A look back to a July 1981 Baseball Card catalogue
Compton57
Posts: 21 ✭✭✭
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79/80 Topps Hockey Wax Boxes for $6.50 and 80/81 Topps Basketball Wax Boxes for $7.50. Wow!! Today those sell for $35K and $20K when you can even find them.
ilove old hobby magazines etc. mine only go back to the late 80s though. I cant believe i kept all of them!
George Brett, Roger Clemens and Tommy Brady.
This is great stuff- thanks for posting.
Yep - definitely a different time back then. I recall going to a card show in early 1981. I was 14 so Dad drove me. one the way out, I walked by a table that had baseball cards but in the corner back was another table with several boxes of unopened late 1960’s football, hockey & basketball cards—-all selling at $2.50 per pack. back then, with minimal exception, only baseball cards were popular. My dad wanted to go so I went through a box of 1969 Topps basketball tall boy packs & flipped them over to see the player who was on the bottom of each pack. I found 2 packs — One w Wilt Chamberlain showing on the bottom & another Jerry West. So I paid $5 for those 2 packs. I opened both packs & since they didn’t have card holders for the tall boys, I wrapped each in cellophane plastic & placed them carefully inside a 4-sheet plastic page. in 2002, I got all the cards from both packs graded by PSA & there were 7 PSA 9’s —- including Lucas, Bill Bradley. The Chamberlain graded at a PSA 9 but unfortunately got the ST qualifier due to a slight stain as it was obviously at the back of the pack. Still have all of the cards as part of my 1969 Topps basketball set. good times indeed
If possible can you post photos of some of those cards . Would love to see them.
I love seeing these old listings. Thank you for sharing!
I picked up some hobby mailers from the 40s and found very little for sale - mostly trading back then.
I'm getting lazy - could post for discussion key pubs that I like others have like the original SCD, Beckett, Baseball Magazine, Fritsch Topps/Bowman checklist, Jefferson Burdick's classification of cards...etc.
One thing I remember - as much as things change, they stay the same. Back in the 70s, there were people complaining that collectibles were turning more into a business than a hobby. Like today where the COVID happening has affected our hobby; wait a few years and who knows? A correction of sorts?
There's one group - headed up by Mr Wonderful, has purchased - I believe - 3 logoman cards to the tune of 27 million bucks. I just wonder... May that backfire?
Some know that I collect PEP cereal Babe Ruth premium rings; I used to pay like 40 bucks for a color variation; now they're asking like 200 bucks! I'm out of the color variation biz.
Rarity rules, whether by design or evolution. People will pay up for what they can afford. If you got 27 mil to spend, by all means, spend it.
Sure. Will post a few when I get home next Tuesday. I just wish I had time to go through the other boxes!
Mike Cramer, the owner of Pacific Trading Cards from that ad and later the maker of Pacific cards, wrote a book about his life and time in the card business. Highly recommended!