Card Show Blaster - Dollar Boxin'

This past Monday, thanks to a holiday from work, I had the good fortune of attending a card show for the first time in years.  It was a decent-sized show, just shy of 100 tables with some autograph guests.  Having just returned from a vacation I was a little short on time, and funds, and nearly skipped it altogether.  In the end though I'm pleased that I stopped by, and I kept my day's spending under $75 including the small admission fee.  I thought that was pretty reasonable given how long I go between making it to shows.

To show off some of my haul today I thought I'd do a card show "blaster" post, featuring 20 singles plucked from dollar boxes...

There are going to be quite a few 1959 Topps cards in today's post.  One vendor had some really nice clean commons in his dollar bin.  I've been slowly plodding away at this set for years, and am past the halfway point with the cards in a binder even.  I figured it was worth my time to pull up my want list on my phone and see if I could do any damage.

In particular, I was happy to find a few needs from The Sporting News Rookie Stars subset, as I never seem to run across these for cheap coin on COMC like I do other commons.  From that subset I got Chuck Coles of the Red(leg)s...

...hurler Jerry Walker of the O's...

...Dan Dobbek of the Senators...

...and Deron Johnson, which I was particularly pleased to find given the "Yankee tax" that seems to exist on cards from this era.

This Pete Burnside is a little off-center, but aside from that is almost stunningly mint.  Couldn't leave it behind for a buck, that's for sure.

More red here with Charley Maxwell of the Tigers.

A confused-looking Taylor Phillips breaks up the color palette here with some black.  I can't tell if that's a batting cage in the background?  Too fuzzy.

Johnny Logan's a bit off-center as well, but again in remarkable shape otherwise.  The type of card that will likely never get a condition upgrade.

We'll close it out with some bright yellows and green here, starting with Bob Trowbridge.  I like how much of the frame Bob takes up here, makes him look monstrous in a way.

There seem to be one or two cards in every vintage Topps set that uses actual photographs that appear illustrated.  Such is the case with Ellis Burton here.  When you compare this image to the scan above or below it seems obvious.

Rounding out the '59 Topps is a smiling Walt Moryn.  I spent about 20 minutes digging through this particular vendor's dollar boxes, and wish I could have found more '59 Topps needs to be honest.  As it stands I'll happily accept this dozen, putting me at 326 cards now for my set.  54.9% complete and counting!

While I'm not actively pursuing the 1960 Fleer Baseball Greats set, I nonetheless could not resist grabbing the handful that I ran across in a dollar box at the show.  There were six of them, and I blindly grabbed all six knowing I had just a few cards from this release.

As with the '59 Topps cards, from the same vendor as it happens, these were in remarkable shape overall.  With a checklist less than 80 cards deep, it would be tempting to try chasing this one, but the reality is I just have too many other hobby projects at the moment.  Happy to scoop up cheap ones and hang onto them for now though.

My favorite of the bunch has to be this Burleigh Grimes.  The photo is just fantastic, and besides I don't have all that many cards of Grimes.

Bill Terry, again "Yankee tax" free!

My one mis-fire in this post was Ford Frick here.  He's pretty off-center top to bottom, and it turns out...

...that I already had a slightly less off-center copy in my small number of cards from this set.  My dupe's available if any of my regular trading partners are interested, just leave a comment!

Last but certainly not least on the Fleer Baseball Greats front, Tris Speaker!  $6 well spent on these if you ask me, even if I did inadvertently end up with a dupe.

We're at $18 and counting now, so let's close this "blaster" out with a pair of Piersalls!  Jim with the Indians courtesy of 1960 Topps...

...and Jim with the Angels in '65!  A nice way to bolster my small Piersall collection for less money than a Big Mac.

So, there you have it, $20 spent at a card show.  These 20 singles alone made the trip to the show worth it, particularly the damage to my 1959 Topps set.  I've got more great pick-ups to show off this coming week though.  Until then, thanks for stopping by!