Bazooka Gum's 13-year run of card sets ended in 1971, but not without an air of mystery. The 1971 Bazooka baseball set is actually a two-headed monster. Again created for placement on the back of Bazooka boxes which were filled with penny pieces of bubble gum, the set consists of 36 unnumbered cards, produced on 12 panels of three players each. However, there is also a … [Read more...]
1968 Bazooka Baseball Cards Shifted Location
There were some radical changes at Topps when it came to designing the 1968 Bazooka Baseball cards. Kids who gazed upon the 25-piece boxes of gum were used to seeing cards on the backs of boxes, separated by perforated lines but unencumbered by anything else. Maybe the company felt it needed to shake things up. Maybe kids around the country were writing letters, demanding … [Read more...]
1960 Bazooka Baseball Began With a New Look
Baseball cards were once a staple on the back of Bazooka bubble gum boxes. From the late 1950s through 1971, kids could count on the stars of the day showing up on the back, ready for the scissors with dotted lines to guide young hands. Topps changed the format of its Bazooka cards after the debut issue of 1959, replacing the single card full panel with a back that featured a … [Read more...]
1943 MP & Company Among Small Number of Sets Issued During WWII
It is often reported that once the United States entered World War II after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, no more cards were issued until after the war. But, at least two card sets - one baseball, one non-sport - were produced during the war by M.P. & Co. of New York City. The first was the non-sport War Scenes set (R168 in the AMERICAN CARD … [Read more...]
Why Aren’t You Collecting 1939 Goudey Premiums?
Their two most well known sets may be the 1933 and '34 issues but 1939 Goudey Premiums represent an interesting challenge on their own. These supplemental sites are larger in size, printed on thinner stock and feature a host of Hall of Famers. The premiums come in two sets and two sizes. The smaller 4 by 6-1/4 inch set of 48 different players is listed as R303A in the … [Read more...]
Early Baseball Card Gum Company Wrappers
Occasionally, we try to go back into the hobby's past to give new life to articles that were once printed in some of the hobby's print publications, most of which disappeared long ago. This story originally appeared in The Trader Speaks, a popular outlet that was available by subscription from he late 1960s to early 1980s. by Bud Tompkins Since my involvement in … [Read more...]
E120 American Caramel Among Most Popular 1920s Sets
Just about every decade has a baseball card set or two that lead the collectors' popularity poll. The 19th Century has Old Judge and in the early 1900s there are T205 and T206. Cracker Jack's two sets are the leaders in the early teens and the Goudey and Diamond Star sets are popular with collectors of 1930s material. In the 1920s there were a number of interesting sets, … [Read more...]
T200 and T222 Fatima Cards Provide Interesting Challenge
This article, written by Joe Michalowicz, originally appeared in the Trader Speaks, a noted hobby publication that ran from the late 1960s to early 1980s. In 1913 Fatima Turkish Blend cigarettes, a division of the Liggett & Meyers Tobacco Company, issued two sets of cards, listed as T200 and T222 in the American Card Catalog. The T200 set consists of team pictures of … [Read more...]
1964 and 1971 Topps Coins: Not So Heavy Metal
While the rest of the world around us grows old, we collectors remain young (at least in heart) and continue to pursue our youthful endeavors of amassing information and just plain things that immortalize our heroes of baseball. These "things" keep yesteryears always in the present, offering us perpetual youth as we continually relive the exploits of the great and mighty and of … [Read more...]
Quirky 1921-23 National Caramel Set Relied on Repeats
Through the years, eagle-eyed collectors may have spotted the same photo used in multiple card sets. Sometimes even a few years separated them. It was a lot more common, though, in the early days of sports card collecting. With few professional photographers and even fewer shooting sports in the 1920s, the use of photos was pretty common. Those issued with candy or baked … [Read more...]