Brianruns, I appreciate what you're saying, but I think there is an element that you are missing.
For the record I am a published historian myself and have done extensive research work for three major university athletic programs and the Hall Of Fame.
That being said, one has to realize that - in many cases - we're just dealing with cardboard here. There is no "value" to any of it other than the emotional value that one applies to it. There is a factor of preserving such items so that future citizens might experience that same emotional value, but if it comes at a cost of depleting the emotional value for the current owner, that's counterproductive.
There are tons of things out there that I wish someone from the 1910's had bothered to save and preserve so that I could enjoy it today, but that's also part of the rarity of history. It's fleeting. I'm sure everyone alive today wishes the previous owners of the Dead Sea Scrolls had thought to preserve the entire document in UV protectant glass away from direct sunlight in a climate controlled room, flat and with acid-free paper. But that didn't happen.
That's one reason I don't deal in graded cards. To me it seperates the item from my enjoyment and places it at measurment of someone else's enjoyment.
I get what your saying, but flaunting some credentials in some effort to trump the validity of how someone else handles their "worthless" items seems a bit disengenuous.
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