Toughest "regular" issued set from the 1970s??

[toppcat]

Originally Posted by Harliduck

It's funny...OPC must be a regional thing when it comes to popularity. Growing up 45 minutes south of the Canada border here north of Seattle, OPC cards in the 70's were fairly common with my school buddies. The difference? We HATED OPC cards. I can't really say why, there wasn't any dislike for anything Canadian, but we routinely threw them away or tried in vain to trade for something else. I remember having a 71 OPC Hank Aaron card when I was around 9 or 10, so 1979 or 80ish, back when owning an Aaron was a BIG deal...and my buddies wouldn't let me count it as actually having an Aaron card because it was OPC.

I still have a little of that in me. When I put together my 68 Topps set a couple years ago, my first lot came with a dozen or so OPCs. I immediately replaced them...the kid inside me said they didn't count...haha...

There was always a little bleed through along the Northern border with Topps cards but I never realized it also went the other way. On Long Island, no OPC back then, that's for sure.

[MattyC]

It was the same growing up in NYC. We rarely saw an OPC card and when they did surface, they were discarded. We wanted Topps. That said, I can totally appreciate how tough they must be to find for those who love them.

In terms of toughest overall set in the 70's, my votes would be 71 and 75 minis. The centering and tilts on the minis are just brutal, not to mention full color corners.

[steve B]

OPCs were always interesting to me.

My parents took a trip to Nova Scotia in 78 and brought back a pack or two. Then we took a mostly camping trip across the country with a couple diversions into Canada in 79.

I bought a whole box early in the trip, and managed to not wreck them on the way.

But in the Canadian part of Glacier national park the gift shop had cards! But......they were 78's. When I asked if they had the new ones they pointed at the box of 78's. When I told them those were from last year they got a confused look and said they had only gotten them the week before.

So distribution might have been a bit "unusual" for OPC.

Steve B

[Harliduck]

Originally Posted by toppcat

There was always a little bleed through along the Northern border with Topps cards but I never realized it also went the other way. On Long Island, no OPC back then, that's for sure.

Yes...we bought OPC cards in packs in the 70's in Arlington, WA...that is about 40 miles south of the border. We used to yell at our mom when she brought packs home from that convenience store and not from the "big" supermarket that carried Topps. As you went north it was more OPC than Topps, especially near Bellingham.

Steve B...that is super weird, as we had the SAME experience. That same mom and pop in Arlington store late in 1979 got a shipment of 1978 OPC cards. Mom came home with a pack, we were shocked. We did send her back to the store and she brought home two boxes, she said it was all they had. Getting 78's in 79 to us was cool, even if they were OPC. My childhood 78 set is still littered with OPC with the cards I couldn't trade out, haha. With two stories like this I bet they had a surplus on 78s and forced them out to retailers.


With all that said, I am with Matty...seeing some of the OPC cards are now pretty cool and the fact others are passionate about them is neat...especially considering they are more rare. Those 71's actually do POP with that yellow.

[Orioles1954]

1970s Topps Baseball cards are about as exciting to me as a pair of wet socks. I really, really like OPC for many reasons.

1.) The bright card stock is superior and the rough cut has that certain charm.
2.) Has interesting "traded" lines with different team/color designs.
3.) Printed at most at 10% of the mainstream Topps issue and priced comparably.....very undervalued.

The "sunburst" action/photo reverses of the 1971 OPC set absolutely blow away the American issue.

[Jim65]

Perhaps the most famous OPC card