Posted By:
warshawlawMy first pack in 1971. Every Friday night my family went out for dinner and we usually ended up at the mall in Mahopac NY, where my Dad would buy me a pack or two at the candy store. I still have a few of those dog-eared 1971's.
My first full boxes were two boxes of the 1975 baseball set that I got for my 10th birthday. The following two years, a favorite uncle sent me a Topps "care" package (he did some legal work for them) with all kinds of sugary crap and a couple of vending boxes of baseball. I'd sell off the candy and buy more cards. Alas, he died in 1977 and I not only miss him, I got no more cards.
By the late 1970's I was dealing at monthly card club meetings in LA and people were sending me entire collections. An aunt in DC sent me a shoebox full of 1972 high numbers, some friends with college age sons gave me a gigantic moving box full of thousands of late 50's and early 60's cards, etc. If only I'd stayed with it past 1980 (I discovered girls and cars and wasted several years), I'd be wealthy today.