The first-ever sports collectors' convention -- August 23, 1969

[trdcrdkid]

The first successful convention of sports collectors was the West Coast Sports Collectors' Convention, held in Brea, California at the home of collector Jim Nowell on August 23, 1969. I wrote about the background and aftermath of that first show back in early March in a post called "1969: The dawn of card conventions" (here: http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=218969), which included a press release in the July 1969 Sports Collectors News that optimistically dubbed it the "first annual" West Coast convention. That optimism was justified, of course, as such conventions exploded in popularity over the next few years. Last night I posted Lionel Carter's detailed description of the 1970 second annual West Coast convention in the Sports Advertiser's Journal (here: http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=221637), and earlier I posted Nowell's description of the 1971 third annual convention in The Ballcard Collector (here: http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=218371).

Following that first convention in 1969, Nowell wrote up a very detailed account of it for the November 1969 Ballcard Collector, including a description of the planning process and lots about the convention itself, including an auction that netted $111.35. There were 13 collectors there plus "four beautiful gals (non collectors)", as Nowell put it. From what Nowell wrote, it sounds like he actually remodeled his home in anticipation of this get-together, and that he and Ed Broder selected the date because that's when Dennis Graye was going to be visiting California from Detroit. Graye was so enthusiastic about his experience at Nowell and Broder's convention that when he got back to Detroit, a similar get-together was organized in October at Lloyd Toerpe's house, and Toerpe, Graye, and several others began planning a more ambitious convention for 1970, one that would be open to the public, and which would grow into the annual Detroit show.

Anyway, here is Nowell's description of the very first sports collectors' convention on August 23, 1969. Since the pages of The Ballcard Collector from that time are legal size (8.5" x 14"), too big for my scanner, I've divided each page into two scans and put them together. Enjoy!