More Team Cards

A couple more of my team card requests were returned today.

Whitey Herzog signed the 1958 Senators and 1961 Athletics team cards.

And Don Lassetter signed the 1958 Cardinals card.  His ballpoint signature is very light and difficult to see.

My Informed Delivery email for yesterday showed five returns, including, I think, some nice ones from Camilo Pascual and Juan Marichal.  Unfortunately, the returns didn't actually show up in my mailbox.  This is quite common for a Monday after a Friday, or Saturday holiday.  They usually show up 2-3 days later.  I hope these follow that same pattern.

Huge Day at the Mailbox - 10 Returns!

After a slow week, it ended with a bang: 10 returns!

Some of the vintage team card requests started coming back.  In no particular order:

Bill Mazeroski signed the 1958, 1963 and 1965 Pirates team cards.  I'm tempted to leave the 63 and 65 as-is, with just Maz's autograph, rather than trying to add a handful of signatures.  The 58 is already signed by Gene Freese, so I might try to get a few more on that one.  What do you think?

Charlie (Charley) Maxwell signed the 1958 Tigers team card for his $10 fee.  There aren't too many signers left for this card.  Jim Small is the only one I am sure of just by looking at the names on the front of the card.

Dave Giusti signed his 1963 and 1975 Topps, as well as the 1961 Colts and 1972 Pirates team cards.

Bernie Smith signed his 1971 Topps.  George Kopacz doesn't appear to be a good signer, at least since 2007, so this card may be done.

John Edwards signed his 1963 Topps, as well as the 1963 Reds, 1972 Astros and 1973 Astros team cards.  He also generously included three signed and personalized photos, as he usually does.

John De Merit signed his 1961 and 1962 Topps, as well as the 1958 Braves team card.

Bob Skinner signed his 1963 Topps and the 1965 Cardinals team card.

Lou Skizas signed his 1958 and 1959 Topps and the 1958 Athletics team card.

Bob Molinaro signed his 1979, 1981 and 1983 Topps.

Finally, Bobby Shantz signed his 1959 Topps, and the 1958 Yankees, 1959 Yankees and 1965 Cubs team cards.  I included $20 with my request.  Unfortunately, his signature smeared on the 58.  I might get another one and try again.  After all the requests I've sent to Mr. Shantz over the years, I was shocked I hadn't gotten a 1959 Topps signed by him yet.  Mr. Shantz also included a nice, signed index card, thanking me and adding some stats.  He noted that he had 27 complete games in 1952.  Can you imagine that?  If someone pitches a complete game today, it makes the headlines.  And Bobby Shantz pitched 27 in one season!

After buying a bunch of team cards on Ebay, I realized I just can't stand to send out requests with just team cards in them (unless the player charges), so I had to order a bunch of cards to send out with the team cards.

Felix Mantilla and Bob Speake Returns

It has been a surprisingly slow week so far, but I received two returns today.

Felix Mantilla signed his 1957 and 1959 Topps for his $5 per card fee.  There was a small, crescent-shaped chunk of the bottom of my sase gone on the bottom edge, which also included the bottom left corner of the 59 Topps inside the envelope.  I don't know if this is part of the machinery used to sort the mail or what, but I've never seen it before.  It was a very clean cut, so it wasn't just a tear or snag on something along the way.

And Bob Speake signed his 1956 and 1958 Topps, as well as the 1958 Topps Cubs team card.  He had his wife (according to the letter) type up a half-page note to me in response to a question in my letter as well.

I have a lot of requests out so hopefully the returns pick up soon.

 

Reattaching Bobblehead Heads

I had sent out five bobbleheads earlier this year.  Some to private signings, and some directly to the players.  To make it easier, and cheaper to ship. I removed and sent the head only.  I've had them sitting on my desk waiting to reattach the heads, which I finally got to today.

The heads have a spring attached, which is somehow attached to the inside of the head, probably with glue, then the other end of the spring is attached to a neck on the body.

Once the spring is back on the neck, I use a hot glue gun to help keep the spring attached.  This sometimes results in a head that doesn't bobble as much as it used to, but I feel better that it is attached securely.

Here you can see the Eddie Guardado bobblehead when I have attached the spring to the neck but haven't glued it yet.  I use some small picks I bought at Harbor Freight to help scrape away any old glue, and to try to pull the spring down to the bottom of the neck.  It's tricky, and you have to be careful not to break the neck or pull the spring away from the top of the inside of the head.

And here's a picture with a light coat of hot glue to help keep the spring in place.  You can see the thin string of glue to the right of the neck across my finger.  Hot glue can be a little messy.  It reminds me of trying to glue windshields to plastic model cars when I was a kid.  I always got the model glue all over the clear plastic.

Here are the five bobbleheads I had to reattach the heads to.  From left to right: Brooks Robinson, Shannon Stewart, Camilo Pascual, Eddie Guardado and Jim Perry.

Weekend Returns

I received three returns on Friday and Saturday.

Tom Carroll signed his 1975 and 1976 Topps and also answered a question in my letter.

There was another Tom Carroll that played for the Yankees about 20 years earlier.  He signed his 1955 Topps for me just about 18 months ago.

Ed Acosta signed his 1971 and 1972 Topps cards, as well as the 1972 Topps Padres team card which was previously signed by Leron Lee.  I bought the 71 Topps already signed by May.  There is an upcoming signing with Milt May, but the fees were more than I wanted to pay.

Finally, Dave Rader signed his 1972, 1973, 1975 and 1976 Topps cards for me.  I already had all of these cards signed by Mr. Rader over the years, but I had all of these lying around, and I hate to see a baseball card go unsigned, so off they went.  Unfortunately, the 76 got smeared.

I've been sending out a lot of requests with team cards, mostly from the 60's, so I'll start sharing a lot of returns with team cards included in them over the next several weeks at least.