I was very curious when I looked at my Informed Delivery email this morning and saw one of my sases with an additional Forever Stamp added. I never add more than one Forever Stamp to a regular sase because if it were more than one ounce, I'd use a small, padded envelope with cardboard inside to keep it from getting bent.
Anyway, this sase happened to be from Bobby Shantz, who signed his 1950 Bowman for me. While he doesn't have a set fee, and many people don't appear to include any fee for him, I usually send $5 per card.
Because this card was special (his rookie card), and because I specifically requested that he sign it in blue, I included $20 cash with this request.
As you can see, he signed it beautifully in fine blue marker and added his MVP and Gold Glove inscriptions without me asking. He also wrote a brief note on my letter, thanking me for my kindness, which he signed as well.
Mr. Shantz will be 98 years old later this month! His signature is still very nice and doesn't appear to have gotten messier in the last 20 years, which is how long I have been collecting autographs ttm. I have sent to him 21 times over the years, sending more than $100 over this time, which is an incredible bargain.
Some day when I don't have any ttm returns to discuss, I'll highlight my Bobby Shantz collection.
Moving along, I also received a ttm return from Tom Timmermann, who signed his 1971 Topps nicely in blue. I did not include a fee with my request. According to his history on SCN, he was charging $5 per card via "The Athlete Connection" a few years ago, but that didn't seem to stick.
He has a history of randomly (as far as I can tell) signing fewer cards than what people send in. The last time I sent to him, I sent two cards and he only signed one. The card I just received from him was the one he didn't sign last time. I just sent one card this time so as to be sure to get his 1971 Topps signed for my set. His history on SCN shows him signing 1 of 3, 2 of 3, 1 of 6, 1 of 2 but also 2 of 2, 3 of 3, etc. I don't see any requests where he signed more than 3, but I also don't see many requests where someone sent in more than 3.
If you have a specific card you really want signed, I recommend sending just that one card. If you have several cards and have no preference as to which gets signed before the others, then I'd recommend sending no more than 3 at once. I think this gives you the best chance of getting more than one signed. I think more than three, and you're very likely to only get one signed. There's a relatively small amount of data, so this is mostly a guess based on anecdotal evidence.
The good news is he doesn't appear to keep cards, so even if you send in more than three, it doesn't look like there's a big risk of losing any of them.
I also received a magazine and a bunch of cards from two separate purchases from fellow SCN members.
One purchase was much smaller than the other, consisting of just two cards: 1958 Topps signed by Bob Keegan and Jack Harshman. I already have both these cards. The Harshman looks very much like the one I received when I mailed a card off to Mr. Harshman in 2004. The Keegan card is a nice upgrade to the one I previously purchased. Mr. Keegan passed away in June of 2001.
I just can't pass up reasonably priced vintage autographed cards that are in good condition.
The other purchase included a 1969 Life Magazine signed by Jerry Koosman. Mr. Koosman is still with us and signs for $10. The note on SCN doesn't differentiate between items, so just $10 per autograph. I paid $25 for this magazine (and no shipping). The seller paid $4.67 in postage to send me this magazine and the cards below. Therefore, if I were to try to get this magazine signed ttm, I would have to pay about $9.34 in postage round trip, plus his $10 fee, plus about $7.50 to buy the unsigned magazine on eBay. So, financially, this wasn't a huge bargain, but I saved myself the work of packaging it up for the round trip to and from Mr. Koosman, writing a letter to hime, etc.
Other than the great photos and sports articles in these old magazines, the ads are just as entertaining and sometimes more so.
I especially like to look for car ads. This magazine has great ads for the Ford Torino, Chevy Nova, Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme, etc.
This magazine also had the following ads. As a kid of the 70's, these products were the things of dreams. I'd probably like to have them today as much as I did back then! (If you click on the image, you can see a larger version). Look at this guy putting a mini bike in his trunk! Those sedans from the 70's had huge trunks, probably bigger than the bed in my Chevy Colorado today.
Sorry, I am getting WAY off track here...
The seller generously gave me a 1972 Topps Royals team card for free, as a thank you along with my order.
It has four signatures from three players. Mike Jackson signed it twice, and Steve Busby and Ron Hansen each signed it once. All three of these players were on the team in 1972, but not in 1971. Team cards are really commemorating the team from the previous year, including the picture. It's confusing, but that's how it works. The seller, or whoever worked on this card, worked under the reasonable assumption that the 1972 card would have the 1972 team pictured on it. Usually, players are on a team for several years, so even with the one-year difference between the card year and team year, you'd think many of the players would overlap, but this card's previous owner was unlucky in that regard.
Some players won't sign a team card if they're not pictured on it. Even if they were on the team the whole year, they may not be in the picture for various reasons. A little over a week ago, I referenced an article describing how the team pictures were quite frequently the wrong ones. You can read that HERE.
I like to get as many players to sign these team cards as possible, so I include players that were only on the team for a short time, mainly because they were traded at some point in the season. This is also a reason why a player might not be in the picture and might refuse to sign.
The rest of this purchase consisted of various signed cards. Some vintage and some modern cards signed by older players. It's amazing to me that these cards were listed for sale over a year ago and didn't sell immediately. The seller did lower the prices a few times, but how can anyone pass up a Duke Snider autograph for $5? Obviously, I couldn't. Same with Bobby Thomson. Most of these cards are of deceased players or tough signers, or signers whose fees would be higher than the price I paid for the card already signed. There are several cards for my sets, including 1973, 1975, and 1976. I'm not going to list all the cards here, but here are all the pictures.
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