Personal Collecting History

[todeen]

Originally Posted by Exhibitman

I have never been a ‘own ten top flight cards and nothing else’ kind of collector, yet I’ve also never fallen into the completist category. In other words, I have a big-ass pile of stuff: i call it "The Festival of Bric-a-Brac." I like such a wide variety of cards and memorabilia from many eras, sports, cultural segments, etc. My collection was is a rambling, varied thing with tons of backwaters and tidal pools of micro-collections.

I liked this very much. I told my wife that I want my collection to be like a museum with rotating exhibits. Right now my allowed display space has my Tris Speaker stuff in it, but it once had Reds memorabilia and autos. I'm thinking of doing a modern-vintage (1989 - 1995) exhibit next.

Last summer I told my wife I would support her in paying off debt and reduce my monthly card money. So I picked up some of the modern cards I'd always been wanting, were widely available, but I'd never gotten around to purchasing. The 89 UD Griffey, 93 Topps Gold Jeter, and 93 SP Jeter were all at my LCS. I'm glad I bought them in June last year, because I got them just before they went crazy in price. The Griffey Tiffany I bought at the beginning of its climb on ebay, and I thought I got a nice example for a 7. Then, the more I've been on this site, the more I've learned about regional and SGA cards. I've explored that, and I learned about the Kahn's sets that have many a Reds star. So I picked up the Kahn's Larkin RC to add to my collection.

All of these cards came out in the hey-day of my youth. I wanted to pull a Griffey out of a pack, so I purchased lots of 89 UD and never got one! That's when I decided buying packs was foolish and I hated the chase. I'd rather just pay the inflated price for a single card, or the complete set.

[Exhibitman]

That's funny, Tim, how similar our pack-busting experience has been. I have busted dozens of boxes of cards since 1990, and the only good card I ever pulled was this one:



To compound the injury, when Jeter got popular in the Yankees' run of the late 1990s I thought about getting a RC but figured why bother since I already had the coolest Jeter ever. D'oh!

[cornhusker]

Chris, they are still selling plenty of cards through the bid board auctions up there in the Schuylk. Mid level vintage weekly it seems. Interesting place.