25 year quest ends sadly George C Miller Company

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Posted By: dan mckee

There comes a time in every true collector's career when that once in a lifetime opportunity shows itself and you need to "pull the trigger". Well, my time came this morning but I missed it by a half an hour. There are 2 known George C Miller company wrappers in collections today that held the rare cards and both display American League on them. Well, knowing there are National league players in this rare set, we thought there should be a National league wrapper. Well now there is. One surfaced this morning and I missed it! Yes I thought about ending it all but I pulled a few Washington Times cards and burnt them to make me feel better. I had won a scrapps card from a gent and noticed in the description that he had other old baseball stuff listed. I checked out his other auctions and he had some neat stuff.

Then I made the BIG MISTAKE, I looked at what he had that had already ended! I looked and almost died! The National league Geo. C. Miller Wrapper that would go perfectly with my set! 30 minutes late and many dollars short, that is me. I have 200 search criterea set up for george c miller and I missed this! Well, it is confirmed, the Natiomnal league exists!
I hate this hobby.



http://cgi.ebay.com/EARLY-ORIGINAL-NATIONAL-BALL-GAME-TOFFEE-WRAPPER_W0QQitemZ5227021910QQcategoryZ50133QQssPag eNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

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Posted By: Brad Green

Sorry that you missed it, Dan! The seller didn't even mention George or Miller in the auction. I would think that he should have, given that it says "Geo. C. Miller" on the wrapper.

Did you consider emailing the winner? Maybe he bought it with the intention of reselling it at a show. Unfortunately, it does not look like he has sold anything on eBay recently.

Like you said, you now know that the N.L. wrapper exists, even if you don't have it yet.

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Posted By: dan mckee

Hi Brad, of course I jumped on the winner and offered him a very nice profit but he is a long time "wrapper" collector who has just about everything. The absolute worst possible luck I could ask for. Dan.

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Posted By: Anonymous

...and at a very low final price no less.

I must confess that i've never seen either wrapper and obviously missed it too, so you can't blame me this time.

cheer up..you never know what's coming around the bend ..and thanks for sharing.

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Posted By: Joe_G.

I was the high bidder the entire auction until seconds were left. I was the only bidder until yesterday ($25). A couple bids raised my still winning bid to ~$86 this morning when I had to leave for work. I wanted to make sure I won it so I raised my maximum to what I thought was "heavy" before leaving for work with a mere 3 hours left. $172.50 wasn't enough and I was sorely disappointed when I got home tonight.

I thought the item would go unnoticed, I also thought the same on the nice Richardson Scrapps which I was also high underbidder. Nice items, poor listings. It's a lot more difficult to find a steal these days on eBay. In hind sight, I should have bid higher on both items. Not sure what it would have taken to win them though. It only takes one person to spoil your "good deal".

Joe Gonsowski

editted to add that I did lose the lead to Rhys for a short time before this morning. We missed out on a nice piece Rhys

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Posted By: dan mckee

Joe, you will need to add another digit to your bid and then some for a Miller wrapper that is noticed. Dan.

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Posted By: Bob Rousseau

well, this will take awhile to get over but look at it this way- in this game, like most in life, more than once or twice, you probably were the one that edged out a more "deserving" person- sometimes you're the one that gets aced out by someone else. It's like I used to say to friends that were bemoaning the lover that dumped them-we've all got blood on our hands. You're the dump-ee right now, but you've also been the dump-er in the past.

You've got to remind yourself of those prior victories, take a stiff drink, and move on. Besides offering the winner a big profit, you also might at least ask him to keep your name in case he does decide down the road he wants to sell it.

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Posted By: Aaron M.

Dan:

Man, do I share your pain. I've been looking for a very rare 1912 Red Sox World Series pinback for years with all sorts of search topics set on E-Bay looking for it. Then one day last December I happened to check completed auctions (which I do occasionally to monitor sales for items I'm not bidding on) and an absolute choice example with the charms still attached went for about $900.

I think the same pin was subsequently framed with a Red Sox season pass and photo and offered in June's Sotheby's/Sportscard Plus auction and sold for over $6,600. (Here's the link: http://search.sothebys.com/jsps/live/lot/LotDetail.jsp?&lot_id=4FRMT)

Another one in damaged condition just went for over $1,000 in Leland's Fredo auction (I was the underbidder and wouldn't go higher for a pin I would only replace later because of condition problems).

To this day I still don't know how my searches didn't pick it up. And I still lament the loss and cringe when I think of it.

I know this is totally unethical, but what the hell? I would suggest contacting the seller and making an outrageous offer to rescind his auction. yeah, he'll probably get a negative out of it from the buyer, but if you offer him an outrageous amount of money as opposed to the $175 selling price I would imagine he'd do it.

Aaron
http://aaronsroom.blogspot.com/

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Posted By: dan mckee

Hi Bob, thanks for the thoughts and yes, I did ask the winner to keep me in mind. Actually, knowing he is strictly a wrapper collector and was just 4 wrappers away from having all of them, I feel he was more deserving of the wrapper than me. I love cards first, but then like to have a wrapper with each full set I have. I am also sure I have ousted someone in the past, that doesn't make me feel any better because then they suffer the loss. It is a game, and as long as I treat it as that, will survive.

I won't offer the seller after the auction, I had that happen to me as a winning bidder and it is not fun. If I lose my ethics, I will have little left. Good carma, once given, will come back around. Dan.

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Posted By: Ted Zanidakis

DAN

I think you will agree, no matter how scarce an item is in this
hobby, once one copy finally appears....more will follow. I've
seen this over and over again in my past 28 years in this hobby

There is nothing that is really scarce anymore with the advent
of EBAY. We travel a lot to New England, especially Maine and
New Hampshire. We usually check out every Antique dealer on the
way. So, Dan I will be searching for this wrapper for you.

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Posted By: dstudeba

My bete noir has been a 1954 Wilson Franks Nellie Fox. They come up about five times a year on eBay and I am always the underbidder. A long time ago, someone emailed me about one that was very poorly listed, but the auction ended before I read the email. I was really pissed as it went for at least $200 less then it was worth. I have run into the winner in quite a few other auctions, and realized that I probably would have been outbid even if I had found it. I sounds like this wrapper collector might have outbid you even if you had seen it. At least that is how I like to rationalize it.