It's 1955 and you have a nickel

[Hxcmilkshake]

Originally Posted by profholt82

1955? I'd have been careful to not prevent my parents from gettting together at the "Enchantment Under the Sea" dance.

Calvin?

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[baseballfan]

I think I would have gone with Bowman, especially if I knw the design looked like that new Television thing

[brob28]

Pretty sure I would have chosen Bowman simply due to there being more cards per pack. However, it would have ended as soon as I started getting cards of umpires, to my 5 year old mind this would have been an indignation I could not have stood for.

[ALR-bishop]

By the way, a big thanks to David for posting the 55 packs.

[Paul S]

My Wayback Machine only goes back as far as 1966, when I was 13, and still remember where I snagged my '55 Bowman Mantle - unfettered by wax - for a quarter (BTW, the Mays was a dime).

[Chuck9788]

I recently showed my father (born 1947) my HOF card collection for the first time. He really enjoyed my cards, but when I showed him my 1955 Bowman cards his eyes lit up like fireworks! He was giggling like a kid when he saw the umpire cards like Nestor Chylak and Jocko Conlan. Haha, it was like as if he just took a time warp trip.

[bobsbbcards]

I would have left the 5 & Dime store and scored me some crack on the street. Crack cost less back in the day...

[ALR-bishop]

Crack still might be cheaper than some packs today.

[62corvette]

I lived this choice. The corner grocery store was a block away in Scottsbluff, NB. by the time I got there with my nickel, Bobby Forrest (whose dad was the Cadillac dealer) usually had bought the boxes of Topps. I did buy a Topps pack (1955) that I remember well, because in it was a green 1954 Topps #50 Yogi Berra. I still haven’t figured that out. This particular store never stocked Bowman. If they had, I would have bought those.

[Volod]

It seems that geographic distribution quirks may play a considerable role in this contest. On the other hand, I wonder if the "poll" might be tainted by more recent bias in the hobby toward Topps and against Bowman. In July of 1955, however, I don't think most kids were even paying much attention to cards, as summertime diversions of other sorts were more attractive. Like most kinder of that time period, I had collected cards as a seven to ten-year-old, and my fondest recollection is of the 1953 sets from both companies. But, by the spring of '55, my interests had turned to eleven-year-old girls and sports generally, so that the only card set I actually could later recall from that year is the Bowman, probably because of its unusual design, plus the fact that Bowman had to some extent cornered the card market in my small hometown.

[CobbSpikedMe]

I'm happy to see some more votes for Topps in this scenario. Like I said in my initial post, when I was 8 in real life I didn't like the Bowman cards. That wasn't in the actual 50's of course, but still. As a kid, it was all Topps for me. Now I actually love the old Bowman sets and really like the 55's, but not then.

[Lueth2048]

At the beginning of the year it would have been Topps. After seeing Bowman's improvement over 1954 it would have depended on my mood.

[drmondobueno]

So this thread would be lost on the lad I was, with my hobby horse and Daniel Boone hat. And a fistful of melting ice cream cone. Now, If I woulda been 8, the Bowman TV cards hands down.

[jchcollins]

The Bowmans, hands down. One of the cleverest set designs of all time. Unfortunately I wasn't born until 1977...:-(

[Frank A]

To be honest I bought plenty of cards in 1955. Made no difference to me who made them or if one had a better design than the other. Just wanted any baseball card with the gum!