1952 Bowman Small FB # 63 Charley Conerly (New York Giants)

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The following autographed vintage cards come with an auction house LOA (Letters of Authenticity) from the top authenticators in the hobby - PSA/DNA / James Spence / UDA / GAI !!!

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.

Tobacco cards were instrumental in the start of the baseball card industry but were pretty much unheard of since 1920. That is until RED MAN TOBACCO got in the game issuing baseball cards in 1952, 1953, 1954 & 1955.
For just 20 cents you got a pouch of Red Man tobacco and one awesome 3-1/2 x 4 inch baseball card with it's tab (3-1/2 x 3-5/8 without). Exchange FIFTY tabs and you got one free big league style felt baseball cap of your favorite team. This made cards with tabs much, much harder to find and values 2 to 10 times higher.
25 players from each league were selected by "Sporting News" editor J.G. Taylor Spink. A Player's artwork with different backgrounds was used year after year. If a player changed teams, new team name & logo were painted over the old one. To determine the year, just subtract 1 from the expiration date on back of the card. The 1954 set had four variations.

How long have sports cards been around ? (part 1)

The first baseball trading cards date back to 1869. For many years, baseball cards were packaged in packs of tobacco as a way to increase sales the same way that today prizes are packaged in boxes of cereal. In the 1920's and 1930's, candy and gum companies started packaging baseball cards in their products as well.

Baseball card production was virtually halted in the early 1940's due to paper shortages created by World War II. The "Modern Era" of baseball cards began in 1948 when Bowman Gum Inc. offered one card and one piece of gum in a pack for a penny.

The first important football set was the Mayo set featuring college players in 1984. Other than the 1935 National Chicle set no other key football set was issued until 1948 when noth Bowman and Leaf produced sets.

1952 Bowman Small FB # 63 Charley Conerly (New York Giants)

1977 Topps AUTOGRAPHED
Baseball Cards

Auction's most costly vintage baseball cards

1952,1953,1954,1955 Red Man TOBACCO
Checklist & Values

1952 Bowman Small FB # 63 Charley Conerly (New York Giants)

1977 Topps AUTOGRAPHED Baseball Cards

Auction's most costly vintage baseball cards

1952,1953,1954,1955 Red Man TOBACCO Checklist & Values

1977 Topps AUTOGRAPHED
Baseball Cards

1952,1953,1954,1955 Red Man TOBACCO
Checklist & Values