Why the **** did you start collecting vintage memorabilia????

Runscott · #1 08-29-2013, 07:47 PM

Ben, it's funny. I sold that piece for about what I paid for it, and the buyer was having a lot of second thoughts. I think when he re-sold it and doubled (or tripled) his money, he felt a little better.

Runscott · #2 08-29-2013, 07:51 PM

Here's the other piece I should have kept, and a check as well:

BigJJ · #3 08-29-2013, 08:21 PM

I added a horse pic above, representing about one tenth of the horses here.

gnaz01 · #4 08-29-2013, 08:30 PM

Great thread!! Having dealt with just about everyone in this thread, I, too, feel privileged to have read this and to "know" all of you, sort of!

drcy · #5 08-29-2013, 09:55 PM

I collected a variety of sport and non-sport memorabilia as a kid, including Topps baseball cards. I consider trading cards a kind of memorabilia. As a 7 or year old I collected newspaper, political buttons, figures, TTM autographs-- and still have some of it in a closet box. I'm not a hoarder in the least, and family members sometimes comment only how little I have in my home.

As I kid I also was interested in art and music, played piano and clarinet, composed 'classical' music for piano, painted, had my own cartoon strip and was in planning stages of my own version of Disney land. In college I had a couple of political cartoons published in a newspaper and a poem published in an anthology-- neither areas held my interest, so that was the beginning and end those. So the who general art and collecting fits together.

mr2686 · #6 08-29-2013, 10:42 PM

1972 6th grade (yeah I'm old Ben) my buddies and I used to get our Dodger programs signed at the games. Always great fun to gain status based on who we got. I was the talk of the lunch room for a couple of weeks when I got Cesar Cedeno (well, until he killed a prostitute, but that's another story), and also the butt of jokes when I got Alston and Gilliam (both currently matted and framed on my wall...so take that you know-it-all 6th graders).
After that, High School and girls happened and I didn't seriously start collecting until July 31,1988 when a buddy from work talked me in to going to the mall to see a card show with Duke Snider as the guest. I noticed my buddy had a HOF book which I really liked so I ran down to the book store and found a hardback copy and had Duke sign it along with a photo and ball. That started a long road of getting HOF sigs and going to shows.
Here's the picture I got that day, and the reason I remember that date so well.

David Atkatz · #7 08-30-2013, 01:58 AM

In the summer of 1961 I was a 10-year-old Bronx boy, and, like most everyone else in New York, I became totally caught up in the Mantle/Maris home run chase. An avid reader, I read everything I could find about Mantle--"The Mickey Mantle Story," for example--and that led me to start reading about that Ruth guy he was chasing, and that led to Gehrig and the 1920s teams. I was totally enthralled.
I'd always had the autograph bug--I began to write to Yankees at the Stadium, and at their homes in the off-season. When I became a bit older, I'd go to the Stadium with friends and hang out at the players' entrance and get my yearbooks signed. My Bronx neighborhood got a little bigger when I entered Junior High School, and met kids who came from neighboring Elementary schools. One of those kids was Harvey Meiselman, and he showed me his baseball autograph collection. He had check cuts of J. Franklin Baker (Man, did his handwriting look old!) and checks of Ty Cobb, and Mickey Cochrane, and Eppa Rixey, and... and Babe Ruth! Amazing! I learned from him about the "serious" collectors, who tracked down and wrote to old players, and players' families, and I began to do the same. Soon I had Cobb checks, and Cochrane checks, etc., but I was too late for a Ruth check. So I traded a collector in Tennessee ten Cobb checks for a Ruth check. (There were mimeographed newsletters that we all subscribed to, which, among other things, listed collectors' names and addresses. Everything was done through the mail.) I was in heaven when it came. (May seem like a bad deal now, but I got those Cobb checks for free, so, what the hell.)
I began tracking down people who knew the old Yankees, and sometimes I was spectacularly successful. I obtained a signed and inscribed Gehrig photo, for example, from the daughter of a Gehrig family friend. And all of this--except for postage, envelopes, and index cards--was free! (Perfect for a poor boy from the Bronx.)
When I went away to college in 1968 I put it all away. I had other things on my mind. Sex, drugs, and rock 'n' roll. And, oh yeah, becoming a physicist. But in 1990, having settled down (I was a physicist, and a husband, and a dad) I took it all up again.

Scott Garner · #8 08-30-2013, 05:29 AM

Great stories everyone! Ben, thanks for starting this thread.

Like most boys that played Little League, I began collecting baseball cards in 1967 when I was 9. (Yes Ben, I'm older than Mike! LOL). Since I grew up in the shadows of Angels Stadium, I liked cards of my hometown team the California Angels. Angels All-Star shortstop Jim Fregosi was my favorite position player (I always wore uniform # 11 for this reason).

In 1972, I was crushed when the Angels traded Fregosi to the Mets for who ironically would become my all-time favorite player Nolan Ryan and a host of other players including Leroy Stanton and Don Rose.

I was fortunate to catch one of Nolan's early games in 1972 with the Angels from directly behind home plate. Keep in mind that the early to mid 1970's Angels teams were pretty terrible and Ryan was a breath of fresh air. The sound of one of his fastballs hitting the catcher's mitt was awesome- WHACK!!

The fact that he was also wild was also cool because it led to a lot of drama as he was developing some semblance of control with the help of catcher Jeff Torborg and pitching coach Tom Morgan.

Torborg had caught Koufax and was instrumental in helping Nolan with the pitching mechanics required to be successful in the majors. I made it my mission to catch as many Ryan pitched games as possible, because that was the best show in town.

It dawned on me in 1972 that saving tickets to games that Nolan pitched would be fun as each ticket represented a link with a hard date to a specific event. In addition to my ticket, I also picked up other tickets on the ground after the game. I suppose this is the exact moment that I became a memorabilia collector. I ended up trading tickets with other collectors that I found that did the same (not many in 1972). Through word of mouth, I eventually was able to locate other collectors in other baseball cities that collected tickets and would trade with them as well. As others on this thread have mentioned, $$ did not change hands at this point, only trading. My ticket collecting theme expanded from only Ryan tickets to also no-hitter tickets (as well as a few other themes that I have since abandoned).

Since 1972 I have collected tickets to every Ryan game (807 regular season games) that he ever pitched in regardless of outcome (win, loss or no-decision). As of today I am only 73 ticket dates away from completing this theme. It's been a long road and a lot of fun.

My no-hitter ticket collection currently stands at about 187 games dating back to 1901, BTW. Both of these are the largest of their kind in the hobby.

Here is a photo of my full ticket to Nolan's 1st game and 1st win with the Angels in 1972. Ironically it was Nolan's 30th career win (his uniform number on the Angels) and notched his 500th career strikeout (Charlie Manuel).

The best part of all this is the network of friends that I have made along the way. To me, this is really what the hobby is all about.

Forever Young · #9 05-15-2018, 11:19 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mr2686

1972 6th grade (yeah I'm old Ben) my buddies and I used to get our Dodger programs signed at the games. Always great fun to gain status based on who we got. I was the talk of the lunch room for a couple of weeks when I got Cesar Cedeno (well, until he killed a prostitute, but that's another story), and also the butt of jokes when I got Alston and Gilliam (both currently matted and framed on my wall...so take that you know-it-all 6th graders).
After that, High School and girls happened and I didn't seriously start collecting until July 31,1988 when a buddy from work talked me in to going to the mall to see a card show with Duke Snider as the guest. I noticed my buddy had a HOF book which I really liked so I ran down to the book store and found a hardback copy and had Duke sign it along with a photo and ball. That started a long road of getting HOF sigs and going to shows.
Here's the picture I got that day, and the reason I remember that date so well.

I was able to add to my childhood memories with a couple items. I love when I can add things that are "priceless" for 3 figures.

These are the original painting/ pencil art used for the numbered lithographs you see.

mr2686 · #10 05-15-2018, 11:34 AM

Great additions Ben...and nice resurrection of an old thread.

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