Monday, August 29, 2022

I Had a Mickey Mantle Card Once

 A Mickey Mantle baseball card in great shape sold for some millions of dollars the other day. 

I remember my baseball card collection, based on buying bubble gum at the corner store. I don't remember whether there were three sheets of gum and one card or vice versa, or some other ratio. Anyhow I had a stack of cards maybe 3 inches high, many of which were Wayne Terwilligers (just because that's the way they did the cards--those for the best players were the rarest).

I did have a Mickey Mantle card. I think it must have either a 1952 or 1953 card because it included the fact that he had been sent down to the Royals, which was 1951.  I think my cards were Topps, which started its baseball cards in 1952. 

I was a Yankees fan (the local baseball team, the Triple Cities Triplets was a Class A farm club); more importantly my sister was a Dodgers fan so I could only be a Giants or Yankees fan.  I liked the card, but there was something different about it.  Perhaps it was a Bowman card rather than Topps.  I don't know.   I definitely didn't get it from a bubble gum package.

The other thing which sticks in memory is condition: if the $12 million card grades 9.5 out 10, mine would have graded .1 out of 10. I believe I was given it by my friend, Van M., perhaps because he had a better version. Mine was crinkled and folded, with ragged edges.  

At some point I outgrew the collection, which faded away like all such things.


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