A few more 53-54 Parkies - 5 to be precise

I have had these cards for an eternity and have just had no time to share them. My 53-54 project has been stalled a little lately as I have been working on a few other things but my love and desire is still strong with this set. These 5 cards bring my total up to 24 out of 105 which isn't too bad especially considering I have the Horton, Schmidt, Delvecchio and a few other higher BV cards.

However, some of the cards in this post aren't big names and may resemble a playing card with the roundness of the corners. Nevertheless, here they are:

#84 Gerry Couture

 Here is Gerry putting some pressure on the net. Love the old-time skates, and Gerry was quite the scorer in the minors, but did have his A-game during the 1950 Stanley Cup playoffs where he lead the Red Wings in scoring with 9 points and won a Stanley Cup.

#3 Gord Hannigan

 Gord would only appear on NHL cardboard three times, this is his second year card. He played 4 part seasons with the Leafs before disappearing from the NHL.

#77 Jim McFadden

This former Buckaroo won the 1947-48 Calder Trophy as NHL top rookie with a decent 48 points in 60 games and beat out players like Red Kelly and Metro Prystai for the award. Jim would never top those totals over the next 6 seasons but did finish with a respectable pro career including 100 regular season goals and 226 points in 412 games. Jim also won a cup with Gerry in Detroit. 

#69 Jim Peters

More Black Hawks! Like Jim and Gerry, this Jim won a cup with Detroit in 1950 and was actually shipped to Detroit in a trade with a few others guys (George Gee, Clare Raglan etc.) for a player to be named later and some cash(apparently 75G's). Jim does have to his credit 3 Stanley Cups (2 with Detroit '50, '54 and 1 with Montreal in '46).

#68 Don Raleigh

Here is another for the set and my PC. Old Bones can be seen striking this same pose here and here. The addition of this card makes 24 for this set and leaves me only two cards short of a set of Don Raleigh cards from his playing days. I am still missing his 54-55 Parkhurst and 54-55 Topps.

The Swap Meet Part 1 - Vintage Goal

Well before I begin this post, I want to give everyone a little background info. For starters, I was tied to a budget for this adventure. I only had 65 bucks to spend and in hindsight I could have shown up with 600 and probably still left stuff behind. With that being said, 65 isn't much money when it comes to buying vintage so I did my best to try and balance all aspects of my original goal.

So here are the vintage cards I hauled in(please excuse the camera glare....had not time to properly can these):

1966-67 Topps #35 Bobby Orr Rookie reprint

One of my most favourite pick ups for sure. This card is MINT!!! Extremely well done, too bad it is a reprint. The backside shows a little reprint stamp on the card. Not sure what this card is worth, but I paid 2 bucks and would do so again in a heartbeat!

Here is the back and between the goals and assists is the reprint stamp so that I may not use this beautiful card for evil purposes! (Sorry for the Orr tease, but I couldn't resist it!)

1952-53 Parkhurst #99 James Bones Raleigh (He goes by Don though)
This is my first and only 52-53 Parkhurst card. The card isn't in amazing shape but isn't too bad either. A crease across the front and back and a second lighter crease is also on the back. Corners are rounded but apart from that, the card still has some gloss and was certainly worth the 5 bucks I paid.

Here is the backside of the card. Nice and clean with a neat little mail-in offer!

1953-54 Parkhurst #45 Benny Woit

When I saw Benny, I just had to leave with him. Like the Raleigh card there is a crease, but again the surface is otherwise nice and I love the first full-size Parkhurst cards. This too is my first 53-54 and about 5 min before seeing this card, I just saw my first Beliveau RC in person. He wanted 60 bucks for it. It would have blown my budget right away but the card was in poor shape and I thought I would try for lots of smaller cards rather than the one biggie. I am still having seconds thoughts about my choices but maybe when all the posts on this are done you can tell me if I made the right choice.
Here is the backside of the card. Like the previous year, Parkhurst had stuff to give away and the write ups include both French and English for the first time.

1967-68 Topps #51 Alex Delvecchio

This card is pretty nice. The nicest of the three real vintage cards with no creases. IT does have a couple dinged corners but other than that it is a beaut. Totally worth the 5 bucks I spent.

Here is the back, you can see the reflection of the camera as well as the few dings. The backs of this year were very similar to Topps' 66-67 offering.

In addition to these three vintage cards and one reprint, I also picked up a 79-80 Topps Doug Risebrough and an 83-84 OPC Dale Hawerchuk. I paid a buck for both of them but didn't think they were worth showing. The Hawerchuk was for my 83-84 set and the Risebrough was because it was in great shape and I don't own any Topps from that year. So I spent 18 bucks on those cards and 47 bucks on 20 autos, 4 game used cards and 5 non-auto rookies which I will be sharing in the next two posts.

One neat side effect of these purchases is I now think I need to try and collect all of Bones Raleigh and Benny Woit's cards. I own both 51 Parkies of them so each have about 3 more cards I am missing (more or less). If you have any you want to see or trade, contact me!

In addition, both are still around and I am going to try and fire some TTM requests their way too....here is hoping I get lucky!

Parkhurst Project Cards 6, 7 and 8

The other day I saw on eBay a seller who had a few different 51-52 Parkhurst auctions on the go and was willing to do combined shipping. I looked at the cards and to be honest, because of the photography, it was difficult to tell the shape the cards were in except for the little write up about the defects of each. I decided to take a chance and put a max bid of 5 bucks on each auction based on what the seller said.

Sure enough to my surprise, I won all three for 5 bucks a piece. When the arrived about 10 days later, I was happy to see they were all in pretty decent shape.

Ed Slowinski

Card number 102 and card number 6 in my set. As a card, Ed Slowinski has one corner that is rounded and the other three corners are worn but still have some sharpness to them. There is a very light crease near the middle of the card, but the colouring more than makes up for that.

As a player, Ed Slowinski didn't have a long career but he did have a few solid NHL seasons. He played from 1947-53 in the NHL and in 291 games he finished with 58 goals and 132 points. His best season was in 51-52 where he had: 64 gms, 21 goals, 22 assists for 43 points. After 1953, Ed tore up the AHL for a couple of seasons before leaving hockey in 1958.

Don "Bones" Raleigh

Card number 93 and card number 7 in my set. Of the three cards, Bones is in the roughest shape having a couple light creases and 4 round corners. The colouring is much nicer in person than in the scan and the text is sharp.

Bones played 10 NHL seasons all with the Rangers. His best year was in 1951-52 where he had: 70 gms, 19 goals, 42 assists for 61 points which was good enough for 4th in league scoring. Bones would play in two NHL all-star games (1951, 1954). I think I know where the nickname came from, according to Total NHL (the book) Don Raleigh was 5' 11" and he weighed 150 lbs.

Hal Laycoe

Card number 25 and card number 8 in my set. The card is in pretty good shape, a very very faint crease on the bottom, rounding on the corners and a very light stain on the back. Like some of the other cards, the colouring is great and the text is sharp.

Hal Laycoe's claim to fame is he had a significant role in the Richard Riot. Click the link to get brought up to speed if you were unaware of the history of that event. As a player, Hal was actually a Montreal Canadien for 4 seasons and would have played with Richard during those years. Laycoe was a stay-at-home defenceman who never scored more than 5 goals in any one season. Of the three cards I bought, all being rookies, his card is the only one listed in the Beckett with a Near Mint value of $80. I imagine the value of that card is associated more with the Richard Riot than with his accomplishments as a player.

Progress:

Card #25, 93 and 102 and 6,7 and 8 of 105 for my set.

Percent Completion:

7.62%

Cost of Cards:

$17.50

Total Cost of the Set to Date:

$49.95

With this latest pick up, I really think this is a set I am going to be able to complete.....It is just a matter of time (and a little money).