Hobby history: Bray-Wagner letters, 1939-1948

[trdcrdkid]

Over the past couple of years, Leon has posted a bunch of letters written to hobby pioneer John D. Wagner from the 1930s to the 1950s, and he tells me he has a bunch more stuff that he hasn't yet posted. They've been a fantastic window into the early days of the organized hobby. For reference, here are those threads:

Jefferson Burdick letters, 1936 on:
http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=207878

Charles Bray hobby letters to John Wagner, 1930s on:
http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=219248

The John D. Wagner hobby letters, 1930s on:
http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=207944

I've also posted a lot about hobby history over the past couple of years, but those posts have pretty much all been based on hobby publications (many of which are pretty scarce, admittedly). However, I just got four letters written by Charles Bray (hobby pioneer and longtime editor of Card Collector's Bulletin) to John D. Wagner between 1939 and 1948, and I thought I would share them with the board.

The first letter is from February 20, 1939, right before the publication of Burdick's United States Card Collectors Catalog, and has some interesting nuggets. Bray was sending Wagner 179 cards on approval, including 24 Old Judges, and was asking 5 cents each for them. He tells how he has mounted some of his tobacco card sets on cardboard using cellophane and stamp hinges, and is going to enter them in an American Legion hobby show. He also tells how he was in "a card collector's paradise" recently and bought 400 cards, but was disappointed that the guy wouldn't sell his Old Judges, because he had known some of the players and pasted their death notices on the backs of the cards.






Next is a short letter from April 21, 1940, in which Bray tells Wagner about missing out on another lot of Old Judges because they had too much sentimental value to the seller. It must have been cool to be buying (or trying to buy) collections of Old Judges from the people who had originally collected them as kids. Bray also mentions that he had enclosed two "team pictures" (T200s?) on approval and had thrown in a couple of Old Judges for free.





The third letter is from August 31, 1944. Bray had started running the bimonthly auctions in Card Collector's Bulletin; the third auction had just ended on August 12, and he was busy preparing for the fourth auction, which would appear in the October 1 CCB. (I posted that auction in this thread: http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=240726.) He tells Wagner how he had just missed out on getting a big lot of tobacco cards because the guy had donated them to a waste paper drive, of the type that must have claimed a lot of card collections during World War II.






The last letter is dated August 16, 1948, when Wagner was in the process of selling all his non-sport cards to Bray (as described in his bio in the Card Collecting Hall of Fame, which I posted here: http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=240459). Bray discusses the prices he could pay for Wagner's cards, and mentions that "Jeff" (Burdick) had recently gotten into Detroit Publishing postcards, which Burdick would write a book on in 1954. The most interesting part to me is Bray's description of Burdick's house, where the attic was stuffed with buttons, banners, and flannels.