[Exhibitman]

Oh, I agree, stuff is out there. To us it is the world; to 99.99999% of the world, it is dusty crap in an attic, basement or garage. I go to a lot of flea markets and paper shows and estate sales, and sometimes I see what is clearly the remnants of someone's estate: photos, papers, cards, etc. Gives me pause to think that this hoard of material represents an accumulation of a life, or maybe more than one life, consigned to a dusty bin in a parking lot. Then again, I also think sometimes that this item sat around for 50-75-100+ years waiting for me to find it and preserve it and appreciate it. The Greatest Generation and Silent Generation are in their dying years now and their stuff is starting to emerge. I am not at all surprised that childhood collections accumulated in the prewar era are still emerging and yielding 'new' T cards, probably courtesy of children or grandkids of those generations. Or maybe I am just contemplating this stuff because my parents died last summer and my daughter and I are still in the process of liquidating their stuff. Alas, no T cards, but lots of toilet paper (my father hoarded batteries, TP and tissues; I found hundreds of batteries, 100+ rolls of TP, and thousands of tissues and baby wipes when clearing out their stuff).

But I digress...

One of the humbling (and fun) things about collecting cards, especially those with an international base like boxing or soccer, is that there is always more out there to be discovered, so you are never complete and you never know it all about those issues. You also cannot assume that the 1 of 1 remains so.