[jchcollins]

Similar, but I came a bit later and never got rid of the cards I collected as a kid. Unfortunately that was during the height of the junk era; my prime collecting years growing up were from 1986 to about 1994. Not that the cards then were horrible, and I do have some fond memories of them even if most today are not particularly rare or expensive. In the late 80's and early 90's however, I really got into vintage (then just called "old") cards - mainly from the 50's and 60's before I was born. So to me, cards from that era have always been a more expensive proposition, because they were worth something when I found them. I never had the opportunity to collect "cheap" cards of HOF'ers. I was never much of a set collector of older cards mainly due to the expense and difficulty then of finding and acquiring them at all, and that has carried over into my adult collecting. I tend to go for singles of HOF'er and stars rather than complete sets - the idea being I think that if I can't have all the cards, I can at least focus on getting my favorite players that I have read and learned about. I used to think this was somehow sad and/or incomplete, but really upon more recent reflection - it's freeing. I buy only the cards I want - and don't find myself buying random commons I'm not really interested in just in the name of filling out a set.