Al Rosen - Mr Mint - Passes

[brian1961]

Rest in peace, Mr. Rosen. My sincerest, deepest condolences to his wife and family. I'm so sorry for your devastating loss.

I did not have many dealings with Mr. Rosen. Some downers, and as I wrote, you really needed to approach him with a certain humility to get anywhere. Be that as it may, when I reflect on my collection, the majority of the finest, most cherished baseball cards in my collection have a provenance that may be traced directly, or indirectly, to Alan Rosen.

He was a true giant to the hobby from the early 80s on, and for a long, long time. Yes, he was a character. A self-promoter, par excellence.

So? He did it right. Some of you guys speak of self-promotion as if it was a sin.

He spent an absolute fortune on all those weekly full-page ads in the pages of SPORTS COLLECTORS DIGEST. Those ads were innovating, outlandish, and flat-out unforgettable. They got into the minds of almost everybody in the hobby when the thought of, "who could I sell my cards to?", or "I found these old boxes of unsold baseball cards. You think they're worth anything? You're telling me to call Mr. Mint? What kind of a name is that? Oh, that's his moniker, and his real name is Alan Rosen. What's his number?"

He sold collectors all kinds of great cards, and when the time came to sell, they would often turn back to Mr. Mint to do the work of re-selling them.

Yeah, I had a few bad experiences with Mr. Rosen. He was churlish, but the good far outweighed the bad and ugly.

When researching my book, NEVER CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN, Mr. Rosen was one of the men I sought out to interview. Alan very willingly gave of his time and knowledge in a lengthy phone conversation, at his convenience of course, which is only right. He unloaded to me all he knew about the scarce and beautiful 1953-55 Stahl-Meyer Franks gems. He gave me some extremely good insights on these cards, and some valuable anecdotes. I got the conversation on tape so I would quote him precisely. Very gracious and very helpful. I salute him.

Both his books are well worth reading, full of interesting, excellent insights, and the stories of his finds---priceless!

Mr. Mint will never be forgotten; that's for sure.

---Brian Powell