Sunset Strips

Back at it today kiddies, as we finish our look at Topps Salesman's Samples (for now) before your webmaster takes off for some R and R.

For the first time in four years Topps went with horizontal cards for their 1960 baseball set and also mixed it up with the sample for the last pre-expansion year:



No corresponding back scan yet but as advised previously, I'll do a catch up thread with all the missing samples at some point.

1961 brought a return to the familiar:



Not only do the 61's look great, they celebrate the year of you blogmaster's birth!

Whitey Ford and Ken Boyer make an appearance as the representatives of the Stamp inserts on the reverse and presaging his assault on the record book, we get a Maris back perhaps in homage to his 1960 AL MVP award. I am not sure if other players are shown on different stamps on other samples nor if the small Magic Rub Off set was shown later on down the line and further investigation is in order:



1962 shows clear signs of the expansion era with a capless Gil Hodges (went to the Mets from the Dodgers) and a logoless Minnie Minoso (joined the Cardinals for a brief stint after playing for the Pale Hose the year before):



More stamps, albeit trimmed, on the back, plus the incredible Mr. Maris again. Jim O'Toole and Jim Gentile seem like odd choices for representing the stamp insert in '62 but both had big years in 1961, especially Gentile:



1963 brings some stability to MLB and presumably Topps. I love strips where full bleed borders just keep going and going and going...



Stan the man adorns the reverse but oddly there is no mention of the Peel Off inserts in 1963:



The immortal Stan Williams gets card back honors for some reason.

Sorry for the '64 scans, my graphics-editing skills are minimal:



The reverse is weird as we get some generic coins up top just when Topps should be moving toward realism. Still, you get a Mantle back and a mention of the coin inserts:



1965 shows Topps last Brooklyn set:



The reverse gets a little colorful and shows an Embossed insert. I can't make out who it is but then again, you can;t make out who's who on the insert either!



1966 would be the start of the Duryea era. Koufax and Mossi are really the yin and yang of 60's pitchers, aren't they?



Things are getting real interesting on the reverse in '66. With a color shoot of a Koufax decal insert:



The '66 pack graphic is also given prominence in the first year where penny packs were not available. Check it out:



Topps ended the traditional salesman's sample strips in 1967 but I don't have scans yet, sorry!

Once again thanks to Anthony Nex for the scans; any technical difficulties are of my own doing not his. Off to Florida for some sun and surf - see you all in a couple of weeks!

Strip Showstopper

Last time out (yesterday, actually) we explored the world of Bowman's salesman's sample strips and promised a peek at Topps own strip show. Well we're off!

Topps had salesman's sample strips produced for the 1952 baseball cards and so predated Bowman by at least two years. I am not aware of any earlier strips but it is possible they could have produced some, especially for 1951; maybe one will show up someday. The 52 strips look exactly as you would expect:



Those are numbered: #41, 42 and 43 which fits the known pattern of how Topps consecutively printed the 52's, row by row. The back touts the Giant Size theme that was starting "Taps" for Bowman.



Boy a box of those would be sweet!

The '53 strip adorning the header of this blog is not a sample, merely a remnant. No scan as of yet (I will do a catch up thread when I get ahold of scans for all the missing years).

There is a nice sea of white on this one from'54:



More of a mashup now as left to right we have #'s 24, 45 and 33.

The back is getting to look like the "classic" samples, which have one facsimile back and some advertising but this one is transitional. Check out the truncated reverse of the middle card and note the flip flop, which is odd given that doubled rows of similar colors were how the 54's were arrayed.



By the way, the backs on the samples often did not match the card fronts. Sometimes a random back was used repeatedly.

1955 brings us a vertical strip:



Nice but the real eye-opener is on the back:



Yes, that is a 1955 Doubleheader card affixed! Here, we have a better orientation and an opened DH:



You can see the ad mentions the Double Headers in this blow up:



I guess calling the DH's a gimmick seemed like a good idea at the time! It seems like there is no hope of ever finding a 5 cent Doubleheaders pack; they appear to be solely a penny item to be sold alongside the regular issue.

No '56 scan today kids, so we move on to 1957:



The strip is horizontal but the back is vertical:



That is the "classic" look I referred to earlier. I can't quite make out the middle part as the scan is blurry but the middle would be used to good effect shortly.

No 58's either today I am afraid but we can close out the decade with a '59 strip:



Aside from having the fabulously monikered Gene Green on a pink card (?!), the back adds a new wrinkle:



That is the address of a grocery wholesale in Chicago added to the mix in the middle. I suspect Topps started personalizing samples for their wholesalers to hand out as order reminders while having their own samples going to the wholesaler (or jobber if my understanding of the nomenclature is correct). I think the 1959 sample is really sharp and like how the card back is so green. The premium offer reference is just icing on the cake.

Look for a look at the 1960's samples next time. Thanks to Anthony Nex (again) and Don Johnson (1959 collector supreme) for all the great scans!

Do Blondes Have More Fun?

I have been playing around with ideas to expand the scope of the blog a little bit; nothing crazy just a little bit of contextual history here and a look at TCG's forebears there. The easiest way to feed this urge right now is to add a little more Bowman to the mix, which will in turn lead back to Gum, Inc. right at the start of FDR's administration.

I have been looking at three card strips of cards and salesman's samples of late and have discovered a couple of neat Bowman items out there, courtesy of Anthony Nex, who graciously let me lift about a bazillion scans.

The first known Bowman Baseball saleman's samples are from 1954; sadly there are none known from the classic 1953 color set. The 54's sample is arrayed 2 x 2:



There is another mix of players known and it would not surprise me one bit if quite a few more are out there. The back is neatly arranged:



1955 was the year of Bowman's Color TV cards and we get the classic 3 card variety now:



Unlike the 54's, the back does not even have a true facsimile of a 55 reverse:



They were really counting on the TV tie in. I wonder if they advertised on the boob tube? With Warren J. Bowman's history I would not be surprised, although the budget may not have been there. (NOTE: It turns out Warren J. Bowman wasn't there either-see Comments)

Now, the thing is that Bowman switched the faux wood grain to dark following the first 64 cards' display of blonde wood:



Perhaps the change was made due to production difficulties (brown wood grain would vex Topps in 1962) but they issued a salesman's strip with both grains during the transition:



Here is another:



I don't know the significance of the blonde version being upside down but it must have been cobbled together really quickly. They couldn't have printed both together, could they?

Back soon with a look at Topps saleman's samples from the 1950's. Stay cool kids!