Dealers (or fellow collectors) who lit the fire

[Fuddjcal]

Originally Posted by Writehooks

For me, it started with mailing $8 (Canadian!) to a guy in Detroit for a four-issue subscription to The Sports Hobbyist, circa 1974. I remember the price, because he sent a note with the first issue, commenting on how "cool" the Canuck $2 bills looked. It was a pretty amateurish publication, but fascinating nonetheless.

As I recall, the only professional-looking ad was for The Card Collectors Company in NYC. When I received their first catalog, I spent the whopping sum of $40 to acquire complete Topps hockey sets from 1962-65. I subsequently acquired a couple of dozen T206s (which I later swapped for more hockey cards) and began corresponding with some of the classified advertisers. Subscriptions to The Trader Speaks and SCD quickly followed, and I've been hooked ever since...

In 1974, I was 13 years old and had been collecting with every penny I could find, including searching for pop bottles. I too saw the Sports Hobbyist and couldn't believe what was available. 1952 Mantle was $75.00. I worked all summer to get the funds and my dad told me I was crazy when I gave him the money for him to write me a check.

Mickey never came. I received a 1955 Sandy Koufax, a 1956 Campanella and 1955 Jackie Robinson. I think they snuck in a few others like Spahn and so forth and.....a friggen $25.00 credit. Memo. Probably didn't order too much through the mail again. Makes for a great Story though. I believe they were selling a Wagner for $1,500 at the time. Glad I didn't end up with a $1000.00 credit memo.