Your Information Resource for Vintage Baseball Cards
eNews Issue #72 (April 2010)      www.oldcardboard.com

Please Note: If images are not loading in this email, click here. Welcome to Old Cardboard, the most complete reference resource for information about collecting vintage baseball cards and related memorabilia.  More information about this eNewsletter and its companion website and magazine are found at the bottom of this page. Contents: 1. Updated Auction and Show Calendar 2. Reader Feedback Mixed on Jim Bunning Article 3. Latest Additions to the OldCardboard.com Website 4. Book Review: Bert Sugar's Baseball Hall of Fame 5. News Briefs (A Digest of Recent Hobby Happenings) 1. Updated Auction and Show Calendar The following is a summary of vintage card events coming up in the next 30-45 days. For the most current listings on additional vintage card shows and auctions, see the Show and Auction Calendar on the Old Cardboard website.

OC eNewsletter Sponsor

April 2010
14	Phone/Internet	Hunt Auctions (see website for details).
14	Phone/Internet	Grey Flannel Auctions (see website for details).
15	Phone/Internet	Collectible Classics CCA8 Auction (see website for details).
16-18	Strongsville, OH	Strongsville Show 2010 (see website for details).
17	Phone/Internet	Memory Lane Springtime Classic Auction (see website for details).
22	Phone/Internet	Goodwin & Co. Auction (see website for details).
22-23	Phone/Internet	Heritage Signature Sports Auction (see website for details).
May 2010
1	Phone/Internet	Robert Edward Auctions (see website for details).
13	Internet	Collect.com Auction (Internet Auction #2; see website for details).
14-16	White Plains, NY	White Plains Sports Card Show (see website for details).
19-20	Phone/Internet	Legendary Auctions (see website for details).

2. Reader Feedback Mixed on Jim Bunning Article With the political climate as it is, we perhaps should not have been too surprised to receive a considerable amount of feedback, both pro and con, concerning the article about Hall of Famer Jim Bunning that we ran in last month's issue of the Old Cardboard eNewsletter (see eNews #71, item 2). It is one of the rare instances where vintage card collecting crossed paths, at least peripherally, with current political news at the national level. We have selected two emails representing opposing views about the article content. First, an example of the typical pro-Bunning view: "From the latest Old Cardboard enews, I really enjoyed the pieces on Jim Bunning and Richard Egan. Printing the one on Bunning took some guts. We have a lot of folks within the hobby who tend to view him quite differently but he was simply holding the Senate to account for a bill passed quite recently (PAYGO). My own Rep. (Inslee, WA-1) had repeatedly lauded the finer points of PAYGO but when it comes crunch time, the budget is secondary to political considerations. I've enjoyed following (to a degree) Jim Bunning's political and baseball career. He's a smart and talented man--and principled, too. Thanks again for including it." --Steve Mitchell Mitchell Steve, thanks for your comments. As we pointed out in the article, Bunning is sometimes highly controversial. However, your comments accurately reflect the key point of the article, which is that both sides of the deficit issue need to work together to address the most profound budget shortfall in our history. It is essential that we all sacrifice in a bi-partisan effort to address all issues affecting the economy--one small step at a time. The opposing view can be summarized in the following email: "Pardon me: I do not mix my political views with my card collecting views, and I do not care to find yours sprung upon me, especially when you left out the rather essential, non-partisan fact that the very "Pay As You Go" program Senator Bunning trumpeted, he voted against. Please either remove your political viewpoints from this, or remove me from your mailing list." --Keith Olbermann Olbermann Gee, Keith, that seems a bit of an overreaction, don't you think? Here's why. With Old Cardboard eNews now in its seventh year as a monthly publication, this is the first of well over 100 articles that even marginally addresses political issues. Further, we made an honest attempt to keep the article "fair and balanced" and very narrowly focused on the point that the baseball Hall of Famer made recently on the Senate floor that made national headlines. The article also devotes equal space to highlighting Bunning's baseball career and displays front and back images of his baseball rookie card. I am sorry that you were offended. Please do not fret, however. It may be another seven years and 100 articles before we again touch upon politics in the Old Cardboard eNewsletter. If that happens, then the simplest solution is for you to do what I would do. When I am offended by the left-wing political rantings that I hear on MSNBC Countdown, I simply stop watching and switch over to Fox News.     Nevertheless, your feedback on Old Cardboard is always welcome. In an unusual twist of hobby irony, it is interesting to note that the writers of the above two emails have crossed paths before...nearly four decades before. It should first also be pointed out that each of the emails arrived in Old Cardboard's Inbox independently, unsolicited, and within hours of each other. In February, 1973, Steve Mitchell helped launch Sports Scoop, a magazine focused directly on the card collecting hobby. The magazine is widely regarded among hobby veterans to be the best such publication of its time. It ran for twenty consecutive months ending with its final issue in October, 1974. Throughout the 2-year 20-issue run, Mitchell is listed in the masthead as either Editor, Executive Editor or Managing Editor. As such, one of his key functions was that of coordinating with outside authors and selecting articles to be printed in the magazine. The first issue of Sports Scoop includes articles from a number of leading collectors of the period. Among them, then-14-year-old Keith Olbermann penned an article titled "Topps 1966-67 Hockey Test Set." The one-page article and checklist describes a little-known Topps test issue patterned after a set produced by O-Pee-Chee Gum Company of Canada during the same period. Olbermann would go on to contribute a number of additional articles to the magazine throughout its brief two-year run. Note: Abstracts of several dozen articles published in Sports Scoop, including several written by Olbermann, are indexed in the Vintage Baseball Card Article Index on the Old Cardboard website. To narrow the search, select "Sports Scoop" in the "Publication" pull down menu, then "Refresh." OC eNewsletter Sponsor 3. Latest Additions to the OldCardboard.com Website We are continually expanding the Old Cardboard website with more set profiles, checklists and card galleries. Recent (past 30-40 days) additions include: Set Profiles have been added for: 1932  Doble Aguila 1936  United Tobacco (South Africa) 1952  D357-1  Mother's Cookies 1953  D357-2  Mother's Cookies Set Checklists have been added for: 1941  R330  Double Play Updating the website with checklists and full set galleries for additional vintage sets is an ongoing project, so check back often to check out the latest additions. There are now many thousands of card images on the website and the list continues to grow. We welcome and encourage feedback with checklist additions, card images, error corrections and suggestions. Please send all input to editor@oldcardboard.com. 4. Book Review: Bert Sugar's Baseball Hall of Fame While there may be parts of Cooperstown, New York that must be experienced in person, Bert Sugar’s recently released book, "Baseball Hall of Fame," is as close as you can get to the real thing. "It is the very tour that all visitors to the Hall joyfully take that this book endeavors to duplicate." Sugar writes in his Introduction. We think he admirably pulled it off. In his dedication to duplicating the experience of being there, Sugar provides an absorbing tour through the halls of the Hall. The narrative is illustrated with a treasure trove of more than 300 original and archival photographs--all bound into a nine-by-eleven-inch table top full color format of 272 fact filled pages. Sugar begins (and ends) his tour the same way that all visitors to the Hall do. Accordingly, he writes, the first thing one experiences upon entering the Hall is a shrine-like setting that contains the Hall of Fame Plaque Gallery, the centerpiece of every visitor’s trip. Next stop is the Cooperstown Room, where the beginnings of baseball are accurately described. As reflected in the exhibits, Sugar painstakingly separates fact from myth about how baseball began--and why the Hall is now located in Cooperstown. Following the Hall of Fame’s second floor time-travel through baseball’s long memory lane, Sugar devotes a section of his book to the nineteenth century, then decade by decade to each period of the game throughout the twentieth and into the twenty-first century. Other sections explain and illustrate exhibits focused on baseball stadiums, mascots, concessions, baseball records and awards, baseball art, baseball writers, baseball at the movies and much more. A particularly interesting section discusses the origin of America’s third most frequently sung song, "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" (following only "The Star-Spangled Banner" and "Happy Birthday"). The exhibit (as illustrated in Sugar’s book) presents the original lyrics to the song--written in the hand of Jack Norworth (complete with crossed-out words, misspelled words and doodles) while riding on a New York subway. No doubt the most relevant section for Old Cardboard readers is a description of the "Baseball Cards" exhibit on the third floor of the Hall of Fame. In his section of the book that describes the baseball card exhibit, Sugar traces the history of cards from those found in packs of Old Judge and Gypsy Queen cigarettes of the nineteenth century to the tobacco, candy and gum cards of the early decades of the twentieth century. The baseball cards section of the book is impressively illustrated by a panoramic view of the exhibit along with close-up views of a dozen Cracker Jack cards and a gigantic six-by-ten-inch enlargement of the Hall’s resident example of the famous T206 Wagner. Additional full page plates illustrate examples from sets produced by Goudey, Leaf, Bowman, Topps and others. The book concludes almost like it begins--in the Hall of Fame Plaque Gallery located directly behind the entryway. With nine Hall of Famers represented on each page, the bronze plaques for all 286 members (through 2008) are presented in alphabetical order--an appropriate "appendix" to the virtual tour of the Hall provided by Sugar. Bert Randolph Sugar, "Bert Sugar’s Baseball Hall of Fame: A Living History of America’s Greatest Game" (Running Press, Philadelphia, 2009). Retail Price: $35. *     *     *     * Editor's Note: Bert Sugar's Sports Collectors Bible, first printed in 1975, was a landmark reference in the development of the vintage card collecting hobby. Old Cardboard is planning a feature article in our Summer Issue (Issue #23) to commemorate the 35th anniversary of the SCB, as well as Sugar's many other important contributions to both the game of baseball and the vintage hobby. 5. News Briefs (A Digest of Recent Hobby Happenings) Baltimore National Just Around Corner. There's still time to make plans for attending the National Sports Collectors Convention, held this year at the Baltimore Convention Center, August 4-8. Searching for that obscure vintage baseball card is just part of the attraction for attendees. Many find that meeting fellow collectors (and perhaps finding authentic Maryland crab cakes) is even more rewarding. Advance tickets and conference housing details can be found on the show's web site at www.NSCCShow.com. Brett and I hope to see you there. New Publisher for Collector Magazine. Congrats to Al Crisafulli and Novacent Partners in the publication of their first issue of Collector magazine. Although Crisafulli has produced the magazine since it began in 2005 as SGC Collector (published by SGC Grading Company), this is the first issue with Novacent Partners as publisher. According to Crisafulli, the changes in the magazine's focus will be subtle. While still mostly geared to sports-related topics, non-sports sets will also be covered. The longest and most detailed article in Novacent's first issue, for example, describes several related sets of Hollywood Starlets produced in the late 1930s by Germany's Garbaty Cigarette Company. Baseball related articles in the issue feature baseball book collecting, the T5 Pinkerton Cabinet set and collecting "beater" cards. We believe that Old Cardboard subscribers would also enjoy a subscription to Collector Magazine. Subscriptions to the quarterly are $20 per year and can be ordered online (see the magazine's Subscription Order Page, still on the SGC website). Lyman and Brett Hardeman Old Cardboard, LLC. Old Cardboard, LLC. was established in December 2003, to help bring information on vintage baseball card collecting to the hobbyist.  Produced by collectors for collectors, this comprehensive resource consists of three components: (1) Old Cardboard Magazine, (2) a companion website at www.oldcardboard.com and (3) this eNewsletter. The Old Cardboard website contains more than 500 pages of descriptive reference information for baseball card sets produced fifty years ago or longer.  Each of these set summaries has a direct set-specific link to auctions and a similar link to 's powerful search engine for further research.  The website also includes a Show and Auction Calendar, an eBay Top 50 Vintage Sellers List, and much more.  As a result, the Old Cardboard website makes a great "Alt-tab" companion for vintage card shoppers and researchers.  Old Cardboard eNews provides current hobby news, upcoming shows and auctions, and updates to the website and the magazine.  It is published around the middle of each month.  For a FREE subscription to the eNewsletter, or for subscription information on Old Cardboard Magazine, please visit the website at www.oldcardboard.com.  If you find this information resource helpful, please tell your friends.  We need your support and your feedback. Thank you.