Swag from Bill and Ben

I Wanted to put together a quick post to acknowledge a couple of recent trades.

I am going to lead-off with some a massive contribution that Ben Henry of The Baseball Card Blog made to the Phungo 1959 Topps Set. Ben is going through some serious downsizing and focusing of his collection - I sent some vintage cards Ben's way including the the classic 1971 Topps #5 Thurman Munson card and he sent me back almost 40 cards for the aforementioned 1959 Set.


The 59s included a couple of Phillies, which are hard to find (at reasonable prices) locally and a rare High Number card of Lee Tate as well as 36 other cards that I needed.

This is likely the biggest contribution I have had to the Phungo 1959 Topps Project since I started back in late 2007. If you want to see my 1959 want list as it stands currently or are just so bored you want to check my progress click here. As it stands thanks to Ben I have moved into the final 100 cards of the set, and am well ahead of where I expected to be at this point in 2010 for the project.

Reader Bill

I also made a second trade of vintage cards and other with reader Bill F from Alexandria VA recently. I sent some Padres and a couple 1956 cards his way for a bunch of 1971 Phils and some newer "retro" Phils cards. Bill was also good enough to contribute to the 1959 cause with a Buyback of Claude Osteen.


Loved all these card. I hadn't botthered to pick up any cards from the new T206 or the Goodwin Champs sets. ok maybe I did get T206. Yeah that's right I did get a single pack I think, but it yielded no Phils.

The colors on the Dick Allen make for a pretty sharp looking card. This is a set I probably should of given more of a shot in 2009.

The Barry Lersch card is from the High Numbered Series of 1971 Topps - you can follow Phungo quest for the 1971 Topps Phillies Team Set here.

Vintage Variations

A substantial amount of talk surrounding the new 2010 Topps Cards revolves around the subject of short printed card variations sharing the numbers of base cards. Years ago variations happened due to poor editing/proofing/ fact checking or updates and print processing changes. Today they happen in an effort by the manufacturers to created a buzz about their product.

This weekend Ben Henry over at The Baseball Card Blog published an interview with Bob Lemke, editor of the Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards, who also writes his own baseball card blog. Bob Lemke's Blog covers discoveries of "NEW" vintage variations as well as several other subjects. I have added the Lemke Blog to my sidebar and imagine that if you enjoy vintage cards will likely do the same.

Those of you that have collected the 2009 Obak cards may be interested in his reviews of Obak originals. He's displaying the Obak cards in combination with several paragraphs of research he's done on each player. pretty impressive for what were often forgotten players from over a century ago.

Bob is also in the process of producing custom cards that never were for players from the tobacco set era. He has recently produced T202 Hassan Tri-Fold Card of the Red Sox 1910s outfield.

1959 Topps Variations

The 1959 Topps set I am building has it's share of variations and errors. There are three different Warren Spahn cards to collect which all have variations on his birth date. In one of the middle series of the set about a half dozen cards have two variations, one that mention the player has been traded or optioned and one card that does not. One of the cards that holds this distinction is for Harry Hanebrink:

1959 Topps #322b Harry Hanebrink (includes Traded Statement - Click to Enlarge)

The Trade Statement is contained in the Red Box. The cards that do not have a traded or optioned statement are harder to find. While I believe I have all of the cards with variations, I (of course) do not have any of the scarcer and more valuable versions.

On March 31st 1959 Hanebrink was dealt from the Braves to the Phils as part of a six player deal involving Gene Conley, Ted Kazanski, Stan Lopata, Joe Koppe and Johnny O'Brien.

Hanebrink's 1959 season with the Phils was his last in the majors. He was not issued a Topps card in 1960. As far as I know this is as close as you can get to a Harry Hanebrink Phillies card.