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My Top Ten Sports Card Collecting Moments

4/30/2012

2 Comments

 
April 29, 2012, Orland Park, IL -- If you were a baseball-card-lovin' kid in the Chicago area during the late 1970s, the most ultimate place to be was the card shop on South Archer Avenue. I absolutely loved going there. I remember spending weeks going through the very first Beckett annual price guide in 1979 and figuring out which cards I would buy on my next trip to Chicago's only card shop. While the card shop is long gone, I still buy cards on occasion from Pat Quinn, one of the owners of the shop. Every once in a while, Pat will bring me a real nice deal at the Orland Park show.  This past Sunday, I picked up a small lot of early 1950s baseball from Pat at a real nice price.  It got me thinking of his old shop and collecting cards as a kid. Then I started to come up with a list of my top 10 sports card collecting moments.
    Here they are:
    (1) Going to that old card shop on Archer Avenue;
    (2) Sitting on the curb in front of my house in 1975 and pulling a Hank Aaron card out of pack;
    (2) Going to the neighborhood pharmacy with my friends Adam, John and Todd, and buying packs of cards in the 1970s;
    (3) Buying a large A&P paper grocery bag full of cards from the late 1960s/early 1970s from my friend Andy's older brother Mike back when I was a kid in the late 1970s;
    (4) Buying two near mint 1956 Topps Roberto Clemente cards for just 20 bucks a piece at one of the old Hillside Holiday Inn shows in the late 1970s;
    (5) Buying Jack Smalling's original baseball player address book in the late 1970s, sending out cards to players and receiving them back in the mail with an autograph;
    (6) Attending the old flea market at the Twin Drive-In, in Wheeling, IL, in 1978 and buying my first vintage baseball card, a 1955 Topps Hal Brown, for fifty cents;
    (7) Subscribing and reading Sports Collectors Digest in the late 1970s;
    (8) I went from a collector to a dealer when I put those cards I bought from Mike into a photo album, priced the cards based on the advertisements in SCD (because Beckett did not exist yet) and along with a whole bunch of junk from the house, my dad and I set up at the Twin flea market in 1978.
    (9) Still setting up at the flea market in 1980, I had a lot of money to buy packs of cards. I tried to complete the 1980 Topps set by solely buying packs. After coming up with three near sets, I broke down and brought a list of a dozen or so cards I needed over to dealer Jeff Blatt's house (a short bike ride from my house) and he filled the set for me.
    (10) Attending the 1981 Baseball All Star Game in Cleveland with a pile of cards.  I got most of the cards signed either at the hotel where the players were staying or outside the ball park.  At the hotel, I rode on an elevator with Yogi Berra, Warren Spahn, Ozzie Smith and Terry Kennedy. I had all four guys sign a little program I had that listed all the all star game events over the entire weekend.  I still have that signed program.
    I could easily come up with another 50 or so top collecting moments, but I'll save those for another blog, or we can start a discussion in the comment section. I'd like to hear about your top ten collecting moments.
    Back at the Civic Center, I had a real nice show Sunday. A regular customer picked up some '63 and '65 Topps baseball.  Another regular picked up some '75s and 76s along with a 1970 Topps Hank Aaron. A regular customer picked up some '59s.  A father and son team picked up some mid-1960s baseball.  Steve bought my 1941 Double Play Charley Gehringer, a 1962 Gaylord Perry rookie, and a 1951 Bowman Early Wynn.  An autograph hound picked up some 58s.  A new customer bought some 1971 high numbers.  A regular picked up some '75 minis.  Another regular bought some commons from the 1970s.  Chuck picked my '61-62 Fleer Pettit and a '71-72 Topps Rudy Tomjanovich rookie.  Dave picked up a '59 Topps Moose Skowron All Star. Joel picked up some '65 and '68 White Sox.  A regular picked up some '69s. Rick bought my 1956 Topps Jackie Robinson and some '70s basketball.   A regular picked up some '73s.  A new customer bought some '72s. My other customer named Dave picked up my '55 Topps Phil Rizzuto and some '55 Bowmans.  Gil bought some '65s. A regular picked up some '52 Bowmans.  Then Will, who always closes out the show with me and helps me pack up, which I really appreciate, bought some '64s.
    On the buying front, I bought a pile of '64s, then a group of '57s and '58s, then a group of '68 and '69s. As I was telling Will, I wish I had brought an extra box with me to take all those cards home.  Somehow, I was able to pack them up.  Overall, a good show. We're only in Orland once in May. So in place of Orland at the end of the month, I'm setting up at the Indian Lakes Resort in Bloomingdale, IL.  Next week is Gonzaga, a little earlier in the month than usual.  I was talking with Bill Nest, a card shop owner in Milwaukee, and he thinks the early Gonzaga date is to avoid Mother's Day.  Makes sense to me. I love the Gonzaga show. I'll be bringing newly reloaded '53 Bowman and '60 Topps baseball. It should be another great Gonzaga show. See you next weekend!! 
2 Comments
Chris
5/7/2012 05:00:04 am

My Top 10 Baseball Card Collecting Stories from the late 70's:

1. Every Spring digging through my parents coat pockets and searching couch cushions looking for money to be packs of cards. Also, would lug the glass soda bottles back to the store to collect the deposit ( Usually 10 cents each).

2. The excitement of waiting for the local store ( Rudy's in Willow Springs) to get the shipment of newly issued cards. When they sold out, which was pretty quick, we would ride bikes to the White Hen in Justice or the Pharmacy in Hickory Hills. Many long disappointing bike rides home. The pharmacy in Hickory Hills was only store in the area that would get the Fleer Football.

3. In the late 70's my neighbor across the street gave me a cigar box of her sons cards. They still to this day are mad at her for giving me the cards, but if I remember correctly, the best card in the box was a 1971 Pete Rose.

4.On a family, driving trip to Florida in early 1980, we stopped for gas in Georgia, and totally unexpected the new issue 1980 Topps Baseball were there, I spent a large portion of my souvenir money buying packs. That night at the hotel, I sorted the cards in order of the coolness of the photo, Mario Guerrero was the coolest, look it up.

5. Remember when trading cards was even amount for even amount? Maybe 20 for 20, occasionally a Cubs or Sox player would count for 2 but the end of the trade was an even stack for an even stack.

6. I remember riding my bike to the Flea Market at the Sheridan Drive-In located in Bridgeview. There was one guy there that always sold cards and on one particular weekend day, he had an OJ Simpson rookie for $5. I didn't have that much money left, so he told me to take it and pay him next week. I rode my bike up there several more weekends to pay him, but never saw him again.

7. How cool was it the first time you saw the cards in a cello pack? I remember sitting on the floor at the Hickory Hills Pharmacy searching the entire box looking at the top and bottom card in the pack and picking out the ones that would help complete my sets.

8. I remember trading a huge stack of the new 1977 Topps Football for a huge stack of 1975 Topps Mini's. I still have all the stars (Yount, Brett, etc), and am finally working on getting all the commons. Thanks Tony's wife for putting the book together.

9. I do miss the purity of trading, making plans at school on a Friday and riding our bikes to the school Saturday and spending hours going through each others box of cards and making trades. Good times!

10. I can remember many of the cards I needed to complete each years sets. 1977 Topps, I had the hardest time getting Dan Larson from the Astros and Bill Madlock from the Cubs. 1978 Topps seemed every other pack had Fred Lynn and Carl Yastrzemski both in the same pack. But had a hard time getting Jim Rice and Dave Parker. 1979 Topps was George Brett and Bob Boone and 1980 I couldn't get Dick Ruthven of the Phillies.

10B. Tied for 10th, visiting Tony's table to complete all of these sets. ( This plug should be worth some discount? Right Tony?)

I could put up another 50 stories as well but not today.


Reply
Tony Gordon
5/7/2012 05:32:28 am

Thanks Chris! Awesome list!! I can't remember which cards were tough in '77 and '78. I do remember that in '75, I had the hardest time getting a Nyles Nyman rookie.

Reply



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    Tony Gordon

    Vintage Sports Cards Addict

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