We huddled in bunches on the the playground at recess. A large group of 6th graders turning in a slow circle. This was of multiple benefits. Wisconsin falls and winters during the school year are, of course, cold. The body temperatures contributed to a group warmth.
Also, we needed to see each other's cards.
No, we weren't cheating at poker.
Stacks of cardboard, scented by pink dusty gum, bonded together by rubber bands (a no-no today), less often in clear sheets of nine, enveloped in binders for protection, were on display. We were a mini-stock market, gathered around in circles, trading in baseball, football, less often basketball.
Bubble gum cards.
It seems an obviously difficult task, all these cards changing hands for trade evaluation, without some ending up in the wrong paws before returning to their original holders.
It was an honor system. We trusted each other (for the most part).
It wasn't perfect, however. Once my stack came back missing a 1973 Pete Rose. Then, a serious card. My 1981 Fleer Sixto Lezcano suddenly had a wrinkle in it that it didn't have before. (Luckily I had doubles of ol' Sixto). For the most part the system worked.
Now, mind you, we paid attention to dollar values back then to a certain degree. A few Beckett magazines or an annually published priced guide could be found floating about. But it wasn't the be all/end all of a potential deal. The "Homer Factor" sometimes led to the un-even deal. I was known to trade a card worth far more than the one being offered by my trade partner, because the player I was trading for played for the Milwaukee Brewers, Green Bay Packers, or Milwaukee Bucks. I took grief from several friends in that arena.
"Rob, don't just try to get Brewers, GET GREAT PLAYERS!!"
But I had just started this business within the last year, and there were decades of Topps going back, and a couple of years of Donruss and Fleer.
An ocean of possible home team players for me to acquire.
Sometimes you'd get the coup de grace. A current Brewer/Packer on a card with a former team. I almost had a stroke when a friend willingly dealt me a 1978 Ben Oglivie (with the Detroit Tigers) for what I thought was a card far less steeped in value (perhaps just in sentimentality to me) not in cash. I'm sure in that regard, I was taken to the cleaners.
Below is the actual card. In pretty damn good shape since the trade of 1982 that resulted in me clicking my heels like July Garland after getting off the bus that day.
There was the crown jewel that I wanted to get amongst our swirling of card traders. Our Bose Elementary traders. One had a 1975 George Scott. He was the Brewers all-star first-baseman who had played for the Crew long before I began watching the team.
But to me at that time, 1975 may as well have been the Paleozoic Era. And what a great image of The Boomer the card featured! (However the 1977 card of George featured a far more detailed shot highlighting the "shark's teeth" around his neck).
Alas, I was never able to convince this chap to let loose in a deal. I would acquire this card via eBay in 2008. Many eons later. I won't forget the feeling I had when I opened the envelope it came in, for a card I paid .75 for.
I felt like that kid again, peeling open a wax pack, but this time knowing the gem was coming.
That boy on that freezing playground who had gotten that Ben Oglivie so many years earlier. That's how I felt.
I have written on this blog before about how baseball at this time was a religion.
How I was a student of its seminary.
Baseball cards were rosary beads. They were prayer candles.
And yes, these players, with their image emblazoned in cardboard.
These were saints.
(Not the New Orleans ones)
Others that read this blog know my main sports hero of the time (and to a degree, today) was Green Bay Packers besieged quarterback Lynn Dickey. I elaborated years ago here. It wasn't until we had moved to Waco, TX in 1985 and my friend Bill slyly and with pomp and circumstance pulled out of his deck a 1975 Topps card of Dickey (with the Houston Oilers) that I saw what I felt was the Holy Grail.
Its light shone on me and beheld me in its trance. I dropped to my knees, dipping down my head in reverence. However, I was both jealous and happy for Bill. He was also a former Wisconsin resident (as our worship of Lynn was on an equal level).
Although in all fairness, he being originally from Maine, was a grand admirer of New England Patriots' veteran signal caller Steve Grogan, and collected his many cards when possible. So, when it came to Clifford Lynn Dickey, I had the edge in fanhood, in my opinion.
I did eventually buy that 1975 card at a card show years later, but right next to it on display? A 1974 Lynn Dickey (also known as his rookie card).
Begin church choir music here.
I bought the Holy Grail and the Ark of the Covenant both for a total of $2.75.
Again, .... HOMER.
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