General Forum

An old geezer too.  Collected 55-64, joined Navy, also had cards chucked while I was gone (all of them).  Got back into it with the boys late 70s.  They grew up, I didn’t.   Now have completed Topps sets from 1973 on up and am working on Topps Heritage all years, needing mostly SPs and a few key rookies.  I also enjoy building Phillies teamsets, all brands and years.  Most of my trading takes place here, but I’m also in Trading Bases and The Bench, as well as several Facebook groups.  PWE trades are welcome, every little bit helps!  

Began collecting at 4 years old in 1988, never stopped but was mostly out of the hobby in 2007/08. I added less cards in 2008 full year than I did in a PIF from AirPete this week! 

My focus has changed dramatically. I began with non-sports in 88, added NASCAR at Christmas 1992. On Valentine's Day 1996 my mom gave me a pack of NBA cards and it changed my life. I collected more than 70,000 NBA cards between 1996-06. Then I got burned out and quit. NASCAR was mostly on the back burner until 2003 when I pulled the autograph of my favorite driver from a single pack purchase. I had basically stopped collecting non-sports in 1997. From 2006 to 2009 I did NASCAR exclusively. Then, in either 2009 or 10, I got back into non-sports and now, it's one of my absolute favorite things to collect, even though I don't have much access to them.

In 2009, also I began scanning my entire collection. That eventually led me here and when I discovered the site gave statistics on your collection, I entered in my NBA collection. The memories that brought back got me back collecting the NBA full time. 

From 2012 to 2016 I collected NBA NASCAR and non-sports heavily. In 2013 I almost died from a disease I didn't know I had, and that put the wheels in motion that eventually led to the creation of Cardboard History. 

In 2016 a thread on here was started about the reveal of the Vegas Golden Knights logo. I wanted to see it so I put on NHL Network. It was the previous night's On the Fly repeating the next morning. I watched it and was hooked! Hockey has now taken the #1 spot for me...since I officially began collecting the sport in January 2017 I've collected over 14,000 hockey cards. It still ranks 4th in my collection but I expect it to pass non-sports this year, and I suspect it will take the #1 spot eventually... although with the NBA closing in on 93 thousand cards in my collection it won't be soon. 

Around 2015 or 2016 I I made a chart of who was missing from my collection and began searching for the people I didn't have. I had always been a set collector but the current sets are small and crappy, so they don't make me happy anymore. Chasing people does...I've got the NBA down under 300 people and NASCAR under 30. I have not made the list for the NHL yet. My "Names Project", as I call it, has now become my main collecting focus. 

Last year I created the Cardboard History Gallery, which is a website where I'm posting my collection scans sorted by person, set or team, if applicable. I've got some 600000 images listed and still a long way to go. It was a massive amount of work to put this together behind the scenes, over a year's worth, but my many health problems ensure I have plenty of time. I really enjoy being able to just pull up my folder for each person or team, to be honest the team sections for NBA and NHL are my favorites, and seeing what I have. Before, if I wanted to see each Elton Brand card for example, I'd have to go to my Excel charts, look him up, and then go scroll through my scans, which were only sorted by set, to find what I was looking for.

Currently, I'm trying not to spend money on the hobby or anything else. All my life my one and only real dream is classic car ownership. My health is slowly taking away my ability to enjoy it, and I want to experience it before it's too late...it might be already. I have to try. Unfortunately, the cost of my medicine, and of living, means I've saved up...exactly $12. So, right now I'm actually pretty despondent and not really interested in anything. I'm still going through the motions of collecting, scanning, etc, but right now I'm only doing it because I have to do something. I'm basically living for the sole purpose of going to the two tiny car shows we have each week, and the bigger ones I can get to on the weekend...my physical health prevents me from going to all of the ones I want to do. 

I have not bought any cards for myself at retail since January or earlier, though my brother did buy me some last weekend, and my mom brings me some periodically too. As I wrote on Cardboard History a while back, I may be giving up one passion to chase another that may leave me with none...it's a risk I feel like I have to take. 

Began collecting by cutting out 1962 Canadian Post Baseball cards while feasting on Post Alpha-Bits cereal over and over again... Collected in earnest for only about 8 years then was "re-introduced" during the late '80's early '90's period and rightup through today although sporadically at times during these past 25 to 30 years.

Collected from 81-94, then most of my time and disposable money went towards college, girls, and beer.  Fortunately, my cards were the one thing my parents didn't get rid of while I was at school.  Collected very sporadically until I stumbled upon this site in 2016 while looking for someplace to log my collection.  This got me back in the game, although my collection is more narrowly focused than it was when I was a kid. 

Began collecting as a kid with 73-74 OPC hockey. When the boom hit, I set up at a card show for the first time in 1989. By 1992 I was a regular dealer on top of my carpentry job.

In early 1993 I took some time off the tools, to go full time selling and show promoting. Shortly thereafter I opened a store. It operated from 93-96.

Back to the tools, family, and life. Cards became secondary for almost two decades. Always there but on the periphery. At this stage of my life, grandfather for the first time, with a comfortable career, I am entertaining thoughts of another small store. Perhaps 2021.

As others have stated, being here has rekindled the love for the hobby that has been part of my life for 46 years.

Started in the early 80s with my son.   Building sets any and all football we had 100s of them.  He quit but I did not but went to only Topps sets.   Always picking up cards for my PC.    In the early 2000s I get rid of most of my sets (except Topps and stopped buying boxes and packs.   By 2010 I started to down size my extra singles and fouse on my PC only.   3 years ago I retired and was busy the 1st year (honey does and a shed for my tools) but did have some time for collecting.  After that I figured I would do some buying and selling to keep me busy    I did not buy any but my brother ask me to sell my nephew's collection.  Been working on that for a year and half.   Good thing I did not have to buy the collection as my wife would not have been very happy.   She has no problem with me buying cards for my PC.  She just wants her basement back now!!

Started collecting in 2011 and haven’t looked back!

Started mid-80s as a kid also. 84T are the first packs I remember opeing on a regular basis as well as getting uncut sheets from Child's World (old toy store). Sold my collection off circa 2000 when I got sick of SPs in base sets and too many products to track. Little did I know that it was only the beginning. Got back into it a couple years ago when my son starting collecting soccer cards. Haven't looked back since. Trying hard to get back what I had, get current and also go back to the 70T set as a start (instead of my birth year of 74). 

Being born in the late 80s, I sometimes feel like I'm the youngest person here (not that there's anything wrong with that!). I started collecting around the late 90s to about 2000. I remember buying some of the earliest MEM cards at a card show and spending $20 for a game used bat card of Shawn Green...heh. Eventually parted ways with the collection. Restarted last year when I was buying a couple of cards for someone else as a Christmas gift and the seller threw in a handful of extras. My father-in-law is also a huge Cardinals collector of cards, bobbles, memorabilia, etc. which spurred me on. I found TCDB shortly thereafter and the rest is history.

Gapporin - I believe our youngest "regular forum contributor" is IfbBirdsCards.

As for myself, I've been collecting since the mid-to-late 80's. Besides a couple of short breaks (late high school years in the mid-90s & after my divorce in 2001), I've been pretty continuous with collecting cards and other sports memorabilia. My focus has shifted a few times over the decades, but I still collect constantly. The biggest shift was going from quantity to quality. I only have about 70K cards now, but a decent percentage of them are high-value cards (IMO). I still love to bust packs and boxes. I'll bust anything when I can afford to purchase cards. I buy more retail products now than I used to do, but I trade any non-PC cards pretty quick. I've had to put card purchases in secondary mode for the past year as I searched to replace my old car. I used to spend most of my annual tax refund on cards, but I didn't the past 2 years. I still have this year's refund in the bank in case I need it for something unknown. Since I got a new car a month ago, I wanted to make sure I'm covered for a while in case I can't work for any reason. But I've still made a couple dozen card trades, sells, and purchases this year. I still love the hobby and this site is a big reason why!