Manufacturers of baseball cards target a new market segment by combining cards with products that kids love- ice cream, candy bars, and bubblegum.
It began with Cracker Jacks and over the years many more manufacturers of snacks, especially ice cream, candy and gum introduced their own lines of collectible cards:
Neilson’s Chocolates (1921) Neilson's Big League Bars contained one card with every chocolate bar. These were black and white or sepia toned photographs in oval frames. Neilson’s 120 cards had product advertising on the back.
Youngling’s Ice Cream (1928) 60 black and white photos of uniformed players, mostly in action poses.
U.S. Carmel Company (1932) US Carmel issued its Famous Athletes Series in 1932. Twenty seven of these were baseball players. This popular series was similar in look to the earlier Cracker Jack cards.
Bubblegum Cards!
Goudy Gum Company (1933) Goudy was the first of what would become standard operating baseball card procedure-a pack of cards in a waxed paper wrapper and a hunk of gum. Goudy’s initial release in 1933 was a series of approximately 240 cards. For some reason #106, Napoleon LaJoie was left out, and added the next year.
In 1934, they produced another set of 96 colorful cards. These cards are referred to as “host cards, and feature words of wisdom in the form of . . .”Lou Gehrig says. . .” and “. . .Chuck Klein says. . .”. Goudy’s 1935 offering was their puzzle back card. These cards pictured four players on each card. When turned over, the four cards together made a black and white portrait of a team or a star player. In 1938 Goudy produced its “Heads Up” series of 48 cards. These cards came in two versions, both of which pictured a players head on a cartoon body. The second version has small B&W cartoons and comments framing the player.
Other offerings included Playball America (1939). Playball cards were black and white photos of 250 leading players. O-Pee-Chee Batter Ups (1937) were also black and white and had 37 players in their series. The O-Pee-Chee graphics depicted a pitcher or batter superimposed on a baseball diamond with fielders in silhouette. DeLong issued a series of 24 cards in 1933 featuring players in black and white superimposed on a colorful stadium background. 1936 brought black and white mostly headshot cards by World Wide Gum.
Cooperstown, Here I Come
In 1936 the Baseball Hall of Fame opened its doors in upstate New York to celebrate baseball’s greatest players. Selected by The Baseball Writers’ Association of America, and based on criteria it had taken years to formulate, the first inductees were Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Honus Wagner, Christy Mathewson, and Walter Johnson.. The rule that a player could not be inducted until five years after retiring from baseball has been broken only once-Roberto Clemente, who died in a plane crash during a humanitarian mission to earthquake victims in Nicaragua was inducted one year later in 1973. Not surprisingly, inclusion in the Hall of Fame has a huge effect on the value of a player’s baseball card.
Topps Tops Bowman
Bowman (formerly Gum, Inc) introduced a very popular line of cards in 1948. This was a series of 48 black and whites, selling for one cent for one card and one piece of gum. In 1950, they produced a higher quality series of 252 cards. These were color lithos of uniformed players in a combination of head shots and action poses. Their 1951 series included newcomers Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays. Bowman produced popular cards every year- 1952, 1953, 1954, and 1955. Another gum company, Topps appeared on the scene in 1551. The popularity of baseball was at an all-time high, and so was collecting baseball cards. Other cards on the market included offerings by Red Man Tobacco, Red Heart Dog Food, Wheaties, and DanDee, but the two giants, Bowmen and Topps competed for market dominance until 1956, when Topps bought Bowman. The 60’s and 70’s brought Donrus and Fleer, but Topps remained tops with collectors.
REFERENCE: Classic Baseball Cards by Frank Slocum Warner Books 1987
