Your Best Deal Ever (Going Back All The Way!)

[Collectorsince62]

Back in the 70's just before the price guides started appearing, I used to run an occasional ad in a local paper looking for cards. One day I received a call from an older gentleman who was moving. He said he had an old cheese box containing cards, and it was nailed shut but he couldn't remember exactly what was inside. I had no idea what a cheese box was, or why it would be nailed shut, but I was about to find out. I drove a short distance, met the man and he shows me a wooden box about half the size of a shoebox. He finds a hammer and pries open the box. Stacked neatly inside were about 200 1940 Play Ball cards, all in Ex-Ex+. One card however, was lying across the top face up. It was a '33 Goudey Ruth G-Vg. He wanted $125 for everything. I borrowed the money from my Dad who thought I was nuts. Around that same time an antique dealer responded to my ad and said she was setting up at a sidewalk sale that weekend and had a Babe Ruth card she would sell to me before the sale opened. I arrived early, she shows me a '33 Goudey and says "let's start the haggling at $5." She seemed a little disappointed when I handed her the money without bargaining. On the trading front, my favorite trade occurred in the mid 70's when '71 Topps in great condition were really hot and T206's were not. I traded a really nice extra complete '71 set to the owner of a local card shop. He had just returned from a buying trip to the tobacco states and had a bunch of T206's. In return for the '71 set I received a Mathewson, Johnson, Cy Young, Lajoie, Speaker, McGraw, Tinker, Evers, Chance (and Steinfeldt), Three Finger, Chesbro, Jennings, Merkle . . . and a type card from each different back he had. Years later I discovered one of the type cards was a one-of-one Drum. That one has since been auctioned off to a deserving home but the others have all stayed with me.