Mount Rushmore of Industry Icons

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by oldjudge

Octavio-The real My Rushmore has four great presidents. Are Barry and Leon in your top four hobby contributors ever, or are you drastically (very drastically) expanding the number of subjects for the hobby version?

I think you have to nominate Jeff Burdick by acclamation. The other choices are tougher. I tend to favor recognizing innovation, and while they're not popular, for better or worse David Hall is largely responsible for the market penetration of TPG and that guy in Chicago, unless I am mistaken, pioneered the high end sportscard/memorabilia auction house.

[frankbmd]

We may need a larger mountain.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Also, and I wasn't collecting when he was first active, but my sense is that Alan Rosen played a huge role in the transformation of collecting from pure hobby to, shall we say, hobby with financial overtones.

[oldjudge]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Also, and I wasn't collecting when he was first active, but my sense is that Alan Rosen played a huge role in the transformation of collecting from pure hobby to, shall we say, hobby with financial overtones.

Wharton Tigre is clearly the number two person. Buck Barker is number three. The Alan Rosens and the David Halls of the world don’t come close. BTW, David Hall didn’t start card grading, Alan Hager did.