I love reading magazines. I love reading internet articles. And I really love reading sports memorabilia blogs. Unfortunately... I haven't really enjoyed reading books since I was a kid.
In fact... over the past few years, I've probably read less than ten books and two or three of them were baseball card related. Thankfully the latest addition to my library is mostly filled with photographs. The book is called 300 Great Baseball Cards of the 20th Century and it was published by Beckett back in 1999.
As the title states... the book shows off 300 cool cards from the early 1900's to the late 90's. All of the iconic cards you'd expect to see are in there... like the T206 Wagner, the 1952 Topps Mantle, and the 1989 Upper Deck Griffey.
But what the thing I enjoyed most about this book were some of the Average Joe cards... like the 1974 Topps Frank Robinson:
1974 Topps #55
I've looked at this card probably fifty different times while flipping through my vintage binder and not once did this card stand out to me. But after reading the book, I discovered that this card represents the first time the designated hitter was listed as a position on a Topps trading card.
Technically there are a few Topps designated hitter baseball cards in the 1974 set... like Tommy Davis:
But Frank Robinson is the lowest numbered card in the set with that distinction. Now if I could only get my hands on a 1973 Topps Ron Blomberg card.
I hope all of you had a great week. California is finally receiving some much needed rain... but hopefully Mother Nature takes a break tomorrow, so I can hit up the De Anza Flea Market. It seems like months since I've been out to the flea market.
Happy Friday and sayonara!
10 comments:
I'm pretty sure I first learned about the Frank Robinson DH thing from that book too. I have it buried in my bookshelves somewhere.
It's funny, because I received that card a couple of days ago, and I wondered if that was the case, for the DH position...
I should look into getting more baseball card books. A lot of them are great snapshots in time as to what the temperature in the hobby was toward "investors" and the reasons for collecting.
Interesting book; I like the concept. I did a Google search for something similar but hockey and came up empty handed.
The book was well worth the $4.98 I spent. The nuggets of knowledge alone has paid off the book.
Could be an interesting subset to build. There were at least three other players I noticed in the 74T set that were tagged as designated hitters.
My baseball card book collection is pretty tiny. As of this morning, I own 7 books. But you're absolutely right. This book included current values, which obviously have shifted over the past 14 years. Good stuff.
There's a book called, Got'em, Got'em, Need'em that has cards from a variety of sports including hockey.
WoW That book would be a great Christmas gift!
It's a quick read... but I definitely recommend it. Maybe Santa Claus reads my blog :)
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