To crack or not to crack...

[ruth_rookie]

Originally Posted by BradH

I agree with this completely -- I don't remove cards that are susceptible to further damage if they're already frail, or if I don't have a proper binder to put them in.

Back in the ‘80s my best friend and I had the largest collections in the neighborhood, something we were very proud of as pre-teens. We both kept them stored in shoeboxes in our bedroom closet. One day he and I were gonna make a few trades after school, so we ventured to his house after getting off the school bus. It had been several months since we’d done this, and I was very excited because I had finally convinced him to trade me his ‘62 Maris for a couple of Pete Rose cards, who was approaching Cobbs all-time hit record. We get to his house, remove his shoe-box collection from the shelf and....

Half of his cards (along with a large portion of his comic book collection) had been shredded, including the ‘62 Maris I wanted so desperately. Termites had all but destroyed the only thing of value he owned. I promptly went home and convinced my mom to buy me a small safe. But i’m pretty certain (safe or no safe) his cards and comics would be around today if they’d been encased in plastic.