Vintage Sports Cards – Baseball – Basketball – Football – Hockey
Despite its short run of only 16 issues, Topps Magazine produced a ton of amazing content, including this brief piece from Skip Rozin on New York heroes Willie Mays, Mickey Mantle, and Duke Snider.
I love that the magazine highlighted the three players’ 1952 Topps baseball cards.
Tickets to sporting events can be worth more than the price of admission by Bruce Chadwick.
I love that Chadwick highlighted college football tickets. “Some of the most memory-filled tickets are from college football games. Until the early ’70s, schools large and small had colorful illustrations on the tickets, making them much more than just stubs.”
This article appeared in Edition #8 of Topps Magazine in the fall of 1991.
In 1954 and 1955, when kids were ripping packs of Topps baseball cards, many were undoubtedly disappointed when they learned that they wouldn’t be pulling a Mickey Mantle card. And the reason why is simple, Topps never printed them. This article will explain why and show a few of my favorite custom 1954 Topps and 1955 Topps Mickey Mantle cards and the versions Topps has shared.
Topps didn’t print a Mantle card as part of its 1954 or 1955 baseball sets because it legally couldn’t. Bowman and Topps had such a fierce rivalry in the early post-war era that they each tried to sign exclusive agreements with the most popular players to differentiate their products. In 1954 and 1955, Bowman managed to sign Mantle. In 1956, Topps purchased Bowman, so Topps sets were more “complete” from that point forward.
However, even though Topps didn’t print a Mantle card in 1954, it didn’t stop them from publishing an example of what one would have looked like on paper stock. They partnered with Sports Illustrated Magazine in 1954 and printed a black & white Mantle “card.”
Sports Illustrated wanted to boost magazine sales and included 27 paper-thin cards in its first two editions. The first edition included stars like Jackie Robinson, Willie Mays, Ted Williams, Duke Snider, and Eddie Mathews. The second edition was exclusively Yankees, and the 27 printed cards included a 1954 Topps-style Mickey Mantle card.
Topps also, many years later, gave us an example of a 1955 Topps Mickey Mantle card. Topps was printing their own magazine during the peak of the junk-wax era, and in their third edition, released in the summer of 1990, they had a special on “Mantle Mania,” and the center-fold included a 1955 Topps Mickey Mantle style card.
Many other collectors and hobbyists have produced custom 1954 and 1955 Topps cards, but my favorites come from hobby pioneer Bob Lemke, who unfortunately passed away in 2017. On his blog, you can read about his custom efforts: “Ho-Hum … another 1954 Topps-style Mantle. But mine has a story” and “My ’55 Mantle completes Topps-style customs.” I think it’s fantastic that he re-used the portrait that he put on the 1954 custom on his 1955 Mantle, too, just as Topps often did back then.
I’m sure that many Mantle collectors are bummed that Bowman had the exclusive contract to print his cards in 1954 and 1955. But their pocketbooks must be thankful; can you imagine how pricey those Topps cards would be now? Leave your price estimates down in the comments, and happy collecting!
Some folks will say the 1952 Topps set was the company’s first baseball card release because the 51s were more of a “game,” ignoring the baseball cards that were part of the 1948 Topps Magic Photos set.
Whatever you believe, this article from the second edition of Topps Magazine is an excellent primer to Topps’ early baseball card days.
Topps Magazine usually had a section up front called “Fans Notes,” essentially letters to the editor. The first “note” in the Summer 1991 edition was from a reader who read about the Desert Shield cards in the Winter 1991 issue and was frustrated because he had not seen any yet (he was a LCpl). He wrote that he searched and managed to buy a few and thanked the magazine for their contribution.
The magazine then shared the following incredible story and picture from a GI who was a reserve nurse and Topps photographer:
If you’re interested in getting the issue with this picture in it, here’s the cover:
Topps wasn’t going to acknowledge what led to them trying out some new things in their own magazine, but I think we all know the end of the Topps monopoly and competition from Donruss and Fleer drove the innovation.
Nevertheless, Pearlman’s article in Edition 9, The Winter 1992 release of Topps Magazine, provides a nice overview of some unique ’80s releases. In the comments, let me know which one’s your favorite.
In 1991, Topps Magazine ran a feature called Four Decades of Greatness, featuring four players in each issue, one from each of the previous four decades, who were great players and a large part of Topps baseball cards.
Here’s a list of who they included for each decade:
When I first shared these on X, one collector wrote, “Well the thing that jumps out most immediately is including Musial in the 50s, when Topps made like two cards of him in that decade. And The Man appeared on Bowman, Red Man, Red Heart, Berk Ross, and others in that time, so it’s not like he was exclusive.”
What do you think? Biggest snub? Oddest inclusion?