Here’s a cool item that Richard Wolffers Auctions offered in their February 1993 catalog: a Joe Jackson “Baseball Magazine” Advertising Display Piece.
They described it as a 10” x 18” sepia-toned piece from around 1914 with red lettering and one of the most spectacular Joe Jackson display pieces known to the hobby. It had been folded in half (for shipping) but was offered matted and framed with an estimated value of $10,000-12,500. Most of Wolffers’ catalogs were printed in B&W.
The picture is the same as the 1913 Joe Jackson Baseball Magazine premium, but those are usually described as being 9” x 16”. REA sold this one for $3,240 in the summer of 2022.
The posters/premiums have been found in varying formats of player identification, copyright information, and promotion for the magazine, so this display piece may just be a variety. Let me know if you know more; happy collecting!
Vintage baseball cards are incredibly popular, but people sometimes forget that baseball card manufacturers had to find original photographs to design the cards around. Here are some original photos of Mickey Mantle that Bowman, Topps, and Wheaties used on some of his earlier baseball cards.
1951 Bowman #253 and 1953 Topps #82 Mickey Mantle Cards
1951 Bowman and 1953 Topps Mickey Mantle Original Photograph
1951 Bowman #253 Mickey Mantle
1953 Topps #82 Mickey Mantle
1951 Wheaties Mickey Mantle
1951 Wheaties Mickey Mantle Original Photograph
1951 Wheaties #G Mickey Mantle
1952 Bowman #101 Mickey Mantle
1952 Bowman Mickey Mantle Original Photograph
1952 Bowman #101 Mickey Mantle
1952 Topps #311 Mickey Mantle
1952 Topps Mickey Mantle Original Photograph
1952 Topps #311 Mickey Mantle
1954 Bowman #65 Mickey Mantle
1954 Bowman Mickey Mantle Original Photograph
1954 Bowman #65 Mickey Mantle
1956 Topps #135 Mickey Mantle
1956 Topps Mickey Mantle Original Photograph – Headshot
1956 Topps Mickey Mantle Original Photograph – Action Shot
1956 Topps #135 Mickey Mantle
1958 Topps #487 Mickey Mantle All-Star
1958 Topps Mickey Mantle All-Star Original Photograph
1958 Topps #487 Mickey Mantle All-Star
1958 Topps World Series Batting Foes Mickey Mantle and Hank Aaron
1958 Topps World Series Batting Foes Original Photograph
1958 Topps #418 Mickey Mantle / Hank Aaron World Series Batting Foes
1960 Topps Rival All-Stars Mantle & Boyer
1960 Topps Rival All-Stars Mantle & Boyer Original Photograph
The photo of Mantle and Boyer was taken in 1957, three years before Topps released the popular 1960 Topps Rival All-Stars card.
1960 Topps #160 RIval All-Stars Mantle & Boyer
Happy collecting!
PS: I put this blog post together ~ three years ago and am republishing it. None of these photos are of items in my collection, and I don’t have good records of the auctions/collections I pulled them from.
Here’s another cool uncut sheet from the hobby library archives, a 1973 Topps Test Candy Lid Uncut Sheet. This one was offered as lot 389 in Christie’s East Sports Memorabilia Auction in October 1992.
The sheet includes stars like Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, Pete Rose, Carlton Fisk, and Nolan Ryan. It was described as being in near mint condition and carried and had an estimated value of $700-800.
The Standard Catalog described the set as “a bit out of the ordinary, the Topps Candy Lids were the top of a product called ‘Baseball Stars Bubble Gum.’ The bottom (inside) of the lids carry a color photo of a player with a ribbon containing the name, position and team. The lids are 1-7/8” in diameter. A total of 55 different lids were made featuring most of the stars of the day.”
Here are a few examples.
There are also several slabbed and unslabbed proofs on the market, so I wonder if someone cut up the sheet.
Let me know what you think in the comments and don’t forget to check out more uncut sheets on the archive. Happy collecting!
Deion Sanders and Bo Jackson are two of the most famous, “modern,” two-sport professional athletes. But did you know there is an NBA Hall of Famer who also pitched for the Chicago White Sox? Among the 13 athletes to play in the NBA and MLB, Dave DeBusschere was undoubtedly the most successful at basketball. Still, many of today’s collectors may not know a lot about him, so in this piece, I’ll share his professional accolades and history along with every baseball and basketball card Topps printed for him.
Dave DeBusschere attended the University of Detroit between 1959 and 1962. He averaged 24 points per game, making the NIT twice and the NCAA tournament once. He also pitched for the baseball team, leading them to 3 NCAA tournament appearances.
He was signed as a free agent by the White Sox in 1962. The same year, he was a territorial draft selection in the 1962 NBA draft by the Detroit Pistons. He played for the White Sox in the majors from 1962-1963, in the NBA for the Pistons between 1962 and 1968, and for the New York Knicks between 1968 and 1974. After two more years of minor league pitching, he eventually gave up baseball to concentrate on playing and coaching basketball.
He had a career 3-4 win/loss record as a pitcher with a 2.90 earned run average as a baseball player.
His first baseball card was in the 1963 Topps set, with two variations.
1963 Topps #54 – 1963 Rookie Stars
1963 Topps #54 – 1962 Rookie Stars
He also had cards in the 1964 and 1965 Topps baseball sets.
1964 Topps #247 Dave DeBusschere
1965 Topps #297 Dave DeBusschere
DeBusschere had an impressive NBA career. He was known as an elite defensive player, which resulted in his election to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1983. Over his career, he averaged 16.1 points per game, 11 rebounds per game, and 2.9 assists per game. He was a two-time NBA champion with the Knicks, made 8 All-Star games, and was a six-time All-Defensive First Team member.
His first basketball card was in the notoriously rare 1968 Topps Test release, so his 1969 Topps Tall Boy is more classically considered his first Topps basketball card.
1968 Topps Test #11 Dave DeBusschere
1969 Topps #85 Dave DeBusschere
Topps also printed cards for him in 1970, 71, 72, and 73, and he was on the Knicks Team Leaders card in 1974.
1970 Topps #135 Dave DeBusschere
1971 Topps #107 Dave DeBusschere
1972 Topps #105 Dave DeBusschere
1973 Topps #30 Dave DeBusschere
1974 Topps #93 New York Knicks Team Leaders
Today, most athletes commit to a single sport long before going professional, though some successful two-sport athletes play multiple sports in college. Like Tim Tebow or Michael Jordan, others have tried to transition between sports, but few have had Dave DeBusschere’s success.
PS: The 13 men who have played in the NBA and MLB are: Danny Ainge, Frank Baumholtz, Hank Biasatti, Gene Conley, Chuck Connors, Dave DeBusschere, Dick Groat, Steve Hamilton, Mark Hendrickson, Cotton Nash, Ron Reed, Dick Ricketts, and Howie Schultz.
Here’s a great piece put together by Jon Brecka for the November 1994 issue of Trading Cards magazine, ranking baseball’s top ten most sought-after cards. Thirty years later, it’s hard to argue against! Would you trade any out?
Here are cards 6-10.
How many people do you think have all ten “All-Time Greats?” What a collection that would be!
It’s time to look at the history of another T206 Honus Wagner—this time with the PSA 1 example sold in Mastro’s 1999 auction.
While raw, The T206Resource labeled this Wanger as 31a in their gallery.
Then, after being consigned to Mastro for their November 1999 Millennium Auction, it was graded and given the notation 31b by the T206 Resource. The T206 Resource said it sold for $58,513, which is partially true, as lot 869, with the 15% buyer’s premium, the final price, per my records, was $67,290. I believe it remains in the same slab to this day.
Two other incredible cards accompanied Wagner on Page 207 of the catalog: the Plank sold for $13,126, and the Magie sold for $9,492.
By the way, The T206 Resource calls this The Long Island Wagner on their Sales History page. Is that accurate? Also, if anyone has any more information about the history of this T206 Wagner example, please reach out. Happy collecting!
Here’s a historically significant ad TCMA placed in the April 1972 issue of The Trader Speaks—one of their first as a newly incorporated company that year.
Unfortunately, I’m unaware of a definitive source of TCMA sets and checklists; the major catalogs are all missing at least a handful. That said, The Standard Catalog does include the 504-card 1972 TCMA The 1930’s set. Here’s what they wrote about it:
Extending to over 500 cards, this was one of TCMA’s first ventures into the business of creating collectors’ edition card sets of former players. Over the length of the series there were a number of style differences. The set was issued in 21 series of 24 cards each. All cards were printed in black-and-white (except for Series 18-19 printed in blue) and feature player photos on usually borderless fronts. Dimensions were about 2” x 2-3/4” for most series, with Series 15-16 in a 2-1/2” x 3-1/2” format. Except for a TCMA copyright line on some of the earlier cards, there is no other printing on the front. Back have player identification, team affiliations, TCMA copyright and, after #72, a card number. Production is reported as 1,000 sets. Blank-back version and uncut panels of 12 exist.
But there’s another great source of information for the 1930’s and reprint sets from TCMA’s ad, and that’s Bert Sugar’s 1975 The Sports Collectors Bible.
And why is that? Well, Mike Aronstein wrote the section on “Collectors’ Issues!”
He’d have had a good idea three years later what he printed! Here’s the intro that he wrote:
Next, in the first two pages of the 1930s set, notice that the first three are described as unnumbered, and Aaronstein included information about distribution. Series No. 1 was issued separately, with 2 through 19 issues in pairs.
A few pages later, on the bottom of page 346, Aronstein included information about the company’s reprint sets. Some of these are mentioned in The Trader Speaks advertisement.
