The Kindness of Strangers

Every week there seems to be at least one example I can come up with that illustrates the generosity exhibited by those that share in the sports card hobby.  Today's post is just the latest.  I was contacted (a couple of months ago now) by a reader named Angus from Canada.  Though he doesn't have a blog of his own yet, and though I had never met or even exchanged messages with Angus before, he was kind enough to pick up a bunch of 1979-80 O-Pee-Chee Whalers at a local card show for me!

I'm always amazed by folks who bother to remember what I need, and then to search it out at a card show and send it to me.

Angus covered most of the team set here as well!  He wasn't sure what particular cards I was missing, so he grabbed all of them figuring any dupes could be potential condition upgrades.  Well, this Andre Lacroix is indeed one I did not have.  Score!

Same with this Carroll!  Although depicted with Detroit, the "Now with Whalers" designation and that oh-so-familiar logo meant I needed this one for my team set.

It will be fun to sit down this weekend and merge these in with my existing cards.

I have a couple of ideas in mind on where to send my un-needed duplicates off to!

Here's another one that's new to my collection!  '79-80 Topps/O-Pee-Chee will forever be one of the most monumental hockey sets ever released in my opinion.  I completed the entire Topps set a while back, but it's so nice to get within range of completing the Whalers team set from the OPC release after all these years.

This is one of my favorite hockey cards of the '70s, period.  In fact, the avatar that I use on Blogger comes from the cartoon on the back of this card.

One of only two cards of Al Hangsleben released during his playing days, and the only one that features him with the Whalers (the other is from '81-82 OPC and he's with the Caps there).

Dave Inkpen is a card I was missing previously as well.  He only had two cards from his playing days as well, with the other being a '76-77 OPC WHA.

Here's the final card that I didn't yet have from this batch, Chuck Luksa.  To my knowledge this is the only card of Luksa ever produced...

With these in hand I'm now just two cards away from a complete Whalers team set.  As my want list indicates, I'm in the market for #279 Dave Keon or #293 John Garrett if you've got one or both lying around collecting dust.

Angus threw in a couple of unexpected cards to accompany the OPCs, including this Zarley Zalapski All-Star insert from '93-94 Stadium Club.

The final card I need for my 1982 Topps baseball set, but in O-Pee-Chee form!

Last, but certainly not least, was this slightly over-sized Petro Canada All-Star 3-D card, something I'd never seen before.

When you open it up here's what you get.  A nice 3-D effect with Fisk gunning down a baserunner, his stats in the foreground.  Certainly a cool oddball!

Angus, I appreciate your generosity in searching out and then sending these cards to a total stranger!  Thank you very much!!!