Evolution of collecting habits (aka "slow Thursday")

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Posted By: runscott 

I was sitting in a very poorly decorated igloo the other day, talking with a bald-headed friend and sipping a Fresca (or was it polar bear urine?)...

Most of you already know what I collect (old baseball photos), but I thought it would be interesting to hear how various board members' collecting habits have evolved. For instance, getting bored with something and moving on, etc.

I started off collecting '50s Bowman football cards, got hooked on t206s when I picked up a Dan McGann card just to see what a t206 looked like. After that, I just enjoyed holding and looking at as many different types of cards as possible, which is the reason that I have bought (and sold) so many cards over the last few years. I don't feel compelled to "own" any particular cards - instead, I just enjoy learning about them (how they were created, etc.). Pete got me hooked on candy cards for a while, and I still love them but can't afford to collect them with their "new" prices. Also, although prices may continue to climb, most cards will always be available (at some price).

Once I discovered old baseball photos I was hooked completely. Part of my love of old photos is that I am a photographer, so I can appreciate good composition, etc., the other thing that appeals to me about them is the history. Some photos, like the 1890's Boston Beaneaters set that Lew Lipset auctioned recently, bring the players back to life so vividly. Many of the teams of the 1800's had individual albumens made of their players, and as anyone who has ever seen an old albumen knows, they can be incredible.

But my favorites are the old team photos of the amateur teams - gorgeous, inexpensive, and they are great fun to frame and hang on the wall.

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Posted By: Tom Boblitt

evolved......STILL evolving........

Started with current cards around 1982-1983 after buying my first cards around 1975-1976.......

Did a lot of shows from about 1984-1995 and during that time really didn't collect as much as just increased inventory. Really got hot and heavy into autographs (hence the ebay name 'autograf').

Started eBay in 1995 (when it was still free and Pierre Omidyar might email you to tell you that you'd posted an item in the wrong category.....now he's a BILLIONAIRE) and started collecting more vintage pre-WWII stuff then.

The collecting really hit a lot harder in mid to late 90's moving into 19th century stuff, cabinet photos, Louisville Slugger mdse like bats, pens, etc. That's where I'm at now. Also fall prey to a few new issues (BLASPHEMY!!!) like Topps/Bowman Heritage and even......Topps 206........

Okay, I feel like confession is over........

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Posted By: Ben

Learning about new sets and collecting different cards is what keeps the hobby fresh I think. At the risk of sounding like a flake, I think collecting is kind of like a body of water...when flowing, it stays fresh, and perhaps even drinkable, but when stagnant, it gets choked up with weeds and fungi.

I grew up in Edmonton Alberta (city of champions!) in the 80's when the Oilers were rocking the NHL...naturally I collected only hockey cards. But, when Gretzky was traded to the Kings, I slowly began to realize that hockey sucks, and old baseball cards is where its at

SO, I began collecting prewar baseball in my late teenage years, and have been doing so ever since. Started out collecting only hofers, guys I had heard of or read about...But, as my knowledge of baseball history and pre-war sets deepened, my collecting interests followed suit. For now, I've settled on t205, '33 goudey, and '56 topps as far as set building goes, and beyond that, I'll pick up a card here and there that is either pleasing to my eye, or particularily rare/historically important.

Nice thread!

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Posted By: Ben

Fellow collectors are also an enormous influence in the evolution of collecting tastes. When I first began reading this board, one of the running threads about n172's really sparked my interest in that set. And, more recently. Jaime Leiderman peaked my interest in 19th century cabinets and CDV's...little does he know, he just bolstered his ebay competition

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Posted By: Hankron

What I enjoy more than anything, is the handling and learning about new and interesting areas and things. For example, I recently bought a large archives of documents and signatures, ranging from Chilean generals to Dick Van Dyke, orchestra leaders to Nobel Prize winners. When I offer an autograph or document for sale I have to provide, for the potential buyer's benifit, a brief bio of the person (Did you know that Harry James was married to Betty Grable? Did you know that, at age 19, Trudy Ederle broke the men's record for swimming the English Channel by almost 2 hours? Did you know that Adolf Hitler didn't allow Adolf Butendant to accept the Nobel Price in 1939?). If I put up for sale three obscure autographs in a day, when I go to bed that night I have learned about three interesting people or new things abou someone I thought I already knew. I don't know about anyone else, but to me that's great. I actively and purposely expand what I deal with, in part so I can learn about more cool stuff (and make money selling it).

As a kid I collected baseball and football (mostly baseball) cards straight from the pack. Though I don't deal with them much anymore, I appreceate all forms of the cards, from 19th century to 1970s Topps. I recently handled a pair of 2000 Fleer Greats of the Game autographed cards (Gaylord Perry and Rocky Coloavito). I thought they were pretty cool, with a nice design for the signature, a COA printed directly on the back and definitely worth buying for someing looking for a HOFer autograph.

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Posted By: TBob

At the age of 8 I bought my first pack of Topps cards, a 1958 penny pack and was hooked. I was amazed by my friend Tommy Dragonmueller's neatly arraned sets in shoe boxes which included cards I had never seen before, i.e. 1956 and 1957's. I collected the 58 and 59s at Wyberg's drug store on Nicollet in Minneapolis until we moved to White Bear Lake, where I collected the 1960's and 1961's. In 1962 we moved to Hamilton, Ohio and I collected the 1962 set. I never knew there were high number cards in the 61 or 62 sets until years and years later. I dropped baseball card collecting when I turned 13 as Babe Ruth and later high school baseball were all I needed and because as an 8th grader, girls didn't think guys were cool who collected cards.
In 1981 I returned to collecting at the ripe old age of 31 as I chewed the gum to quit smoking (that worked for about 5 years) and in 1983 turned to the T206 set and later went in to the T207s. I collected complete sets of the Topps cards from 1959-1988. After I sold off all my vintage cards in the early 90's, I began anew collecting vintage cards and started collecting and completing the sets from E-90-1 to E-98 and T205, T206, T207, T212 and the majority of T213.
One thing I should mention is that in 1985 I was one of 3 partners who bought the largest "find" of T213s ever. It is still called the "Southern Find." I had a complete set of T213-3s (how many of those exist? One?) and sold it to Bill Mastro for a ridculous price. The cards were all around EXMT. I also sold off the duplicates which included the very rare T213-3 Cobb with overprinted back which was graded SGC 50. I still have one of the overprints, the McGraw with hat and that's never going anywhere. I wish I had kept the Trader Speaks, BHN and SCD issues I purchased along the way, just for nostalgia purposes.

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Posted By: Jimmy Leiderman

Thanks Scott for starting this thread...

Started collecting vintage cards back in 1990 (16 yrs old) just after reading a copy of the "old" SCD.
Almost instantly started buying 19c cards and some 20c rare types.
First 19c cards were a Just So Virtue, N28 Caruthers and N167 Connor.
After a 7 year "hobby break" (Mostly due to grading companies ruining the hobby, SCD periodical leaving vintage material almost out, etc..)found my new hobby on eBay after bidding on a beautiful CdV depicting early star Paul Hines. Which I didn't win
Now I mostly collect 19c baseball photography from the 1860's and 1870's era.
Think I like the history research after buying a piece because it never ends. Almost every 19c image needs to be identified and success is very rewarding from the historical point of view.

Don't think I'll get back to collecting cards, but I do like reading about rare types and finds like the ones Leon L. usually brings to the board.

Ben, you can bid against Scott on those cabinets, but please keep your fingers away from the CdV's...

BTW, some of my images as well as other great stuff from other board members are up for viewing at:

http://www.19cbb.com

jl

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Posted By: Kevin Cummings

My addiction all started because of how we decided to announce my son's birth. At the time, former major league pitcher Jim Bouton had a company which did business cards and such in the appearance of a baseball card.

I thought it would be extra special if we included my son's card in a pack of real 1983 Topps cards. Opening all those wax packs started juices flowing that hadn't for about 20 years.

That progressed into buying a full set for my son for each year since his birth, but that didn't take long. At that point it became less an effort for my son than one for myself and, like many, I embarked on a Hall of Fame trail.

After reading Nemec's books and picking up my first Old Judge (Tim Keefe) from Terry Knouse, the actual photograph on the old card and the stories of the characters just made me want to focus on 19th century items. I've still got a long way to go, but the 19th century items get me more juiced than any 20th century items.

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Posted By: Jeff O

A very interesting topic...

I still have the first card that I can remember ever pulling from a pack - a 1977 Topps Greg Luzinski, which was a really big deal for a 6 year old kid in Philadelphia who loved home runs.

I have collected cards ever since, but didn't enter "The Hobby" until I encountered my first card shop in 1983. I remember buying a 1956 Topps Carl Erskine and taking it home to show my dad, who grew up in Brooklyn in the 50's... he immediately went out and spent $20 for the Campy from the set, and the rest is history.

Within the year we were putting ads in the local papers looking to buy collections and setting up at shows. By 1987 my father had quit his job and opened a baseball card shop, which he owned and operated (along with promoting shows) for about 8-9 years.

My collecting started with building the 1956 Topps sets and collecting cards of specific players. I eventually got into hockey cards in 1991 because it was something new, and tobacco cards about a year later for the same reason. I also got really, really into old hobby periodicals for about 2 years, and I have an extensive collection - complete run of Trader Speaks, run of SCD from the first issue through 1987, Sport Fan, The Old Judge, ACC, the Sports Collectors Bible...

I bought my first Seattle hockey stuff in the early 1990s as well, and that has been my primary collecting interest for about the past 3 years... I've been selling off my other items to get more money for Seattle hockey stuff.

Jeff O
http://www.seattlehockey.net

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Posted By: Jeff Kennedy

Well my story seems to take that same turn that alot of others took. I started out collecting cards in 1988 when I was in fourth grade. That is when my fascination with the game of baseball began as well. Living in the southern Indiana area I had no other choice but to be a Chicago Cubs fan. We had WGN and back then they broadcast damn near every game that the Cubs played. That was also Mark Grace's rookie year and in '89 the Cubs won the pennant and went to the playoffs. The Cubs got spanked by Will Clark and the Giants but Grace was my favorite player and it was easy to be a Cubs fan in '89 because they played so well. It was also great to be able to come home from school and turn on a matinee ballgame at Wrigley. That is around the same time that I began to collect baseball cards. I focused primarily on trying to accumulate every card that Grace appeared on. I was able to accomplish this task but back then, that was'nt too hard as not as many card companies existed. That was also the year that Upper Deck debuted and me and my best friend opened box after box of Upper Deck in hopes of building the entire set. In this effort I was also able to pull a handful of Griffey's rookie cards which would later be worth more then any other card that I had ever owned at the time. After collecting a couple of years, I recieved a box of The Sporting News "Conlon Collection" as a birthday present. These cards which exhibited pictures of the famed baseball photographer Charles Conlon turned me on to an entirely new side of baseball. I had always heard of Babe Ruth and the likes but the pictures of some of the "not so famous" players opened up a whole other side of the game that I wanted to learn more about. So learn I did. I began to read and learn as much as my youthful mind could retain in regards to these players and the history of the game. After reading several books it became clear to me that my main level of interest existed within the "Dead Ball" era and it's players. It was'nt long after this that my interest in the current cards took a dive. I still was a huge Cub fan but my interest in the current cards just was'nt there. I put them up in my closet and kept my Conlons out where I could flip through them on a daily basis as I learned about some of the players depicted in the set. I continued to follow the Cubs on a downward spiral and continued my research of the "Dead Ball" era as the years went by. Then came junior high and high school where alot of my focus on baseball was curbed to girlfriends and dates. When I got my license, I gathered my cards from my closet and took them to a local card shop where I sold them for mere gas money. That ended up being one of the best investments I ever made as a Friday night date with the prom queen Heather Brown, was worth any amount of Griffey Upper Decks that you could throw at me. Although my cards were now being housed under a glass cabinet at the local card shop, I still continued reading and reading. Did an extensive 40 page essay on the "Black Sox Scandal" senior year of high school and continued my courtship with young Heather Brown. Enter 2001, where I discover EBay while at a friends house. Just piddling around I enter T206 into the search field and BAM!!!, you have 221 results. I could'nt believe it. There is was. So many of these cards that I had only seen pictures of in books were now right before my eyes, ready to be purchased. My first purchase, a Ty Cobb (Green Portrait) in VG-EX condition. After recieving it in the mail, I was officially hooked! After learning about the set and the newly established grading companies, I then decided to try and attempt the entire T206 set (minus the Big 4) in a PSA 6 EX-MT. In the beginning, this was'nt too unrealistic, as I could win common PSA 6's on EBay for around $50. This changed shortly thereafter and I began to spend the majority of my funds on PSA graded T206's only. There were some other issues that I also had interest in such as T207's, but the T206 set had me 'bogged' down. After accumulating a very nice collection of some 25 or so HOFers and commons, I then decided that it was more in my budget to go after PSA 4 graded T206's. The market on PSA 6's went crazy and it would have taken me some 40 years and several thousands of dollars to collect the T206 set exclussively. Needless to say, I got burnt out. I would see other items that I wanted but would hold off on purchasing them because that would get into my T206 budget. Therefore a little over a month ago, I decided to sell off the majority of my PSA graded T206 collection to raise the funds for a T207 set. I spoke with other people about what I was doing and I got the same response from all of them. "You are crazy". Now I know that T207's are probably tougher then T206's but I have to admit, 200 cards as opposed to 523 cards sure sounds easier. Alot of people despise the T207 set because of it's gloomy colors and lack of HOF players but you have to go beyond the cards. The majority of this set is made up of obscure players many of which have fascinating stories behind them. In a little over a month, I have accumulated T207's Big 3 (I. Lewis, Lowdermilk, W.Miller)as well as a nice size collection of some of the other rare cards in the set. I figure that this is a good start and that if I start with the hardest ones first, it will only get easier. Right? If you have stuck with the thread this long, Heather Brown is now Heather Kennedy and is also the mother of Ty Kennedy . She is 100% supportive of my love for baseball and these little pieces of cardboard and rarely complains about what I spend on them.

(119) random Mark Grace cards (1988-1992) $42.25

(6) Ken Griffey Jr. 1989 Upper Deck cards $725.00

Marrying the prom queen Heather Brown and having a beautiful baby boy together..........Priceless

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Posted By: ty_cobb

For those of you are wondering who the hell is
'ty_cobb'? I've been a board contributor since
it was formerly hosted on Full Count baseball cards,
and being a bit of a dinosaur have never changed the
name I post under.
My name is Dan Koochin and I grew up in a semi-pro
sports household. First cards I remember having are
1970 O-Pee-Chee hockey, wifey bought me the Bobby
Orr for my birthday a few years back, its one of the
first cards I owned. I was hooked, I had most of the
1970,1971, and 72 baseball sets as a youngster. Dad
had won the hockey Memorial Cup with the Edmonton
Oil Kings in 1963, played exhibition against Toronto's
Johhny Bower that summer, and played in Canada's first
Winter Games in Montreal (I think 67'). Red Wings camp
didn't work out and we moved to Europe, he won the
championship with Italy in '73. We spent several years
travelling through Europe, in 74 we crossed Africa
overland from Cairo to Cape Town. I returned to Vancouver in 1976 and promptly rebuilt my old 70s baseball sets. In 1979 I came across a publication called the Trader Speaks and purchased 3 Ty Cobbs from
an ad in the back. I was hooked on T206 and by 1983 had
acquired about 150+ players. In the 80s I sold my collection. Around 1995 I became interested in home
computers and it made things a heck of a lot easier to acquire cards with the internet. By 1998 I was on Ebay
and decided I wanted to try the T206 set again by rare back variations. Many of the old Full Count baseball
card board members were of tremendous help both in
acquiring cards, and with sharing their knowledge.
I couldn't have done it without you guys. (You know
who you are).
This year has been the most dramatic change for me
in collecting habits, I've started 1900s Military
cards as well. Have N224s, T79s, T80s (including
rare Uzits packaged with the T206s),Breisch Williams,
and Zira.
My card website is at
http://members@shaw.ca/bluemanitou/

and for the hockey fans like Jeff O. I'm
building the Edmonton Oil Kings site at
http://oilkingchampions.tripod.com/cup.htm

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Posted By: ty_cobb

T206 Vintage Rare Backs

http:members.shaw.ca/bluemanitou/

What the hell is 'bluemanitou'?
If you ever get your hands on the
1919 game four World Series Program
with the blue Comiskey cover, good
ol' Cicotte chips in 2 errors to botch
the game . Above the scorecard they urge
you to buy Ute Chief Manitou's mineral
springs water by the case (had to taste
better than the Blatz beer ad which also
adorns the scorecard.)

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Posted By: rob

My interest in 19th century baseball began about a dozen years ago when I picked up about 20 Old Judge cards at a card show in Kansas City. The condition of the cards was about good on average and the guy had them for quite some time and couldn't sell them. I bought them for between $5 and $10 each and didn't even realize myself what I had. Unfortunately, Kansas City doesn't (or at least didn't) have anything in the way of vintage material at card shows. Conversely, when something like this showed up nobody knew what they had. My gain I guess but, anyway, that jump-started my interest. I putted around with it for awhile until my favorite auction of all time came around - The Mark Rucker Collection. Wow! I didn't win anything except the civil war diary that had some baseball content (that actually started me into civil war diary collecting, but that's another story) but the material was out of this world. After a bit I diverged into the civil war material for awhile but just got back into the vintage baseball material in the last year. I buy and sell a few Old Judges (ramram on ebay) but like Jimmy and Scott I am mostly interested in team and multi-player images from the 1800's. More players for your buck I guess. I believe I will try throwing up a new thread and show a few of these images to see if the board members can help identify a few of these guys. Anyway, up to this point I'm still mostly a reader and not a writer to this board but I might start posting a little more.

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Posted By: Nick

Great Thread...

I started collecting in the late seventies. I started out as a set builder. I put together most of a coplete run of Topps cards 1951-87(the 52'topps high numbers were tough). I continue to sell them off on Ebay and in the shop.

After that I bought into the Grading craze for a year or two.

And currently I am collecting Latin player cards(pre- 1971) and T206 Backs.

I have recently bought into a local card store. Probably not a good investment. I hope to introduce more people to vintage(especially pre-war) cards. If anyone from the board is in Las Vegas feel free to stop by. The shop is called "DREAMCARDS".

This is a great hobby!

Nick

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Posted By: jay behrens

Like most people I started as a kid. The first card sI remember buying were 1969 Topps football cards that included Jan Stenerud and Larry Csonka. I continued until about 1977, then I got 'too old' collect cards anymore. In 1980, Lee and I came across the annual Beckett, saw that 1972 Carew was $50, and I got sucked back in. Shortly after that I found the book put out by Kieth Mitchell and Roger Erbe. This book got me hooked on vintage cards. the first card show I went to I bought a stunning 1956 Jackie Robinson and one every Pete Rose card from 1963-69. The one card I wish I ahd bought at the show was a n172 Harry Stovey card that was priced at $15, which I thought was too much and would have cut into my Pete Rose budget. I didn't actually buy my first pre ww2 card until I got in the Navy and stationed in Philly. There I met Ron Oser and Bill Bossert who really showed some incredible stuff in the hobby. The first vintage card I bought was actualyl a complete set of t201s only missing the Speaker card. Going to the Willow Grove show in 1982 introduced me to whole spectrum of cards and memorabilia and got me interested in other things than just cards.

My collecting has never been focused until recently. Almost everything I bought was purely a magpie reflex. If it looked pretty and the price was right, I'd buy it. I got out of the hobby/business in 1991 and only recently returned in the past year and half. This time though my collecting is focused on something I had always dreamed about, obtaining one card of every major leaguer that appeared on a card. For now, I narrowed it to 1908-1944. The Post war players will be easy enough to obtain if I ever decide to go that far.

For now, trying to finish off the pre war players will be hard enough given the very limited budget I ahve to work with.

Jay

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Posted By: Peter Thomas

Again a similar story, although it is obvious that I am older than most of you. I started collecting pop bottles and exchanging them for 48 Leafs. The little bottles were 2 cents and the big ones were 5 cents so my collection and Bob Olshansky's grew rapidly as we could find many bottles along the Boston - Worcester Pike on our way to Cashman's store in Natick. I still have those cards with others, unfortunately many of the Leafs have a scotch tape mark on the front top. No sleves in those days. My step grandad worked in a rexall drugstore and he gave me a group of 200 or so 33 goudies that he had from a promotion that was run at the time. You could bring in 1 or 2 cards and get a prize of some sort and the cards would be cancelled by punching a distintive hole through the trademark. I still have many of these cards and am getting them slabbed - I know they will all be 1's, but they still look great. I continued to collect cards into college. I stopped in 62 because I didn't like the 62 cards. I did go to college in Boston and in my freshman year I would walk from MIT accross the Harvard Bridge to Fenway to see Williams last games. I could get there about 2:15 from a 1:00 class and yes I did get to see his last at bat from the bleachers for free. My son got me reinterested in cards in the mid eighties and I am now focused on 48 Leafs, T204's (have traded with scott - thanks), but upgrades are really hard now. A lot of my remaining T204 dups including a set of square borders will be in Mastro's next auction. I am also working on E92's, E93's and E103's and all Boston players from 19th century thru Williams. As a kid the Braves first baseman Earl Torgeson lived accross the street and would get us tickets to Braves games. My mom was a Braves fan and my dad a Sox fan, who as a kid did get to see Ruth in the right uniform. I'm an Architect living in Florida now but I still hope to see the Sox win one before I'm gone.

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Posted By: Jay Miller

Like Peter I am older than most of the Board's participants and I see, like Peter, I also spent some time in the 60's at the Tute. I started my collecting in the mid-1950s buying packs of baseball cards at Sam Stoller's candy store. Although all of my friends and I worked on completing the sets I don't think any of us ever did. Growing up in the Bronx I was thrilled if I ever got a Mickey Mantle card. I also still remember the smell of that Topps bubble gum when you opened a pack. One time when we were visiting relatives a cousin of mine, who had "outgrown" his cards had a box of cards from 1948 to about 1956 and he said I could take the ones I wanted. That was my first experience with older cards. I collected until I was out of junior high school-about 1964. At that point I pulled out the star cards and saved those in a box and threw the others away. Just so I wouldn't forget I also wrote the year of each card on its front--nice move! I left these cards at home when I went away to college in Boston and later to grad school on the left coast. When I got back the cards were still there. Unfortunately, my collection of comic books, which included Superman comics back to the 40's and all the better comics from the 50's had been given to a long gone next door neighbor's kid. Being a collector at heart I collected hangovers until 1979 when I got married and moved from Connecticut to Houston. I got back into collecting while down there and started collecting shells(Murex shells--an ornate type of carniverous snail), and then football cards. We moved back to Connecticut in 1986 and after taking a few years to get settled I started to get into football cards in a big way. I got to the point in the very early 1990s where I had virtually every football card (with the exception of some regionals)that ever had been issued. I was getting bored with this and a friend suggested that I look at vintage baseball and he further suggested the Old Judge set as something that he thought I would like. The first card show I went to with him was the Greater Boston show and I saw my first Old Judge and was less than impressed. I think I bought one or two just to get him to shut up and didn't think much about them for a while but then I started looking in catalogs and looking at the cards some more and they just started to grow on me. What probably really got me going was the people who I met and talked to about these cards. People like Keith Mitchell, Barry Sloate, Bob Richardson, Lew Lipset, Rob Lifson and many others. I think what appealed and still appeals most to me about the set is that you cannot complete it. Why, because "it" is a moving target. Can you get one card of each player other than California League cards--not impossible. Can you get one card of each player in the set--virtually impossible. Can you get one card of each player by team--virtually more impossible. Can you get one card of every pose--NO. Can you keep trying, no matter what you set to be your goal--absolutely. My reason for collecting is not completeness. In a way for me that is the enemy. When you complete something there is nothing left to do with it and, for me anyway, it looses interest. The joy is approaching completeness without ever getting there. Such is the lot of the Old Judge collector.
BTW I have been a Yankee fan most of my life(I did root for the Red Sox in 1967 while at school) but I would love to see the Red Sox finally break through and win the series. It would just be good for baseball.

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Posted By: Julie

Of course I think it's the most fascinating story in the world, but it seems to me that from time to time, I've managed to tell most of it already, so I'll just hit the highlights:

1) In 1983, when my son, who got me hooked, lost interest in baseball cards, he was so afraid to tell me that he asked his father to. "I'm afraid she might--DIE, or something," he said. "Can I have your cards?" I asked "Hmm...all but the autograohs," he answered.

2) a family catastrophe forced me to sell 1)all my jewelry and 2) most of my cards between 1988-1991. Fortunately, because of Beckett's sneaky way of either not listing 19th century cards at all, or listing them in such a twisty fashion it was almost impossible to find them--I hadn't gotten into the 19th century yet.

3) finding myself financially on my feet again,. in 1993, I started collecting 19th century stuff, with the vague idea of eventually getting one of each 19th century HOFer. I wasn't rich, so it was one-card-at- a-time. I found that certain dealers were particularly helpful: Lew Lipset, Terry Knouse. Barry Sloate, and of course always Mastro auctions, Jay Miller, and the Nameless One. I was still collecting early 20th century cards and photos--in fact there are "pockets" of intererst in my collecting: The Jackie Robinson Brooklyn Dodgers, the Blacksox, the dead bvall era, great pitchers from all timess, the 19th century. deaf players (only 3 have cards)--and special players i just liked. These "pockets" interfered with my getting one of each 19th century HOFer--I have 6 Ewings, 2 Dummy Hoys, 5 Hoss Radbournes, 5 King Kellys--and so on.

4) My stepmom died a year ago October, and left her real and adopted children a very good chunk on change. After giving a whole bunch to my children (against everyone's better advice--except the children!), and buying a few necessities, I proceeded to squander a good half of it on baseball cards and photos--which was more fun than anything I ever did (with 2 exceptions..). It's also been a joy giving cards away--alomost as much fun as getting them!

5) Ben Fisher has gotten me interested in the real old hockey players--I have a rookie Vezina, and C57 Vezina, an Art Ross, Lester Patrick and great photos of Vezina, Plante and Roy--a small but potent collection.

The day my C57 Vezina came--his first photographic card--I was reading a short story by Alice Munro, in which an old but interesting woman is singing a hymn:
He's the Lilly of the Valley
The Bright and Morning Star
He's the fairest of 10,000 to my Soul..."

It made me think of Veaina, so i asked "Google Answers" what the rest of the words were, and who wrote the hymn. Of course the hymn was about jesus Christ, not Vezina. "You won't mind," I asked my researcher, "if those lines keep reminding me of Vezina?" "Of course not," he said, "since the hymn is about the ultimate goalkeeper."

Humph! Enough to make a Christian out of you!

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Posted By: W.M.

I started collecting cards in 1974 at the age of 12 the same time I became interested in baseball. The 1974 set is still my favorite set and my favorite baseball card is still the 1974 Hank Aarron home run king card. I bought my cards at the Virginia Beach Virginia Little league field and Woolworths at Pembroke Mall in V.A. Beach. In 1975 we moved to San Diego California and somehow I got a hold of a collectors publication that came out in news print I think it was the Trader Speaks, from that publication I ordered some 1951 and 1955 Bowman baseball cards and from then on I was hooked on old cards. In the summer of 1975 I went to a baseball card show at the Holiday Inn in Mission Valley (San Diego) and I saw the most beautiful and oldest cards I had ever seen t206's, I bought ten for a dollar a piece and since then I have never stopped buying them. My collection now consists of complete sets from the sevinties and many vintage cards from the late 19th century and from the early 20th century. I read many hobby publications in the 1980's and 1990's ,( what ever happened to Renatta Gallasso?) In 1999 I discovered the Full Count web site and then this one I read this one always and sometimes post and I am always impressed by the knowledge of those that post on this board. And for Dan Koochin aka Ty Cobb I often drink coffee with Willie O' Ree what a great human being he is.

[Archive]

Posted By: ty_cobb

I didn't know much about Willie O'Ree until
about 1996. As his media story spread, their
have been several good TV documentaries made,
in particular about Herb Carnegie, Ossie Carnegie
and Manny McIntyre (from Willie's home town).

[Archive]

Posted By: Rocky Lockwood

I have been watching this discussion and decided to join in. I, like many was caught up in the early 90s boom. I went to shows in Irvine, Vegas, Anaheim, Santa Monica etc. looking for great stuff from the 70s-80s and 90s. I had just finished attending a show in the LA Convention Center, and was feeling pretty disgusted with the onslaught of material that was hitting the market. I asked a vendor about where to find game used bats and he pointed me to Kendrich and Company (now gone) as a good source. I wandered down and on the way stumbled acrossed a little shop and decided to check it out. After seeing all of their new stuff I was stopped dead in my tracks by two cards. A T206 Boss Schmidt and a 35 Goudey with Greenberg, Fox, Walker, and Rowe. I walked out of there, less $25, and an obsession began. I have since built an entire set of T206 Tigers cards. Added a couple of T202s, a couple of T3s, some T205s. I haven't bought a card newer than 1935 since.

As a side note. The real turning point came in 95 when a burgler broke in and stole my collection. I was devasted. I called all of the local card shops and asked them to keep a lookout. Within hours calls started to roll in. One dealer followed the guy to his apartment and got the license plate number, another simply told the guy that the cards had been reported stolen, pulled them off the counter and called the cops. I got more than half of them back. The fact that the cards were so distinctive made the difference. Imagine calling someone and asking them the be on the lookout for a 1992 set of Topps. When I got the cards back I spent hours recleaning the cases (getting the fingerprinting dust off of them) and dedicated myself to making the T206 set.