Fun Local Lot Buy - 1955 Bowman

[Harliduck]

Was able to pick up a nice 1955 Bowman lot this evening...206 of 320 cards, no dupes with the majority needed are high #'s. Almost all the stars are in there, from the Mick to Aaron to Ford...Hoyt to Rizzuto...Minoso Mays to Matthews...a really cool start to completing the set.

There is a catch...about 30% of the set has the players uniform numbers written on the front of the card! Almost no creases in the lot, soft corners and decent centering throughout...i'd say VG to VGEX with a few worse, a few better. Got the lot off the second owner...the entire lot originally belonged to a guy who pulled them from their packs. As a kid he took the time to record all the numbers...haha. I think it's cool to have all these together and will finish the set in VGEX'ish condition to match and upgrade a bit.

Anyhow...thought I'd share as this is a pretty unique buy for me. I have pretty strict standards for my 57 and up sets...and they get a little lax 56 down...so this set is a little lower than usual standards with all the ink, but I'm not going to lie...knowing a kid 65 years ago put his mark on these cards has a special allure, cool to keep these all together! Only paid $500 for the entire lot, I could probably sell the Mantle as is for close to that...so stoked for the deal I got. Thought I would share!


Anyone got some extra VG to VGEX high numbers laying around??




Here are some of the stars with their numbers recorded!

[Volod]

Nifty acquisition, John. Will they be stored in those neat looking piles, or (shudder) entombed in plastic cases? I only had a few '55 Bowman cards as a kid. I had turned eleven by that year and my interests shifted from celebrated athletes to great literature (Classics Illustrated comics). I think some of those '55 B cards I had did wind up in the spokes of my bike, though, so they are today in much worse condition than your collection.

[Harliduck]

Steve...no plastic cases for these beauties. While I do have some graded cards, my passion lies in raw sets in binders. These are destined to reside with my 55 Topps set in all their raw glory...and priceless now to me...

I did my share of spoking, but not quite as regrettable with 78 Topps of my youth!

[JollyElm]

Truly awesome, and we're all jealous. Are any of the big stars free from the penwork?

[egri]

Nice find John! The longer I collect, the more I've become partial to old cards that show their age, whether that's creases, writing, dinged corners, etc. I like thinking that the card was handled and played with; it didn't go straight into a shoebox.

[Zach Wheat]

Originally Posted by egri

Nice find John! The longer I collect, the more I've become partial to old cards that show their age, whether that's creases, writing, dinged corners, etc. I like thinking that the card was handled and played with; it didn't go straight into a shoebox.

Nice pickup....adds a nice but unwanted touch to the set!

[Harliduck]

Originally Posted by egri

Nice find John! The longer I collect, the more I've become partial to old cards that show their age, whether that's creases, writing, dinged corners, etc. I like thinking that the card was handled and played with; it didn't go straight into a shoebox.

Agreed. Another cool thing about this lot was they were in number order and no duplicates, and all in almost the exact same condition. This was how they came from the original collector...so to me that means he was intent on putting the set together and put some organization into it, and got rid of the rest. He either lost interest by the end of the year or couldn't find many packs from the last series....or just started buying Topps...lol.

[Harliduck]

Originally Posted by JollyElm

Truly awesome, and we're all jealous. Are any of the big stars free from the penwork?

Its funny looking through them...ALL of the Dodgers and all but 1 Yankee has their numbers written out (some just on the back)...then just the stars and minor stars. Most of the commons are clean with a few exceptions. The 1 Yankee that was spared was Whitey Ford...not sure how that happened...a Yankee AND a star. Only two of note that were clean besides Ford are Minoso and Red S. Joe Astroth and many more didn't mean much to the kid...haha...

[Gr8Beldini]

One of my favorite sets of all time and my favorite Mays, Mantle and Aaron cards. Congratulations on the really nice find.