Herpolsheimer's and Xmas - do you remember any of the old bb card brands?

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Posted By: Joann

My Christmas and baseball cards, connected.

When I was a kid there were three main downtown department stores in Grand Rapids - Wurzburg's, Steketee's and Herpolsheimer's. Every fall we'd go down there and visit all three for back-to-school clothes, shoes, etc for my older sister. Although the cards say "Boys Clothing", at least by the early- to mid-60's they were full service stores. If you needed anything in GR, it was Wurzburg's, Stek's or Herp's.

But the big thing with these stores was Christmas. Every year all three would dedicate all of their sidewalk windows (and there were many of them) to animated displays of Christmas scenes. That's one of my earliest Christmas memories - as much as the gifts and everything else on Xmas mornings.

Once each season my mom and dad would bundle up all of us kids, put us in the car and head for downtown. It was cold, and it took a long time to see all of the windows. But there was nothing like standing out there in a soft snow with all of the other kids and parents going from window to window trying to pick your favorite. Of the three, Herp's may have been the biggest. I don't remember for sure - just that of the three stores Herp's sticks out most as a name. All three are gone now - done in by the suburban malls.

I have two Herp's cards in my collection. I got one of the M101-4's about 7 years ago. I got one of the 1920ish cards from the recent find from Leon earlier this year. Neither are Detroit players, but I'm happy to have them both. When I show anyone around here my cards, they are fascinated by the Cobb, Ruth and 19th Century items. But they light right up when they see my two Herp's cards. Probably for the same reason they lit me up - those stores are long since gone and the cards spark childhood memories in people my age.

The "find" of the later cards was about 3 miles or so from where I live - they were right down on the west side by Richmond Park. I've toyed with the idea of buying as many of these as I can find and seeing how many of the original 69 I can reunite. For now I'm more than happy, though, to have my two.

Now I'm just waiting for the Stek's find!

Joann

Edited to revise title

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Posted By: barrysloate

Great story Joann, of Christmases past.

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Posted By: Joann

Thanks Barry. The post was a bit self-indulgent, but this time of year I always am thinking about the Herp's cards.

So I'll hijack my own thread and ask everyone this:

Of all of the tobacco brands, caramel brands, 19th Century and even the later issues of the 30's, etc, I have never heard of any of the brands used except Cracker Jacks and the Sporting News (or is it Sporting Life?). Besides those two, Herp's is the only one I have an personal memory of.

Anyone personally remember any of the other brands? Anyone remember smoking Piedmont cigarettes? Or eating Philadelphia caramels? How far back in baseball card history can you go with a personal memory of one of the brands (aside from CJ or SN)? I guess I can get back to 1915 or so with the Herp's cards.

I'll edit the title of the first post to more reflect this question.

Joann

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

Isn't Herpolsheimer's the store featured in "A Christmas Story"? Also I seem to recall that when I watched "The Polar Express" with my kid last year that they showed a Herpolsheimer's with all the Christmas displays in the windows....or maybe I'm just making it all up in my head.

As for the big find of these cards I'm really kicking myself now for not going after at least one of these cards when they all showed up on ebay because when you see them now they seem to have already doubled or tripled in price.

As far as remembering any of the brands anytime I see a Red Man's tobacco card from the 1950s it reminds me of my great grandfather who used to chew that stuff all the time. I think Piedmont's were around for quite a long while after the T206 cards were distributed so I bet there are some oldtimers in here who might remember them.

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Posted By: barrysloate

No Joann, haven't been smoking too many Piedmonts lately. But I can remember getting pieces of Bazooka bubble gum at the barbershop around 1960, and that the baseball players were pictured on the bottom of the box.

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Posted By: Bob Pomilla

Well, I remember shopping at Gimbels, once upon a time rival of Macy's, with my family when I was a lad.

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Posted By: barrysloate

I too remember going to Gimbel's as a child when they still had a coin and stamp department. My grandmother would take me there and I would always come home with a few Buffalo nickels or Mercury dimes that I needed. But no baseball cards.

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Posted By: Bob Pomilla

One thing I never did find out, Barry: Did Bazooka Joe really need that eye patch, or was it merely an affectation?

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Posted By: Scot Reader

Dan,
You weren't halucinating. Herpolsheimer's is in Polar Express. The storefront is shown and one of the kids even shouts out the name as the train roars by. I also just got my annual dose of "It's a Wonderful Life" two days ago and noticed the Sweet Caporal sign in Mr. Gower's store that says "Ask Dad, He Knows" from which George gets the idea to ask his Dad before delivering poison pills that the druggist, distraught over his son's death, had inadvertently bottled. I too love seeing references to long defunct baseball card brands.
Scot

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Posted By: Frank Wakefield

Well for starters, that was a neat tale, Joann.

And now I have to watch It's a Wonderful Life, a movie I thought I knew quite well, but I seem to have missed that sign. Thank you, thank you.

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Posted By: barrysloate

Excellent question Bob, and we may never know the answer. Kramer wore an eye patch for affectation, and switched it from his left eye to his right because it itched. Bazooka Joe...well, that's another story. He took that secret to the grave with him (I don't even know if he's dead).

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Posted By: David Smith

Bazooka Joe's eye???

He shot it out with a Red Ryder BB gun he got for Christmas.


David

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Posted By: Jim Manos

My kids and I watched Polar Express and at the beginning of the move they had a Herpolsheimer's Store front with Santa, Christmas stuff etc... neat post.

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Posted By: Joann

I've never seen Polar Express, but it seems like I do remember someone saying there was a Grand Rapids connection. I should watch that part of it to see if it looks anything like I remember. I highly doubt it - all of the downtown stores have been gone so long I can't imagine there was anything to even work from for purposes of making the movie.

Still though - I'll probably try to borrow a copy and figure out where it shows anything from GR or Herp's. I think one of the people that made the movie or something like that may have been a GR native? I don't recall any details, only that there was a GR connection somehow.

J

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Posted By: Kevin Cummings

No Herpolsheimer's in "A Christmas Story."

The movie was based on a city in Indiana named Hammond. The department store there was Goldblatt's. The department store featured in the Santa scene is really Higbee's in downtown Cleveland where the movie was shot. Higbee's then became Dillard's, which closed in 2002. There were no Higbee's in Hammond. Don't know if either of those stores sponsored a baseball card issue.