Going to card shows in the 1970s

[Exhibitman]

My first show:



I recall that the admission tickets were stamped Yankees playoff phantoms. I used that show to finish my Willie Mays Topps run, with a 1952 and 1953 that cost me $45. I had to borrow most of the money from my father because my savings had run out. My mother just about killed him for indulging me.

Once I got to LA in 1977 it was card shows in abundance as the card clubs started up. I was in the West Coast Card Club and set up at the monthly shows for a few bucks. I might make a whole $75 in a night. It was great. I got these cards in a live auction at one of the shows:


I also ended up the winner of a 1952 Bowman Mantle for $3.25.

I remember turning down Cobb signed checks for $50. Passing by tables stacked with Zeenuts and Home Run Kisses, I mean hundreds of them. Most of my time was spent at the $1 or $2 boxes fishing out cards like this:



Had it signed years later.

I was a kid. I got a meager allowance that went mostly for Topps packs and the occasional birthday or Hanukkah money that went to save for cards. I started dealing to make enough to pay for more cards. My costs were nil; those were the days when my parents' friends would hear I was a collector and simply handed me shoeboxes of cards from their adult kids. It was toys, junk.

By the time I was 12 or 13 my parents would take me to the show, drop me off, and come back whenever. There was a big show in Anaheim every year that Mike Berkus ran, usually on Thanksgiving and Memorial Day weekends. My parents would take my sister to Disneyland for the day and drop me at the show.