Collecting Obscure/Scarce/Under-appreciated sets - Does it affect your enjoyment?

[PowderedH2O]

There are cards that just attract me, while others don't. I don't have the deep pockets of some other collectors, so I don't even bother trying to attempt sets from before 1933 or so. I just grab cards that grab me. No, I don't care if it is obscure. Often, the obscurity is what appeals to me. It isn't that it is rare or hard to get. It is that I don't see it all the time. I think this is why exhibits and other old black and white cards appeal to me so much. The cards are simple and I don't see them on every dealer's table or site.

[Pat R]

Several people have commented how easy T206's are to collect but
that actually depends on how/what you collect. I have been putting
together a (partial) back run of Conroy batting for 7/8 years now.
It is confirmed with a SC350/25 back but I haven't seen
a single copy come up for sale during that period yet there have been
two different Drums and a Brown Lenox (I bid on them but they were out
of my budget) sold during that time. There are no recorded sales in the
past twelve years and I have never seen a scan of a SC factory 25 Conroy.

The same thing can be claimed on other confirmed combos with semi common
backs It would be pretty easy to come up with a big list that have only single
sales over a 10 year period of subjects with Tolstoi, EPDG, Old Mill ect...
backs.

[ValKehl]

I don't collect sets, except for a couple of very small, obscure sets, namely E222 A.W.H. Caramels & 1925 Holland Creameries, and a few subsets. I mostly focus on type cards and cards of all the players on the 1924 Senators Championship Team. I get the most collecting thrill from obtaining cards that are very scarce/rare, especially 1-of-1s. And, I am just as thrilled to obtain a rare card of Joe Nobody as a rare card of a HOFer.

For example, Byron "By" Speece appeared in 21 games (54.1 innings) for the 1924 Senators, achieving a 2-1 W-L record and a 2.65 ERA. He appeared in one game of the 1924 World Series and pitched 1 inning, with no decision. Speece subsequently had cups of coffee with the 1925-26 Indians and the 1930 Phillies. He also pitched in 632 minor league games from 1922 through 1945 (age 48!). He pitched for the Seattle Rainiers his last 3 years, 1943-45, and he appears in the Centennial Flour card sets for each of these years. Below are his 1943 (1 in the pop reports) and 1944 (0 in the pop reports) cards - I'm still searching for Speece's 1945 card (0 in the pop reports).

[Luke]

Thanks for the replies everyone. Kind of made me realize that I had a preconceived notion of what people's answers would be, and not surprisingly that turned out to be an error on my part.

Ryan, I really liked your post. Your collection is incredible. And, it makes perfect sense that there are a bunch of other collectors out there doing the same thing. Just because I haven't met them doesn't mean they aren't out there.

For some weird reason, it seems like I can't just buy one card from one set and move on. I'd be a terrible type collector because I feel this need to accumulate a bunch of cards from sets I like, rather than just picking up random things that catch my eye. So branching out for me will be a pretty slow process.

I guess I just wanted to see if anyone else felt the same way. I buy and/or sell T206s everyday, so I get a constant "collecting buzz" (for lack of a better term). I'm sure if you collect all or most of the scarcest pre-war sets, you'd be able to find something to buy pretty often, but since I'm just starting with a couple non t205/t206/t207 sets, it's pretty quiet out there. One obvious solution is to keep adding to the scope of my collection so that I'm not having to be quite so patient.

[AGuinness]

This is a good thread, sorry I didn't read it earlier...

My conundrum now is around my T206 team set for the Red Sox and the fact that I'm looking for a different back for each player. I've got the money to pull the trigger on a rare back Speaker, but I'm beginning to wonder how long it will be until the right card becomes available. It could be tomorrow, of course, but it might also be a year, two years or even more (based on what I've seen on CardTarget.com and the sales history). I've got other collecting goals and am wondering if I save all my funds for when the Speaker does pop up, or get a little bit of gratification by acquiring other cards. I guess in the end, it's a good problem to have...

[drcy]

I have always collected rarities-- from cards to photos to others--, but not as sets. So when an item came up that I know was rare, I would try to get it, but it was never a matter of trying to assemble a set.

[Rich Falvo]

Originally Posted by AGuinness

This is a good thread, sorry I didn't read it earlier...

My conundrum now is around my T206 team set for the Red Sox and the fact that I'm looking for a different back for each player. I've got the money to pull the trigger on a rare back Speaker, but I'm beginning to wonder how long it will be until the right card becomes available. It could be tomorrow, of course, but it might also be a year, two years or even more (based on what I've seen on CardTarget.com and the sales history). I've got other collecting goals and am wondering if I save all my funds for when the Speaker does pop up, or get a little bit of gratification by acquiring other cards. I guess in the end, it's a good problem to have...

Same situation here. I'm working on a Providence set and can go months between finding a new card, so I'm always debating whether to save up or work on another set. I miss the buzz of buying something, so I'm gradually working on a Sport Kings set too since they are available and many of them are inexpensive.

[brian1961]

Luke, I can only speak from the standpoint of postwar sports card collecting. If that disqualifies my remarks, please move on.

Since I began collecting at the age of 4, my life has been characterized by gravitating to the obscure, scarce, and while I would not say under-appreciated necessarily, as I later found out, the items I enjoyed were toys and things that one would not easily encounter as a child, and I suppose were marketed to those that wanted something a little better than a dime store toy.

My first toys were Tonka, but they were so large for me. Then, walking with my Mom during a shopping trip in Wilmette, Illinois at Carson, Pirie, Scott & Company, I happened upon a display of DINKY TOYS from Great Britain. Love at first sight.

I had regular dime store toy soldiers. Then, while stopping at an Oasis rest stop to eat, afterwards I wandered through their gift shop, looking for toys. I found them, among which were the Marx Warriors of the World. Again, love at first sight. I selected a Viking shooting an arrow---Haakon. A couple years later, I discovered a display of Britains soldiers. Wow. I was in love with the knights that were shooting an arrow from a crossbow. I begged to get 3 of them, and they ran 50 cents each! I still have them.

I loved my Topps, but the difficult to collect Post Cereal commanded more of my respect and admiration. I had to "work" to acquire them, gobbling down many bowls of, let us say, healthy and not very appetizing, gravelly cereal, such as 40% Bran Flakes. Sure, I could easily eat lots of Alpha Bits, but as some of you know, certain players only appeared on boxes of the less popular cereals. So, you want that player, Brian, ya gotta eat THAT cereal. To a kid, that was work. Also, I had to make sure I was ready to go with my Mom when she was doing her grocery shopping. I might have to miss the 3 Stooges, or Clutch Cargo, but it was worth it!

Fast forward to the early 70s, when I was extremely privileged to get in on the early card collector conventions. While I went for Topps and Bowman stars I wanted, THE CARDS AND COINS I PRIZED THE MOST WERE THE BAZOOKA, POST CEREAL, JELL-O, SALADA TEA COINS and DAN-DEE POTATO CHIPS. In a couple years I discovered other exotic scarcities and rarities----Glendale Meats Tigers, Johnston Cookies Braves, Old London coins, Wilson Wieners, and Stahl-Meyer Franks. Rarely were these for sale, when they were just as rarely seen. They were either highly-regarded trade bait, or auction material. The few for sale were smashed, creased, and often stained, and you didn't even consider the card's centering; they were too tough to find in the first place!

My eye was always discriminating. I kept my poor Dad waiting for half an hour while I scrutinized every piece of jewelry at the department store, picking out the piece I loved best, to give to my dear Mom for her Christmas present from me. I was 5 or 6 at the time.

My father enjoyed nice gadgets, and he was frugal and hard on himself to a point. However, the time came in 1959 when he bought a "very nice used car"----an over the top elegant 1955 Mercedes-Benz 300SL Gullwing, the third one imported to America. I guess heads always turned whenever he drove the Gullwing. My family were members of the Mercedes-Benz Club of America. In our Chicago chapter, my Mom and Dad's 300SL was the centerpiece of the club. Now, I cannot say that I tried to copy my Dad's taste for something exotic, unusual, and attractive, but that's how it has turned out. I sure cannot afford a Bugatti Veyron, but my 1/43rd exotic model car collection definitely speaks loud and clear that I know what an important Le Mans and other historically significant racing sports car is.

All to answer your OP question, "Does it affect your enjoyment?"

Mate, it IS my enjoyment. ---Brian Powell

[the-illini]

I love the obscure stuff - the bulk of my collection is "non-mainstream" vintage cards.

My favorite set is a good example...

[NiceDocter]

I have always enjoyed the unusual and off beat items. What fun is it to collect something everyone else already has or is easily available on line any time you want it? For this reason, I was never interested much in T 206 cards (from childhood on) and like many here have only owned maybe 20 or 30 in my life. I kinda looked at them as "commons" back in the day in the first part of my adult collecting in the late 1970s and on...... although I do understand that there are some tremendous rarities in backs and conditions...... if you want a real laugh, I always kind of looked at Old Judge cards in the same light!!!! To each his own, but I still get much more of a kick chasing down something Ive never seen before ...... if you an obscure set collector it almost goes without saying that you eventually branch out into other areas and pretty soon (like so many people here I am willing to bet) you've got your wife or mother or girlfriend saying.....WHY DONT YOU JUST OPEN UP A STORE???? Boxes of stuff everywhere!!!! but enjoying it!!

[Leon]

Originally Posted by Luke

Thanks for the replies everyone. Kind of made me realize that I had a preconceived notion of what people's answers would be, and not surprisingly that turned out to be an error on my part.

Ryan, I really liked your post. Your collection is incredible. And, it makes perfect sense that there are a bunch of other collectors out there doing the same thing. Just because I haven't met them doesn't mean they aren't out there.

For some weird reason, it seems like I can't just buy one card from one set and move on. I'd be a terrible type collector because I feel this need to accumulate a bunch of cards from sets I like, rather than just picking up random things that catch my eye. So branching out for me will be a pretty slow process.

I guess I just wanted to see if anyone else felt the same way. I buy and/or sell T206s everyday, so I get a constant "collecting buzz" (for lack of a better term). I'm sure if you collect all or most of the scarcest pre-war sets, you'd be able to find something to buy pretty often, but since I'm just starting with a couple non t205/t206/t207 sets, it's pretty quiet out there. One obvious solution is to keep adding to the scope of my collection so that I'm not having to be quite so patient.

But just think about picking up a (relatively) lot of cards from a super obscure set? It can feel pretty good to have a large accumulation of cards almost no one has (or cares about, sometimes ) even one of.
.

[doug.goodman]

Originally Posted by Leon

But just think about picking up a (relatively) lot of cards from a super obscure set? It can feel pretty good to have a large accumulation of cards almost no one has (or cares about, sometimes ) even one of.
.

That sounds like most everything I spend time collecting these days, hahahaha.

[x2drich2000]

Originally Posted by Leon

But just think about picking up a (relatively) lot of cards from a super obscure set? It can feel pretty good to have a large accumulation of cards almost no one has (or cares about, sometimes ) even one of.
.

This hits my current collecting habits dead on. The longer i've collect, the more i've moved from more common to rarer cards, regardless of who else likes the set. I love the feeling of knowing I have 40% of the known cards from a set. It just stinks when you know where half the other cards are and know they won't be available for a long time.

DJ

[Rhotchkiss]

Originally Posted by x2drich2000

It just stinks when you know where half the other cards are and know they won't be available for a long time.

DJ

+1000 (except “stinks” is an understatement).