My hobby shop now has a quarter box!

My little hobby shop has been getting cooler by the week. First they went from having a few stray singles that didn't interest me much and ball point pen autos to having some vintage and current rookies. Certainly a nice move especially because the prices are all great. Then they added some quarter boxes and more vintage cards. I had to restrain myself from buying a 71-72 Topps Howe card. He wanted 50 for it, but there was a small ball point pen mark on the back that dissuaded me from buying.

The latest addition was two boxes loaded with singles marked 4 for a dollar or 50 cents each. I start sifting and boy did I like what I saw! Sure there was junk I already owned, but there was also some cool retro singles as well as an autograph. So sit back and see what I found!

Wayne Connelly 62-63 Parkhurst

Don't let the alternate spelling fool you, this is Wayne's rookie!

Paul Martin 03-04 Titanium Retail
Numbered rookie for 25 cents, yes please.

Milan Michalek 03-04 Titanium Retail
Probably the most "valuable" card to me. I don't have any of his rookies so it was nice to land this for a quarter.

Gump Worsley 71-72 OPC
This card is likely VG but it was a fun card to find in the box and one I don't own so it was a no brainer for 2-bits.

Eric Daze 02-03 Stadium Club Lone Star Signatures
This card had the highest book value at 20 bucks, was pretty surprised to see an auto in there and couldn't pass this one up. I remember when Daze was a goal scoring beast with 8 straight 20+ goal seasons.

Gerry Ehman 59-60 Parkhurst

His rookie card! Not in bad shape either!

Gary Edmundson 59-60 Parkhurst

Another rookie, shame for the ink about his head.

Mats Naslund 83-84 OPC
The only card in the lot that wasn't a quarter. This set me back a dollar, but I needed it for my set so I certainly couldn't leave it!

Garry Veneruzzo 68-69 Topps
I learned something buying this rookie card for a buck, Gary was born in the same part of Thunder Bay that I was! I had never heard of him prior to buying this card so not only do I have his rookie, I also had a history lesson.

Claude Provost 62-63 Parkhurst
Card is in pretty rough shape, but I didn't have any from this set before so it was nice to find it.

Bill Reay 74-75 Topps
Looks like his lucky hat would soon let him down as he was fired 2 1/2 seasons after this card was produced. I learned that I will be needed his rookie card to help finish my 51-52 set... Kinda neat info..

Albert Langlois 60-61 Parkhurst
My first from this set as well, almost my second as I left a $20 Jacques Plante card behind. Crazy you ask? Maybe, but the card was pretty rough....creases and pen marks....I still wonder about it though..

Earl Ingarfield 60-61 Topps
His name is Earl and he is my first of two from this set.

Larry Regan 60-61 Parkhurst
Larry looks a bit like Norm MacDonald to me, according to the back of the card he "is a real dipsy-doodler and a treat to watch". The back of the card also says he "had a bad injury due to a gimpy knee". They sure don't write card backs like that anymore!

Jean Guy Talbot 61-62 Parkhurst
Looks like the Canadiens were Irish for a year, these cards had cartoons on the back with a funny rub and reveal punchline. This one had something about soap...

Al Arbour 68-69 Topps

My first non-coaching Al Arbour card. Love the Johnny Unitas hair cut!

Al LeBrun 60-61 Topps
My other card from this set.

Gilbert Perreault 73-74 Topps
I seem to be finding this guy's cards everywhere I go!

Ryan Suter 05-06 Power Play
A few modern rookies grabbed my attention. I didn't have any of his yet and for 25 cents I would buy them up all day. He is a beast on the blue-line.

Andrej Meszaros 05-06 Power Play
Hasn't been able to be as offensive as his Ottawa days, but should figure into the long-term plays for Philly. Lots of talent and a nice deal at 25 cents.

Rick DiPietro 00-01 UD Reserve
Much like the Islanders I wonder why I spent money on this guy. I dropped a quarter, they dropped 67.5 million. I guess my gamble isn't as bad!

There you have it. A nice raiding of the box, and I hope they keep them coming as it will certainly have be back time and time again. Overall, it cost me 6.90 with taxes and it landed me 21 cards. I picked up a few other singles in subsequent trips which I will have to post at another time!

Would you buy one? What would you pay?

I have always been in love with the 1951-52 Parkhurst set, maybe as long as I have been collecting. However, as I get older, my love remains for those little guys, but I find myself equally interested in the old C56's, 55's and 57's from the early part of the 1910's. I just found someone selling an old pack that had could have had the C57's in it.

CHECK IT OUT!

Now, what would you pay? Does something like that interest you? Of course, there is a chance it is a scam, but assuming it is legit, what is it worth to you?

I know I would pay 100 bucks for a wrapper from 51-52, but I struggle to decide what this is worth....

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!

The Latest Swap Meet

Things have been super crazy lately and I want to share my swap meet success but since I don't have much time to do so tonight, I thought I would share the size of the stack I picked up. I already have one regret of something I left behind, but I will get to that in due time as well.

I went with a plan: Vintage, autos and rookies and I think I accomplished it.

Anyway, I will break the post into a couple pieces starting tomorrow and share my finds.