. Thanks to a Net54 member, I just got this 95% complete 1961 Post Toasties box including the panel of seven cards. In doing some research on this card set of 200 players from the 1960 season, I was surprised to come across just one other of these boxes, a mint condition flattened full box pictured in an article about the Post Cereal series. I found a few uncut panels, but no unopened boxes or even opened ones. I was interested to learn that my box was the very first of that generation of 1960s through 1980s cards on boxes of cereal and other products, and that there was an interesting twist to one of the cards on this box. Because the offer was issued in early 1961, they of course used players from the 1960 season, but in the meantime, the Washington team had moved to Minneapolis-St. Paul (the most devastating event of my childhood, by the way!) As explained in an ad taken out in Minnesota newspapers containing an abject apology, somebody at the company assumed that they would be called the "Minneapolis Senators," and used the city's name instead of the correct "Minnesota Twins" on the cards of former Washington players. Seems like small potatoes today, but it must have caused some kind of stink when the first printing came out on millions of boxes of Post cereals, because they actually went to the trouble of redoing the boxes for later printings to correct the "error." I love that the Bob Allison (a big hero of this D.C. kid, rookie of the year!) card pictured in the article is actually on my box. Anyway, I'm hoping this post will elicit other boxes or at least comments from collectors of the cards they were cut out of. I'm thinking this one will make a wonderful framed display as a companion to my Kellogg's panel.
https://www.sportscollectorsdaily.co...s-minneapolis/

Neat box! Always loved those panels and boxes. The Post Cereal backstory probably warrants further investigation though. The team name was announced in November 1960, and Post Cereal had enough of a presence in Minnesota to know the name-selection rumors beforehand rather than relying on some guy. Also, if they thought they were going to be called the Minneapolis Senators, why not print that on the cards, rather than just Minneapolis?

Seems more likely the cards were printed before late November--several players had changes made to show a new team on the updated, perforated versions, and those trades seemed to occur in December, 1960. Finally, I do not believe they ever corrected the boxes, instead they allowed orders of complete team sheets that showed the updates.

And yes, Bob Allison was a real favorite in Minnesota too! He wore no. 4, and my aunt thought he was the most handsome player to ever don a Twins uniform. The rest of us were just glad he could hit. Flashed some real leather in the '65 series too, as noted by Vin Scully:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eUQCLfttnxE

And Joe Garagiola's call
 

Here's Garagiola's NBC radio call of that play that I combined with the color film version:

http://vendiamo.com/X/s/Allison.wmv

I took my information from Mueller's article, which he presumably took from the credited Dan Mabey book on the '61 Post set. He says, "the errors were corrected in a second printing that allowed collectors to send in for 10-card team sheets that were separated by perforations." I assume they didn't have the official team nickname yet, or, as you say, why wouldn't they have printed that, instead of the * and the note of "former Washington Senators." And perhaps the "Minnesota" variation came only on the send-away team sets, which from my box Mabey seems to be in error about those only being available from the second printing of the cereal boxes. That offer is available on mine, which is supposed to be a first printing with "Minneapolis," so maybe there was only one printing of the boxes, and the "Minnesota" correction was made in time to send out with the the perforated team sets. I guess the test would be whether there are any non-perforated Twins cards with "Minnesota" instead of "Minneapolis." I love this geeky stuff. And yes, Allison should have been pictured in the dictionary to illustrate the word "hunk." For D.C. fans, he was Frank Howard before Frank Howard!

Nobody else has a 1961 Post Cereal Box with Cards?
 

Anyone? Bueller?

Had a nice '62 & '63 box, always wanted a '61
Here's the '63 to help put this thread to the top of the page

https://www.qualitycards.com/picture...sugarcrisp.jpg

https://www.qualitycards.com/picture...ugarcrispb.jpg

https://www.qualitycards.com/picture...ugarcrispc.jpg

Wow, that's a beauty! Thanks, Jay.

Minneapolis/Minnesota
 

It is my understanding that every Twins card printed on a box said "Minneapolis" and every Twins card printed on the company sheet said "Minnesota". I don't believe there are any exceptions to that.
As for complete boxes, there are many collectors on this website who specialize in Post Cereal and Jell-o cards, and they have extensive collections of boxes and panels. Unfortunately for me, my collection is pretty weak in that stuff.
I expect that many of those advanced collectors will chime in, and show some of the amazing stuff that they have.

Not mine, but -
 

Here is one of the rarest Post Cereal boxes from the 1962 set. That is probably of more interest to Post Cereal Master set collectors than the regular Post Cereal collector.

Also not mine, but -
 

This is probably the rarest box from the 1962 Post Cereal Football set. I don't own it, but I'm happy to say the owner is a friend of mine. This is thought to be a one of one, the only one in existence.

A couple of plugs
 

One of the leading collectors of Post Cereal cards is net 54 baseball member Ken Marks. In collaboration with Dan Mabey, he wrote a book on 1962 Post Cereal Football cards. It features numerous pictures of complete boxes and uncut panels from that set. It is some amazing stuff. The name of the book is "Goalposts". I believe it is available on Amazon.
Also, there is a free website that features anything you might have wanted to know about 1962 Post Cereal Football, complete with s lot of great pictures. The website is postcerealfootball.com.

I hope so! I'd like to see if anybody has another '61 box to get a fix on just how rare it might be. And thanks for the info.

Mabey also did a book on the 1961 baseball set.

Why do you say that? Apparently, the relative rarity of the grape-nuts boxes is due to that cereal's unpopularity among kids at the time. I actually liked it, but they were hard to eat, you really had to let them soak in the milk for a while.

Those cards were printed on several different boxes. Therefore, the cards are not rare and very easy to find. However, the actual cards that were printed on the 10 ounce Grape Nuts box are very rare and very hard to find. Master set collectors, with the help of Dan Mabey's book on the 1962 Post Cereal set, can tell which box a card actually came from.

Dan Mabey wrote books on the 1961, 1962, and 1963 Post Cereal sets. He also wrote a book on the 1962 Post Cereal Post Canadian Baseball set. He's like the Godfather of Post Cereal collecting.
( I say "Godfather" not in any Mafia sense, LOL, just like a regular Godfather)

So the cards on the grape-nut boxes could only be found on those? Do you know if that was true of other cereals, also, did they have cards unique to their boxes only? Do collectors of these cards distinguish between those cut out of boxes and the perforated examples you sent away for? Any idea what a complete 1961 set would go for? Thanks for you help.

That is a gorgeous box. Congrats.

Post cereal
 

Cards that were only on one box are called single prints. The 1962 Post Cereal set was produced in very great numbers. I don't think there are any single prints in that set.
As I said before, the cards on the back of the grape nuts box are rare. But those players card were also printed on several other boxes. Master set collectors need to know all the variations in printing, and they can tell which box a card was printed on. I think there are 546 variations in that set, or something like that. That is why so few people try to put master sets together. I haven't done one myself.
In the 1961 set, many people collect both the company perforated cards and the box cards. There are 40 cards, I believe, that were only on boxes. There were 160 different perforated cards. I can think of 3 cards that were only on the perforated sheets. There may be more. Generally, the most expensive cards in the set are 2 of these, #93 Chuck Stobbs and #73 Chuck Estrada. The other card that I can think of is #106 Ed Matthews.
You do see complete Post Cereal boxes on eBay from time to time, I guess they average going for around $1000 from time to time. Of course, it will depend on condition and who is on the box.

"That is a gorgeous box. Congrats."

Wayne that's a box I had.
Sold it awhile ago to a friend....at least he still has it! :(

Thanks for the great information!

1961 Post Cereal complete set.
 

Right now there is a 1961 Post Cereal set for sale on net 54 B/S/T. It is for $1100, or best offer, or trade. That seems pretty much in line with what those sets go for.
The seller is net 54 member Trat. I sold him the set that he originally had, and he upgraded it. It looks pretty nice.
Check it out.

Thanks, Wayne, I'm looking at it seriously. I'm not a card guy, but I love the set and the fact I have the box to go with it. Incidentally, the article I linked in my original post seems to show both Allisons in unperforated form, which if true would bolster the contention that there was indeed a second printing with the "Minnesota Twins" correction. It should be easy enough to prove one way or the other by finding one or more confirmed hand-cut Twins cards with the updated team name.

2nd card
 

I'm pretty sure the 2nd picture in the article is a company perforated version which has been trimmed, so you can no longer see the perforations. That happened a lot back in the old days.
Now a 1961 Post company card is expected to still show the perforations.

I guess the only way to tell then is the weight of the cardboard, the cereal box variety being heavier than the company cards. So if someone came up with a cereal box "Minnesota Twins," we would know for certain there was a second printing of cereal boxes with "corrections." If nobody can find one, we would know there was only one printing of those.

Exactly

Hank, I don't believe you will find boxes with the corrections, but I wish you luck. In addition to the Twins, there were a handful of players with team changes found only as perforated cards, and some bio info was changed on a few cards in perforated only form. Also, both Estrada and Stobbs were issued on the team sheets only--Stobbs as a Minnesota Twin. So you if you find any of these other changes on boxes or panels, please let us know, as that would be evidence that maybe all changes eventually made it to the grocery stores.

If you've already checked enough to satisfy yourself there was only one printing of the cereal boxes, that's good enough for me. That would leave all the variations (something like 357 in a set with all those, right?) coming in the team sheets, which would have been much easier to change almost real time as they were being printed according to the orders coming in. So there were 160 cereal box cards, 40 that were only available in company cards, and 157 variations in the company cards. What an interesting set!

4th card perforated only
 

The 4th card that only came from a perforated sheet was #5, Bob Turley.
Also, I have the wrong number for Chuck Stobbs. He is #94, not #93. Sorry, my bad.

I have 3 boxes from the 1962 Post issue.

The first picture is an unassembled corn flakes box.

The next 2 are Grape Nuts and the last 2 are Rice Krinkles.

Love all the boxes posted thus far.

Maybe when folks get back from the National, more will be posted.

Mike love the card boxes especially the Grape Nuts, 3 cards on the back Maris, Mays & Killebrew, quite the trio!

Wow!
 

Absolutely great boxes

Fantastic!

Send-aways for '62 & '63?
 

I don't see the send-away offer on my '61 box on the others, did they not continue that in the following years?

Send away perforated team sheets
 

They only did it in 1961. I don't know the reason why they stopped.

Not mine
 

From the archives of Huggins and Scott Auctions, a nice assortment of boxes.

More from Huggins and Scott's archives
 

Also not mine

More from Huggins and Scott's archives #2
 

Also not mine #2
One pic added.

More from Huggins and Scott's archives #3
 

Also not mine #3

Post
 

sounds like an awful tasting cereal - Grape Nut Flakes !!

From Huggins and Scott's archives again
 

Not mine again

Better than original Grape Nuts, look like rabbit excrement. Lol

These are great! Thanks for posting.

1962 Post Canadian boxes
 

From an H&S auctions in 2013

http://feb13.hugginsandscott.com/cgi...l?itemid=53722

http://feb13.hugginsandscott.com/cgi...l?itemid=53721

Hi Peter.
Boxes like that are almost impossible to find, whole Canadian boxes and Short Prints to boot.

Another box
 

Also from the Huggins and Scott archives, also not mine.