Henry — Russ Mascieri is still around. I’ve bought some stuff from him on eBay recently (username lenelan).
I have Kit Barry’s “The Advertising Trade Card: Information and Prices” from 1981, and his “Reflections: Ephemera from Trades, Products, and Events”, an illustrated 1993 auction catalog. Also all four of William Frost Mobley’s sale catalogs, the last two of which were called “An American Enterprise”. These provide a broad overview of what’s out there, with representative examples, but they’re no substitute for Ron Schieber’s detailed checklists. I agree that Ron’s list of baseball trade cards is invaluable, though there are some things he missed (e.g. two variants of the Merchant’s Gargling Oil cards). By the way, John Kemler, who helped Ron compile many of those lists and who has an even bigger trade card collection, is still around and active as a paper dealer.
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