General Forum

Reflections on collecting as life and death:

I have strong associations between my childhood card collecting and my increased independence, curiosity, and intellectual development. Between the ages of 8 and 14, I was able to visit the drugstore on my own, purchase cards with "found" change and soda bottle returns. I treated cards like encyclopedias--they were windows into worlds with which I was not familiar. I memorized the players hometowns and biographies, learned rudimentary Spanish and French pronounciation, briefly became excellent at math, and gained an understanding of sports history, etc. Moreover, baseball cards provided a mechanism to navigate the fraught territory of American masculinity and the transition from childhood to adolescence. All of these I connect to life and growth.  

Returning to collecting these past couple years has allowed me to reconnect to some of those feelings and fascinations. But the feelings are less joyous and more sweetly melancholic. Mostly, I think about my late collecting in the context of my decline and death. Collecting now is not about youthful growth, but about aged resistance to death. I long to feel again the elemental spark of youth, but mostly collecting (and completing sets in particular) provides a fleeting sense of control even as I grow vulnerable and lose control of my life.   

I'd be curious to hear others reflect on their collecting in terms of their personal growth and development. 

Kieran, collecting for me at times is a fountain of youth. Vintage cards connect me to my youth and with a couple of players a way to remember my dad. 

The unfortunate thing for me is that I cannot share my love for collecting with anyone locally. It tends to be a lonely joy much of the time. 

But it serves its purpose as a diversion from the times we're in. 

I started late into collecting. I was 14 years old. I mowed yards in my neighborhood and worked nights at auctions.

Being from a poor family( dad worked raising 5 kids on military pay and mom stayed home) the money I made during the summer went to paying for my school supplies and clothes and used the money for my older brother and younger brother for their school supplies and clothes.  During the winter months I saved 30.00 from my mowing and I trapped we are the opossums and raccoons I caught and skinned for extra meat and if I ran across a deer I would shoot one of those for extra meet. 
 

I was allowed to keep 20% of what I made. My older brother was lazy and my younger brother just wanted to play and they would get upset with me because I had money. So with some of the cash during the summer I would ride my bike 6 miles to the local Walmart to buy my cards ( no way today world I would let my kids do that).

So I have been collecting from 1989  to current never took a break or stopped and my wife didn't mind when we were dating but about 10 years ago she said my collection is to big and I needed to downsize so I traded and sold all of my basketball Jordan's Shaqs rc and such. That made her happy then I got ticked off at football and I am still trying to move my 10,000 or so cards by selling and trading. My baseball I will keep doing until I just can't do it anymore and my daughters realy don't care for my cards but my 4 year old grandson loves looking at the cards so if I were to go tomorrow my grandson would get my whole collection approx 300k worth from cards starting in 1888-2020. Haven't found any 2021 yet🙁. All I ask of him when he gets older to finish the set I stated 15 years ago 1909-1911 T206. Only 47 more minus the big 8
 

No one is guaranteed tomorrow. In the grand scheme of things, nothing we do really matters...Nothing we do will be remembered once the people who knew each of us dies. So try to enjoy the ride as much as you can. If it brings you happiness, and doesn't hurt anyone, then you should do it. 

I've been collecting since I was a child in the late-80's. The only times I stopped were for financial reasons in the last half of high school and after my divorce. I never got rid of the cards I already owned though. I've been collecting since 2004 without any breaks from the hobby. My total card collection sits at about 115,000 cards now and many more non-card items. TCDB doesn't count unopened material as individual items and that's why that number is much higher than the number in my profile. I don't generally think about my collection from a life and death mentality but I do think about where it goes when I am no longer here. I have nobody to pass this collection to that will appreciate it the way I do, as of now. BUT, I have made it known to my Mom and my siblings that if something happens to me suddenly to sell my entire collection to D&A Card World. They will come buy it and get it out of here and pass it on to other collectors that want these items. Nobody in my family will want it and they have no idea how to deal with it. That is another reason for keeping it very well organized. Any buyer would see what I have pretty easily. I update the minimum price the family should accept for the entire collection about every year. My family knows how much my collection means to me and they also know its value to the rest of the hobby world. But if I am gone, I want them to sell it completely and split the money. No arguments about who gets what or scrambling to figure out what to do with all these cards. The last thing I'd want to see is my currently 35+ year collection thrown in the trash!!! To wrap this up, I treasure the base cards I pulled from packs in the late 80's just as much as the AU'd cards I've acquired just in 2021. All the vintage cards are special to me as most are older than I am and are the history of cards as well as the history of those sports. But I also think about the trades I made to get most of those vintage cards. Only a few of them were bought!  My collection covers multiple sports and also non-sports cards and they range from 1888 to 2021 (as of now). Most of my cards are from the 1960's to present but I love that I own a few cards that are well over 100 years old now. I think I have 3 cards older than any of my grandparents and another couple that are older than my mother. Yes, there is a big gap in there as I own no cards from 1911 to 1951. I guess that should be next on my list of goals - fill in that gap a little.

Interesting perspectives and not something I have thought about much in the past.  Collecting has always been in me. Stamps, match books, wooden match boxes (in Canada there was a series of miniature boxes that featured 5 or 6 scenes from each of our provinces and territories; my dad was a heavy smoker and these are what he used so I had them all in numerous counts - wish I still had them). Sports cards were in that collecting as well though I had very little money (25 cents a week allowance and whatever I could make picking bottles out of the ditches). I stopped collecting cards in the late 1970s and did not hold onto anything from that era.  I restarted in 1990 focussing on my favourite sport, baseball.  I now had the means to buy what I wanted and have that means even more so now.

So why am I collecting now?  It is a hobby that gives me happiness.  Whether it is in completing a set, getting a card of one of my favourite players, or getting a true vintage or difficult to find card, I am happy when I am in my collection. But it is just a hobby and not an obsession.  I do not need that "card"; I do not need to complete that "set". As to what will happen to my collection once I pass on? Again, I don't dwell on it but I expect it will be my youngest son who will take over most of it (the non-sports may be taken by one of my other kids).  My youngest is the only one who follows any sports but what he does with the collection will be up to him.  If he chooses to put it at auction, then so be it. I won't be around to object and I can't take it with me.  All I can do is right now, continue to collect.

Joshua, yes I too wish there were more collectors around to discuss collecting but it seems like most collectors hide away in their collection almost like they don't wish to share any of the joy in the hobby.

I started 'collecting' the first time when I was around 10 years old. At the time, I lived with a foster family that I had been with since the age of 2. The mother was a sadistically mean women who beat me daily. Of course, she was a "god fearing, good Christian lady" who went to church every Sunday, and then beat me or whipped me every Sunday night. She had me join Cub Scouts (good for her image) and that's where I became fascinated with bb cards. The other guys were 'flipping' cards and it looked like fun. They wanted me to join, but I had no cards and no money to buy them with. So I did what any other red blooded American boy would do...I started grabbing every bit of money I could find. When I cleaned the furniture I would keep whatever change I found and hide it from her. Once I had enough, I'd stop at the 5 and 10 on my way to scouts and buy a pack of cards. It was such a thrill to a kid whose only toys had been sticks, rocks, and imagination...these cards were so cool, so special!! Eventually, she caught me keeping a quarter, took me down to the barn, grabbed a board with a nail sticking out and whapped me in the back of the head with it. The scar from the nail stabbing me is still there. That was the end of my first foray into card collecting! To this day, those later 1960's cards bring such a strong feeling of pain, anger and sadness, but also bring back that thrill and feeling of finally 'owning' my baseball cards and being like the other guys...it's kind of hard to explain, but I just love completing sets, especially of 'vintage' cards!! Kind of makes me 'vintage', I guess. This is what this site and community brings out...I have told maybe 5 people in my lifetime about all I've been through; and now I just told hundreds or thousands of people about a very impactful time in my life!

Great thread, I've enjoyed reading about some of you true collectors. Thank you for sharing everyone! 

It's always nice to read about each collector's journey. I started collecting in 1979. In 1981 I became a serious card collecting addict and completed my first set in 1981. I was born in 1967 so I started maybe a little later than some. I would sort my cards by team and read the backs and look at the statistics to learn about as many players as I could. I would take my $5 monthly allowance and walk to the drug store and buy as many packs as I could. I would open them while walking home chewing gum and flipping through them to see if I got any cards and didn't already have. The more valuable cards for me were the ones I didn't already have, not who the player was at that time.

I collected pretty hard until around 1991-92 and then it waned. Too many other things going on with work and college and chasing girls. I would buy a few packs here and there but I didn't really return to collecting until probably about 2013 when my 14 year old son started getting interested in sports and we could do some collecting together. I have been pretty into it again since then although my son has lost much of his interest (mainly due to how hard it is to find a pack of cards on a retail shelf now days). I too have lost my interest in the new stuff due to the scarcity and cost. Luckily I have found a real spark in buying up local collections. Most of these are from the true junk era. I also have a local guy who buys a lot of collections and/or packs and pulls the good stuff and sells me the rest really cheap. I realize there is no real value in a lot of the stuff I am buying but it also doesn't cost me much and I get hours of enjoyment just sorting the cards and looking at them even though I have had much less time to sit back and sort and look at them due to starting a new job last year.

Last week I worked on sorting a bunch of 1990 Topps football and spent several hours organizing them in numerical order and putting them away. Last night it was 1987 Donruss baseball. I am glad I found my niche at this time. My joy comes from the relaation I find in sorting and organizing. I can look back and reflect on really good players that have no value these days because so many want the real banger high value cards. They don't want quantity. I have even really had my trading grind to almost nothing, mainly because I am so busy buying and organizing that I really don't have time to keep my collection list, want list and to trade list up to date.

For a small investment I get all I can do to relax in sorting and reflection. I don't need new stuff, I don't need graded stuff, and I don't need a card to be a high value investment. And lastly, I am enjoying collecting.

I am an old codger, been playing with baseball cards since the mid-fifties off and on, when packs were a penny (1 card) or a nickel (5 I think, cards).  I remember having lots of '53s and '54s, mostly Topps.  Then a long stretch without cards...from high school, US Navy, marriage and kids to when the boys were 10ish, about 1978.  They had a few cards on the coffee table one day; I got hooked again, after 20 years or so!  I helped them finish their '78 Topps sets, and we built sets together until they discovered girls.  Then I collected by myself for a few years, before stopping again in about 1994.  In 2008, I started building Topps sets again and my Phillies teamset collection.  Started working backwards and built sets of 1994 thru 2007 Topps.  Then I got into Topps Heritage .. all sets started, none completed (curse those SPs!).  
 

Today, I often ask myself why I do this.  I'm running out of room in this house, those monster boxes full of dupes are getting heavier and gathering cards for a healthy trade can be a lot of work.  The kids arent much interested in set building any more.   Why do I do this?  Health issues slowed me to a mostly housebound condition and cards keep me occupied.  I still enjoy completing the sets, chasing that last card, poking around on here and in other groups, doing PWE trades for a few of the many I need, and making friends who share in the enjoyment this hobby brings.  Apologies in advance to my survivors, who will need to fugure out what to do with all this cardboard!!