October Card Show - '72 Topps

Poor Charlie Silvera. His cartoon post remains half-written. Overwhelmed by Halloween, Ponies and the card show. He'll have to wait another day at least because it's 1972 Topps day today. Theme song for today's post: Bad Apple from the Touhou project.


Can you believe something more girly and more badass than My Little Pony?

Another one of my goals for the card show was to complete the 1972 Topps Series 1 set. Good news: I only needed two cards. Bad news: those cards were Frank Robinson and *gulp* Willie Mays. My objectives were laser focused though so I was confident I could do this. I found the Frank first.

 

Uncle Dick's vintage cards was at the show again. Thank goodness because Oklahoma Sports Memories had already come to Atlanta in September and didn't make this show. This is the guy I'm always forgetting the name of for some reason. Uncle... Jeff?  Buck? Lumpy? Schnookums? I can't remember Dick for dick.  I think I may have come up with a mnemonic device to remember it though. Auntie Penis. You just don't forget something like that. I know, I've been trying since I thought of it last weekend. DESPERATELY.

Uncle Dick was the second place I bought stuff from and got the lion's share of my cash. I hit the bargain box and the $2 box first (looking for a different set, but that's another five posts) but didn't find a Frank or a Willie at Uncle Dick's. Why couldn't this guy's parents had named him Fred? Having failed in the bargain boxes to find my needed '72s I checked the binders. There are several dozen binders at Dick's table with commons and stars from the '50s to 1978. Note that date, it'll be important in a later post. I grabbed the first '72 binder and looked through it for Willie and Frank. I found Mays first since he's a lower card number and he had one for $15. I passed on it for the time being thinking I could look around the show and come back for it later.  Frank Robinson had three cards in his pocket ranging from $3 to $7. I pulled the three dollar card and looked around a bit more.

On the opposite side of his table setup was another bargain box, this time for cards priced 50 cents and up. I looked through the '72's and found this Robinson for $2! WOOOOO CHEAP FRANK! I got the $2 Robinson and put the $3 one back in the binder. I wish I had gotten my act together before the show and found my want lists because I know for a fact I saw at least 2 Third series cards I needed in that cheapo bargain box. Oh well, it'll wait for the next show I suppose.

After paying Uncle Dick for letting me take his Frank, I wandered about some more and found another box filled with vintage stuff. I looked through the schtuff and found another card I needed for a different set that was way overpriced. Then I found this one with no price at all:

Willie Mays! With a tear and a hole! Even the toploader it was in was broken! Just the condition I'm looking for! I asked the kid behind the table for a price and he referred me to the guy running the table. Turns out it's the guy who runs JT Sports Collectibles, a card shop right down the street from my mom's house. I asked him for a price, he thought about it for a bit and he said four beautiful words:

"How about five dollars?"

OH JOY OF JOYS! Tipton Willie for a Lincoln! SOLD! I even bought the overpriced card and a third card from the guy in my glee at completing Series one. With a well-loved Willie!

Some of you may be wondering, "Why buy that crummy old card with holes in it when you can get one in decent condition for ten bucks more?"

Because beat up cards need love. And I love my beat up series completing Willie. And hey, I'm supporting the local card shop too. Can't beat that with your Uncle Dick.