Full Sleeve Tattoos

Look around any concert stage or pro football field these days and you're likely to see one, if not more, players with a full arm sleeve of Tattoos.  It's old hat now but Topps had nearly everybody beat when it came to tattoo sleeves.  Of course, I'm not talking about ink but rather penny Tattoo sleeves, which were used by Topps when shipping certain items.

Friend o'the  Archive Lonnie Cummins alerted me to several of these recently, in turn based upon information from Eric Roberts over at the Vintage Non-Sports forum. Warning:  that is a tattoo rabbit hole if you click over! These two sleeves were used to protect the inner box of  "New Series" Popeye and Woody Woodpecker tattoos, both hailing from 1959:

There is some bottom indicia on the sleeves but I can't make it out!:

Popeye was the first major cartoon series to be syndicated for TV (in 1956) and the "New Series" was the middle issue of a three set run of tattoos from Topps that commenced in 1957 and by 1960 was the most popular syndicated show in the US. Woody Woodpecker was syndicated two years later and Topps managed this lone issue, with a later one put out by Fleer.

It's not 100% clear as to why the sleeves were used but they somewhat matched the boxes.  Popeye seems to be lacking the additional indicia found on the sleeve and I'm guessing it just has the information for Canadian release.

On the other hand this was the Topps file copy of the box:

I don't know what's on the bottom of a Woody Woodpecker retail box as I don't believe one has been seen in the hobby, at least that I am aware of, and if it's lacking the corresponding Canadian portion of the indicia, it likely was only retailed in the US.  A negative of the Woody box cover exists though:

Woody Woodpecker was popular but not nearly to the extent of Popeye. So were these a 2-1 deal, packaged separately, overstock?  I am not certain at all but they are pretty neat.  

Lonnie is chronicling all the various Topps tattoo issues from the vintage era and is making tremendous inroads in checklisting them. It's a painstaking task as almost none have captions and Topps repeated some designs across myriad sets. I wrestled the 1960 Football Tattoo checklist into submission once and it was a nightmare, even with a large chunk of the subjects already known.  Lonnie's tackling over a dozen-yikes!

Get Your Rah Rah's Out

The ever vigilant Lonnie Cummins alerted me to an interesting eBay auction recently that really blew me away.  I've covered the Topps Sports Club previously (most recently here), which was a promotional effort by the company that, given the bang for the buck, really should have been more of a success.  There were a number of pretty neat things Topps included with membership, including previews of card sets, large color photos of some top names in sports, uncut team checklist sheets plus the ability to order some spectacular premiums.  Promoted primarily via wrapper panel ads and the reverse of some Rak Pak header cards, the Sports Club debuted right as I was exiting the youthful portion of my hobby years and I never even knew about it until after I started this blog.

Anyhoo, Lonnie managed to uncover one of the all-time great Sports Club premiums offered by Topps, namely the 1975 Giant Size Football Action Poster!  Behold its mighty power: 

Yowza!!

I've shown the advert slip for it previously but it's well worth a repeat look:

It's a little hard to read as that's an old screen grab but those bulleted items running down the left side rode along with the poster and required some effort to put together by the recipient:

Boy, there' s a lot going on! There were a number of "card stands" you could assemble and which held, what else, Topps football cards.  Other things though, were needed to deck out your football field:

Those numbers were to keep score you also got to put team names in each end zone. Topps left nothing to chance as they gave you several formations to choose from:

Again, apologies for the fuzz-fest.   For me the best part of all this was the "field figures" along the bottom:

The cameraman is a nice touch as the poster has a TV and Radio booth (and a press box-so where's Oscar Madison?), but those refs are anticipating the plays too much!  And dig the cheerleaders:

I'd say whoever drew the pom-pom girl was using Mary Tyler Moore as their basis for that drawing. As for megaphone-man, no clue. The other neat thing is that the poster was created by Topps and not just supplied by a third party.

The football field was also a Topps creation:

I wish I could get a better shot of the fans-I love trying to figure out when the repeat graphics start on such things!

If one of you out there had room in your man cave, I hope you picked up this remarkable premium, which was offered in two separate lots for some reason.

Getting A Handle On Things

Topps had  robust rewards campaigns for their distributors and retailers, a practice they maintained from day one in confectionery business. Boxes of products contained premium certificates for the local retailers, while better rewards could be had by their wholesalers (jobbers in the parlance). Sometimes they would offer incentives, especially with larger sized orders, or when they wanted to blow out some  product that was in danger of going stale. Bazooka was famous for this kind of promotion and I recently saw a couple of these premiums online and grabbed some scans.

For the executive type, a briefcase was offered as part of one campaign:

That graphic reminds me of Hallowe'en for some reason!  The briefcase in question looks like it was quite snazzy:

Old school security system there with that key! I'm not certain on the dating but believe it to be early-to mid-1960's.

For the family minded, Topps offered a picnic bag, in a wonderful plaid pattern.  This promotion looks like it was used to push a nickel "Clip" version of Bazooka, which I assume was a looser cello containing some product for a vertical counter display:

I'll get to that 211922 code in a second. First, here is what I believe to be the clip in question.  You can find these on eBay pretty easily as a supply of NOS popped up awhile back:

Side view-the clamping pressure is pretty strong on my own examples.

Not sure what the idea was there, maybe there was an easel or backing board that rode along. As for that packing code, it translates to April 19, 1962 and shows it was packed on the second shift.

OK, now for the big reveal of the picnic bag:

Neat-o!  And you know what, it reminds me of  a certain above average bear:

For some reason, I am now very hungry.....

Triple Double Take

In terms of confusion, the 1980-81 and 1981-82 Basketball sets rank up there with the 1955 Hocus Focus fraternal twin sets and 1988's Pee Wee's Playhouse extravaganza atop what, to be fair, is a rather large heap created by Topps.  I don't collect the set as I consider anything hoops related issued after the ABA got busted up to be avoided at all costs but got back into the hobby just after the 1980-81 set was released and remember it perplexing just about anyone who encountered it.

To refresh your memory, Topps went back to an old formula and issued three mini cards on one standard-sized card:

Score!  (sorry, that's a really bad pun!).  Here's the back:

All well and good but 176 standard sized cards were produced with 264 poses featuring 168 different players!  This article from the May 3rd, 1991 issue of Sports Collectors Digest (SCD) gives you the gist (sheet shenanigans, no surprise):

So the current day Sports Collectors Daily (which I usually abbreviate as SpCD) has nice piece on the set, with a killer image of an uncut sheet:

You can make yourself dizzy looking at it!  Without giving away too much of the SpCD post, there are two sheets of 88 but there are many differences between the two.  I can't find any references anymore but my recollection is that there was some kind of professed method to this madness in terms of distribution but personally, I doubt it! 

The good news you can get each player with only 88 cards but what fun is that!? There were no checklists issued by Topps but SCD included a helpful master alphabetical checklist with their article, which may or may not unfurrow your brow:

1981-82 saw even MORE confusion!  A 66 card nationally distributed set was produced but then Topps added 44 cards for each of three different regions; East, Midwest and West, with 110 cards available in each Franken-set. They must have done this to stimulate sales but it apparently didn't work as they bailed on the basketball card market thereafter.

The first 66 cards comprise the National set and they are numbered 1-66, with 43 player cards and 23 Team Leader cards (four divisions with 6 in all but the East, which had 5).  Regional numbering picked up with #67. So why didn't Topps just create 4 regional sets?  Beats me!  What they did do was consolidate some teams into geographic regions that only make sense in the context of forcing the issue.

Eastern Region collectors got these 6 teams (NBA Conferences and Divisions in parentheses), totaling 63 subjects with the number of players per team varying wildly. Each team's count has their leader card in the total:

Atlanta Hawks - 10 (Eastern Conference, Central Division)
Boston Celtics - 14 (Eastern Conference, Atlantic Division) NBA Champions for 1980-81
New Jersey Nets - 8 (Eastern Conference, Atlantic Division)
New York Knicks - 12 (Eastern Conference, Atlantic Division)
Philadelphia 76ers - 11 ((Eastern Conference, Atlantic Division)
Washington Bullets - 8 (Eastern Conference, Atlantic Division)

Midwest Region got 9 teams, with 65 subjects:

Chicago Bulls - 7 (Eastern Conference, Central Division)
Cleveland Cavaliers - 11 (Eastern Conference, Central Division)
Dallas Mavericks - 5 (Western Conference, Midwest Division)
Detroit Pitsons - 6 (Eastern Conference, Central Division)
Houston Rockets - 9 (Western Conference, Midwest Division)
Indiana Pacers - 6 (Eastern Conference, Central Division)
Kansas City Kings - 5 (Western Conference, Midwest Division)
Milwaukee Bucks - 9 (Western Conference, Midwest Division)
San Antonio Spurs - 7 (Western Conference, Midwest Division)

West Region got 8 teams, with 67 subjects :

Denver Nuggets - 8 (Western Conference, Midwest Division)

Golden State Warriors - 7 (Western Conference, Pacific  Division)
Los Angeles Lakers - 10 (Western Conference, Pacific  Division)
Phoenix Suns - 9 (Western Conference, Pacific  Division)
Portland Trail Blazers - 8 (Western Conference, Pacific  Division)

San Diego Clippers - 8 (Western Conference, Pacific  Division)
Seattle Supersonics - 10 (Western Conference, Pacific  Division)
Utah Jazz - 7 (Western Conference, Midwest Division)

That's 195 subjects and each region got their own checklist card. Super Action cards of a few players were also included, in addition to their regular card in the National set but these were regional as well.

Here is a nationally distributed card, front and back:

I like the little stars in the number circle but is that while semi-circular blob dominating the reverse landscape a backboard or a diagram of how to play HORSE?

That little A in the indicia must mean it was the National set. Here is Magic's Super Action card for comparison:

I dunno, his regular card looks more action packed to me.  The reverse has some stats not delineated on his regular card:

Here are the three regional reverses, with indicia for each region running up and down the right border but no indication as to which are the Super Action cards:

A ten year old collector in say, Detroit was probably wonder what in the name of the Wide World of Sports was going on!

Well, I might as well show a Team Leaders card to round things off:

Whew!

Finigan Begin Again and Again....

Sorry folks, formatting issues (still ongoing, apparently, so forgive the crazy quilt of fonts) kept impacting my post about the 1955 Baseball first series slits and the related 1955 Topps Stamp mockup/test.  The first part is now here and the balance below.
 
Here is the section of interest, from the 2,3,4, and 5 columns of the double Spahn sheet:

Related to all this is the 1955 Topps Baseball Stamps test, which was in-house only. I've previously speculated about these noting they came from a 40 subject section of an uncut sheet.  In addition, from those 40 cards (4 x 10 in array) at least one subject is known in every column and row.  The latest checklist I have for the Stamps (2011 Standard Catalog of Vintage Baseball Cards) has two no-prints from the above slits among its listed subjects.  Their list includes 23 subjects, with a 24th, Aaron considered likely by me.  I guess it's possible the stamps came from the other "series" sheet but I kind of doubt it as one of the possible subjects, Wally Moon, is 4x here.  This is why visual checklists are so important, although the Standard Catalog may indeed be correct. 

 

Interesting, no?  Here's the breakdown, noting there are several "One impression" players on it:

1955 TOPPS BASEBALL STAMPS-KNOWN (23)
"CORKY" VELENTINE
"RUBE" WALKER
ALEX GRAMMAS
BILL SKOWRON
BILL TREMEL
BOB SKINNER
BOBBY HOFMAN
CHARLIE WHITE
CHUCK DIERING
DAVE JOLLY 
DON MOSSI
HARVEY HADDIX
HOWIE POLLET
JACK SHEPARD
JIM DAVIS
JIM PENDELTON 
JOE CUNNINGHAM
KARL SPOONER
RAY BOONE
RAY JABLONSKI
RUBEN GOMEZ
STAN HACK
TED KAZANSKI

1955 BASEBALL STAMPS-POSSIBLE (1) HANK AARON

1955 TOPPS POTENTIAL BASEBALL STAMPS-UNKNOWN (16)
ERNIE BANKS - 1
"WINDY" McCALL - 1
DANNY SCHELL - 1
"JAKE" THEIS - 1
BOB BORKOWSKI - 2
DEAN STONE - 1
FRANK HOUSE - 1
BOB MILLER - 
WALLY WESTLAKE -1
JACK HARSHMAN - 1
"DUSTY" RHODES - 1
HANK SAUER - 3
FRED MARSH - 2
CHUCK STOBBS - 2
WALLY MOON - 4
TED WILLIAMS - 3

Numbers = Impressions on slits above.

However, unless a third sheet exists with a different array than the two presently known, it appears the Stamp array was rejiggered from the regular card's sheets by Topps for unknown reasons. I'm working on a full update, which will be posted here as soon as the facts warrant.

Finigan Begin Again

For some bizarre reason, I've never really put together the fact that the two 110 card first series slits are known for 1955 Topps Baseball.  Topps had some interesting things occurring on their press sheets from the inaugural 1952 Baseball set on and things just got weirder each year.  

1952 saw three double-printed high numbers, presumably due to Topps running out of viable players. By the time 1953 rolled around, Topps  had already been in court several times with Bowman (and possibly other companies) and they hedged their bets a little, leaving a five number "punctuated equlibrium" gap as each series went on, backfilling subjects once their contract status was deemed airtight enough, although they got tripped up in the end, with a total of six numbers never being issued.  

1954 saw some interesting gaps and a move to 110 card half sheets (which, forgetting Ferris Bueller's sage advice, I only realized about a month ago, thinking they were 100 card arrays per side for a very long and embarrasing time).  The problem with 1954 is I do not know more than one slit, which had a gap where cards #151-175 did not make the slit.  Although I based that on the idea the known slit was arrayed 10x10 and not 11x 10 I think that gap still holds up. I think Topps did this because the set size went down to 250 cards and, while a plan to keep gaps makes sense, they seemingly had a good enough grip on their players that year it wasn't required.  So the trend was downward on set counts: 407, 274, 250. 

Then we hit the planned 210 card 1955 set, a nadir for sure as Topps went below the Bowman set count for the first time since their direct competition started in '52. Bowman went big of course, issuing 320 cards and going out, on the baseball front at least, in a blaze of glory before their president, John Connelly, decided he wanted nicer things to play with.

As well all know, the 1955 Topps set lost four subjects in the high numbers, possibly printed but either way pulled and never to be identified, landing at a final count of 206 and making me think Mr. Connelly was still contemplating his next moves, which I don't think even he fully knew until the 1955 Bowman Football set got bum rushed by Topps. Here are the two "first series" slits and you will soon realize why I used quotation marks.

Here is the first slit, I think it's the "A" slit but but am not positive as there are no markings:

(courtesy Love of the Game Auctions)

At least one other sheet with this array is known.  The other slit, let's call it "B" but also the "double Spahn" for what will be obvious reasons:

That was posted over at Net54 not too long ago.  It looks so clean I thought it could be a digital recereation (and it very well may be) but this extremely old REA lot shows what I believe is the same sheet, as you can clearly see two Spahns stacked up in the lower right, even with the grainy shot (it was their June 25, 1993 auction).  While it's likely enhanced by whoever shot the original, the Aaron to the right of Spahn and Ted William in the lower right corner of the REA sheet nicely confirms this sheet array is legit:

Also of interest, the backs on the LOTG sheet are misligned!  At a guess, knowing that Topps printed the backs first, the  Love of the Game sheet was likely a test for the obverse colors. Ordinarily, I'd say there's a chance the double Spahn sheet array was altered prior to final printing but a miscut card of ol' Warren, as noted in the Net54 thread, proves otherwise:

The proof is on the reverse, as the miscut stat line is clearly Spahn's:

In the thread on Net54, it's also noted a "double" miscut Hodges exists!  He's #187 in the set as a high number, so Topps was clearly doing it on purpose (more below on this). Now, let's count together, from most to least:

FIVE IMPRESSIONS (1)

70           ROSEN

FOUR IMPRESSIONS (15)
14           FINIGAN             
23           PARKS  
29           WEHMEIER        
31           SPAHN 
58           RIVERA
59           ALLIE    
61           JACOBS
62           KIPPER 
67           MOON 
80           GRIM   
81           CONLEY 
84           PASCUAL            
86           WILSON               

THREE IMPRESSIONS (30)

2             WILLIAMS           
3             FOWLER               
7             HEGAN 
8             SMITH   
10           KEEGAN               
16           SIEVERS 
18           KEMMERER        
19           HERMAN             
24           NEWHOUSER     
26           GROAT 
30           POWER 
32           McGHEE               
33           QUALTERS           
34           TERWILLIGER     
36           KIELY     
39           GLYNN  
45           SAUER  
49           PORTER 
57           O'DELL  
63           COLLINS               
64           TRIANDOS           
66           JACKSON             
72           OLSON  
77           PORTOCARRERO              
78           JONES   
82           HARMON            
83           BREWER               
89           FRAZIER               
100         IRVIN    
106         SULLIVAN           

TWO IMPRESSIONS (15)

5            GILLIAM            
11           FAIN      
13           MARSH 
20           CAREY   
25           PODRES               
40           HOAK    
41           STOBBS 
47           AARON 
50           ROBINSON          
54           LIMMER               
55           REPULSKI             
74           BORKOWSKI       
90           SPOONER            
103         WHITE   
105         DIERING               

ONE IMPRESSION (35)

1             RHODES               
4             KALINE 
6             HACK     
9             MILLER 
12           THEIS     
17           HOFMAN             
21           GRAMMAS         
22           SKOWRON          
27           GRADNER            
28           BANKS  
37           CUNNINGHAM 
38           TURLEY 
42           McCALL 
43           HADDIX 
44           VALENTINE         
46           KAZANSKI           
48           KENENDY             
52           TREMEL                
53           TAYLOR 
56           JABLONSKI          
60           STONE  
65           BOONE 
68           DAVIS   
69           BAILEY  
71           GOMEZ 
73           SHEPARD             
76           POLLET 
79           SCHELL  
85           MOSSI  
87           HOUSE  
88           SKINNER              
102         WESTLAKE           
104         HARSHMAN       
107         ROBERTS              
108         WALKER               

ZERO IMPRESSIONS (14)

15           PENDLETON       

35           JOLLY     
51           HUGHES               
75           AMOROS            
91           BOLLING              
92           ZIMMER               
93           BILKO    
94           BERTOIA              
95           WARD   
96           BISHOP 
97           PAULA  
98           RIDDLE  
99           LEJA       
110         ZERNIAL               

It looks like Topps plugged in both the puncuated equilibrium and consecutive number gap processes at the same time in 1955! Nos. 15, 35, 51, 75 and 110 from the former method and nos. 90-99 using the latter, with 14 "no prints' resulting.  There's a lot of single prints and even a 5x player in Al Rosen, so clearly whatever the next "series" was should have included these, perhaps leaving some gaps they hoped to fill in, until the last series came and they were bereft of any further subjects, leaving 175, 186, 203 and 209 to never see the light of day. Presumably some of the 2x prints were trued up a bit as well but that's not a guarantee. Given the "divide by 5" look to the tranches (and Rosen plus the zeroes add to 15) it looks pretty well planned out to me, even though the arrays are all over the place. Just look how parts of a couple columns repeat elsewhere, the random placements like Spahn and the plethora of single prints.

APOLOGIES: There is some kind of weird formatting problem going on with this post.  Please see the continuation of it here.

Asta Mysto

About four years ago I posted about some concept design cards that seem linked to the 1948/49 Topps Magic Photos set.  These were created by a firm in Chicago, known by a few different names near as I can tell, but helmed by a real outside-the-box-thinker named Sam Gold.  Sam, and later his son Gordon, were responsible for, among many, many, other things, creating many of the in-pack toy and send-away premiums found in cereal boxes across the continent (and the globe, really) from the 1940's well into the 1970's.  There's a whole book or three waiting and needing to be written about the Gold's (I am being 100% serious) but today it's just this li'l ol' blog post.

Click this link for my previous post which covered what was dubbed Quiz-o-Rama and offered by Hake's Auctions, happily won by me. This was part of the lot:

Well, Hake's recently concluded selling a similar batch, which I did not bid on, dubbed Mysto Sports Quiz, which is the focus today. Like the Quiz-O-Rama "cards" which I now think may have been earlier design models, these came with an affixed piece of special tissue paper that, when moistened and rubbed on the obverse of the card, revealed the answer, in a simple line drawing, to a question posed on the reverse. Quiz-O-Rama was bereft of any producer details, whereas Mysto was not. Here, check it out, quiz side first:

We now have a 1951 copyright by Premium Specialties, Chicago which was indeed Sam Gold's company at the time.  Here's some undeveloped frontage:

 

OK, let's face it-no kid was going to know a great polo player unless they were Richie Rich or knew someone who owned a string of poloponies. In fact, all three of these subjects would be pretty foreign to the average kid of the day, except perhaps for Jones.  Alice Marble, which is a spectacular name by the way, was an excellent tennis player and a bona fide celebrity in the pre-TV era, and who may or may not have had a very adventurous time duringWorld War 2.

However, there was at least one big sports name in the "set" and it belonged to a subject clearly missing from the Quiz-O-Rama lot I won, namely Lou Gehrig, who can be seen on the banner above.  Here is the Iron Horse:

I have to think that image could also have been the one from Quiz-O-Rama as it's a portrait from the waist vs. the very similar portrait from shoulders seen on the banner. The quiz was, well, a piece of cake for Gehrig:

Here's what the affixed tissue looked like:

Some additional concluding observations are in order:

1) Mysto was sports focused, unlike Quiz-O-Rama, which included general subjects. I'm not sure if that means anything but it could indicate Gold was pitching to a company that made a breakfast cereal resembling Wheaties. Perhaps he wanted in on the sports premium market or even Wheaties itself, which had focused heavily on professional sports and fitness almost from the time they were introduced around 1926 and debuted their motto "Breakfast of Champions" from the mid 30's in some minor league ballpark advertising.  It was then allegedly popularized thanks to Red Barber ad-libbing a commercial during the first ever televised baseball game but since there were only about 500 TV sets in use when the game was broadcast in 1939, I doubt it; my money's on relentless marketing by General Mills. It is worth noting however, the Dodgers game was shown at the New York World's Fair that day at the RCA pavilion.

2) I don't believe either Quiz-O-Rama or Mysto Sports Quiz ever made it into a cereal box or any other kind of product, and certainly not in the format where the tissue developing paper was attached to the card.

3) My earlier theory that Sam Gold may have pitched Quiz-O-Rama to Topps, or they just copped his idea, may or may not still be correct.  Instead, it may have been just the opposite, with Gold copying Topps and the Magic Photos issue. Or, perhaps he did pitch it to Topps and this was a revamped, or refined idea.

Now, let's go play a chukka or two of polo! Just need to find a horse...