A couple things.
Oddly, a Jose Canseco was the last card I needed for the 1988 Topps set. Easy right? Nope, took 2 years to get one. At the time it had fallen into that limbo of not being a common, but also not worth enough to be in the showcase. So every time I asked the answer was "sure we have that....Out back somewhere"
And, not cards, but one that got away and later didn't and one that did and I'm now glad it did.
The stamp dealer whose shop I hung out at briefly got into cards. He picked up a couple nice items, and two I wanted were a nice older photo of Fenway Park, and a Ty Cobb letter. The Cobb letter was too much, the photo a bit more than I wanted to spend. I've become convinced the Cobb letter was a complete fabrication by Stump. Green maybe felt pen on Cobbs stationery. First page was typical reply to a fan - thanks for remembering me, etc. The second page was really downright mean stuff just as Stump portrayed him.
The photo was a neat pic of a game in progress and signed by "some front office guy"
Eventually I moved was doing a bit better and decided to buy them both, saved up and went to the shop but he'd gotten out of cards about a month before and sold everything. He checked with the guy who bought it all to see if he still had them, no luck he'd moved the stuff wholesale almost right away.
A couple years later I go to the Shriners show and in a binder of random stuff, there's the photo. Same price as it had been, so I bought it.
After a while I decided to look up the guy who signed it.
Yeah, "some front office guy" was Frank Navin, Tigers owner. Didn't figure it out for a while because I was looking for a Red Sox front office guy. DOH!
Steve B