Member’s most precious card

[Al C.risafulli]

My father left when I was 9 years old and my mom worked three jobs to keep things going in our house. In 1981, my whole neighborhood was obsessed with 1981 Fleer, finding all the errors and variations in the set.

Graig Nettles was my favorite player, and when I found out there was an error with Nettles’ card in the 1981 Fleer set, I HAD to have it.

My local card shop was a place called Dollars and Sense, in Ridgewood NJ, and when the owner got a Nettles error and priced it at $17, I knew I would never have one. In 1981 in my family, seventeen dollars might as well have been seventeen million dollars.

And then on my birthday, my mom gave me that card. She worked as a teacher during the day, and in a factory and a medical office at nights, so she could buy me that card. Not really, of course, but that’s what it felt like. I’m sure at whatever she got paid to work in a factory in 1981, it was half a day’s work to get that card.

I’ve still got it, and when they say “you can’t take it with you,” well, I’m taking it with me.

-Al

[perezfan]

Originally Posted by Al C.risafulli

My father left when I was 9 years old and my mom worked three jobs to keep things going in our house. In 1981, my whole neighborhood was obsessed with 1981 Fleer, finding all the errors and variations in the set.

Graig Nettles was my favorite player, and when I found out there was an error with Nettles’ card in the 1981 Fleer set, I HAD to have it.

My local card shop was a place called Dollars and Sense, in Ridgewood NJ, and when the owner got a Nettles error and priced it at $17, I knew I would never have one. In 1981 in my family, seventeen dollars might as well have been seventeen million dollars.

And then on my birthday, my mom gave me that card. She worked as a teacher during the day, and in a factory and a medical office at nights, so she could buy me that card. Not really, of course, but that’s what it felt like. I’m sure at whatever she got paid to work in a factory in 1981, it was half a day’s work to get that card.

I’ve still got it, and when they say “you can’t take it with you,” well, I’m taking it with me.

-Al

Fantastic story, Al...

So many of these treasured/favorite cards are linked to childhood memories of our parents and loved ones. I think that's what draws many of us to collecting in the first place.

My favorite items are not cards, but photos that my Dad took of the Reds and visiting teams at Crosley Field in the 3 years preceding its 1970 demise. It was the formation of the Big Red Machine, and those photos represent my best memories as a kid.

I also collect pennants, because Dad would always be sure we had a souvenir to take home with us after the game. Eventually my brother and I had enough pennants to form a full "pinwheel" circle on the wall.

Fast-forward to now, I've acquired many rare pennants that date back to the early teens. But the ones closest to my heart are still the 1960s Reds pennants (which are all worth under $100).

[Leon]

The definition of a true keeper. Great story, Al.

The other shared stories are great too! I don't think I have any that are so sentimental.

Originally Posted by Al C.risafulli

My father left when I was 9 years old and my mom worked three jobs to keep things going in our house. In 1981, my whole neighborhood was obsessed with 1981 Fleer, finding all the errors and variations in the set.

Graig Nettles was my favorite player, and when I found out there was an error with Nettles’ card in the 1981 Fleer set, I HAD to have it.

My local card shop was a place called Dollars and Sense, in Ridgewood NJ, and when the owner got a Nettles error and priced it at $17, I knew I would never have one. In 1981 in my family, seventeen dollars might as well have been seventeen million dollars.

And then on my birthday, my mom gave me that card. She worked as a teacher during the day, and in a factory and a medical office at nights, so she could buy me that card. Not really, of course, but that’s what it felt like. I’m sure at whatever she got paid to work in a factory in 1981, it was half a day’s work to get that card.

I’ve still got it, and when they say “you can’t take it with you,” well, I’m taking it with me.

-Al

[Rad_Hazard]

Mine is not even my favorite sport or team, but it's one card that I remember pulling at my local card shop in my hometown. I remember it so well because the guy working there offered me $120 on the spot, which was A LOT for a 10 year old me to turn down, but I didn't hesitate and still have the card to this day. It was an absolute thrill to pull!

[cornhusker]

My dad worked in a mfg setting in the 70's also. Was tough work but he make good money for working hard. As a baby boomer raised in rural PA he was somewhat tight with money. A couple bucks here and there for some packs was cool but I was informed that there was no way I was gonna be allowed to "waste 50$ on a Pete Rose card" even if it was his rookie card. Besides, I had several Rose cards with him in a Phillies uniform and they looked better than the floating heads anyway.
So, 40 years later my son and I are at this Gettysburg estate auction of a old time, hard core card collector. It was literally a ranch home full of cards in the middle of an apple orchard. There were hay wagons loaded with unopened modern, baseball reference books, postcards, a house full of boxes of random cards, early 20th century cards, and 3 large fiber drums of random cards- plus, lots of dealers & collectors.
The "mystery drums" seemed interesting as we noticed some '67's, a nice morgan rookie, and a few other decent cards mixed in the top layer with early '80s commons. And they did not seem to be drawing much attention.
My son was excited about the idea of buying over 120,000 cards at auction so I let him pretend to bid when they came up. The auctioneer would look at him and then check w me for the bid when it came around. We wound up buying the cards for under .01 each. Some guys were cool and congratulated him on they buy, and a few "know it all's" dropped comment's like "man I got some junk cards for ya at that price" and "ya ain't gonna find a Mantle in that barrel kid". We still laugh about that comment because he was correct... there were over 2 dozen of them. Along with near sets from every year 1960 thru '83 that turned out to be straight from the wax packs.
We were like card archeologists finding cards from all different years as we carefully excavated the drums that summer. I recall Tom Petty played in the background and Joey shouting "dad, we got one, it's Pete! " we sold most of the cards and put the money in the kids college funds.He got to keep the Rose card as payment for being my helper with the deal... so, I couldn't sell it even if I wanted too