1951 Topps Red Back # 38 Duke Snider (Brooklyn Dodgers)

The history of vintage baseball card auctions is long and colorful.

T-206 Honus Wagner tobacco cards have sold for upto $2.8 million in auction. The "Holy Grail of Sports Cards", it's extreme-high auction value can mostly be attributed to great PR and "auction fever". It's not close to being the rarest baseball card and Honus Wagner is not Babe Ruth or Mickey Mantle. Yes, the T-206 set is beautiful & special but because of the # of cards and scarcities, few collector's try to complete, which should keep auction competition down compared to say 1933 Goudey or 1952 Topps baseball card issues.
BUT IT DOES NOT...

There's a story Wagner banned his card because he was anti-tobacco but there are other stories about financial considerations.

You surely have heard of PSA and may even know that this card was the FIRST they ever graded. But did you know that dealer (B.l. .ast.o name encoded) admitted tampering with the card, perhaps having it trimmed down to size, before PSA graded it so highly for the auction.

The 1969 Transogram Statues/Figurines baseball card set has (60) 2-1/2" x 3-1/2" cards from backs of Transogram figurine boxes. Boxes with 1 or 3 figurines/cards were sold and they were . packed with Hall-of-Famers like Mickey Mantle, Roberto Clemente, Willie Mays & Hank Aaron.

In honor of the 1969 World Champion New York Mets, Transogram issued the 1970 Transogram New York Mets set of (15) figurines/cards in the form of (5) complete boxes.