Thursday, July 30, 2015

National Sports Collectors Show 2015 : Day one highlights

"I just spent all morning flying to Chicago and boy are my jokes tired."


Welcome to suburban Chicago (aka, Rosemont), home of the 2015 National Sports Collectors Show! Just about everything that's a sports collectible can be found here, including this sweet Brooklyn Dodgers patch.


...and this 1923 Independent Baseball League schedule. (P.S. smoke Chesterfield, "they satisfy.")


At the National, "sports" isn't even a requirement. I've started collecting a set of 1930s aviators that includes Amelia Earhart. What should I find but the same card's original art for sale at a cool $15K?


Not every card is super cool and respectful of its star. I can't stop chuckling at this masked Hal Smith and his fastball signal, for example.


A couple buddies at OBC (OldBaseball.com) went the extra mile to create our card packs this year by sealing a pack of member photos inside a collectible wrapper, with gum. Here's the cover:


The wrapper's back text is worth reading, for sure; "Tipton" means a low-grade, well-loved card.


There's our Chicago Cubs style "floating head" team card on top of the pack.


What makes for a great first day at the show? Unexpected finds like these two foreign issues, 1956-57 Chicle (Cuban) #5 Silvio Garcia and 1931 Diana Cigarrillos (Venezuelan) #5, Luis Carratu.


It's a double pleasure to find Carratu, as I both learned about the set and knocked off its #5 type in the same visit; OldCardboard's profile has a little more info on this rare Venezuelan issue.


Silvio Garcia was rumored to be the first choice of Branch Rickey to break Brooklyn's color barrier, but reputedly proved to have the wrong temperament, with more details at the 1956-57 set profile. By this point, he'd switched to coaching and would've moved beyond such trifles...maybe.

Can't wait for day 2, so look for more updates tomorrow!

6 comments:

Fuji said...

Wow... that original art is pretty awesome. Keep the highlights coming. I'm living vicariously through all of the bloggers who are attending.

night owl said...

More! More!

Mark Hoyle said...

Looking forward to tomorrow

Bob said...

I guess the Venezuelan and Cuban cards would reside in your "numero cinco" collection and not your "number five" collection.

Bob said...

I guess the Venezuelan and Cuban cards would reside in your "numero cinco" collection and not your "number five" collection.

Matthew Glidden said...

At least one fellow collector tried to start a "number v" set for me last week, so it wouldn't be unheard of!