There are a lot of unique sets in the post-war hobby, but many more exclusive releases exist, not entirely fitting the traditional classification of an oddball set like individual promotional issues. These cards are usually only known by folks who collect specific players but not the rest of the hobby. In this article, I’ll spotlight one such hidden gem: the 1952 Shelby Bicycles Yogi Berra promotional card.
The card itself is 5″ x 7″ and features a black-and-white photo of Berra in a squatting catcher’s pose. Along the bottom, an endorsement in white script reads, “Ride Shelby, The Winner’s Bike, Sincerely, Yogi Berra.” The back is blank.
The following example currently sits in the current #1 Yogi Berra Master Set on the PSA Set Registry
The date of issue on this card is conjecture. The first driver is the familiar photo of Yogi Berra that Shelby used for this card. Robert Edward Auctions sold a circa 1949 Yogi Berra Original New York Yankees (their propriety stamp is on the back of the photo) PSA/DNA Type I image that was used for the Shelby Bicycles promo, his 1950 Bowman card, and his 1950 Drake’s card; it sold for $2880 in August 2023.
Here’s the front and back of the Type I photo.
And here’s Berra’s 1950 Bowman baseball card.
The second reason the hobby dates the card to around 1952 is from the advertisements featuring Berra promoting Shelby Bicycles. While you will see many of them referenced to 1954 and 1955, Shelby Cycle Company only manufactured bicycles in Shelby, Ohio, from 1925 to 1953 before being purchased by AMD in 1953. One specific advertisement features the Shelby Cycle Company name (and a Shelby, Ohio address) and features an illustration of the offered promotion card. It was free, along with a 16-page catalog, to anyone who requested it.
That advertisement, along with three others (AMF moved bicycle production to Cleveland in 1953, which is where Shelby is addressed to in the next three ads) and a PSA 2.5 copy of the 1952 Shelby Bicycles Yogi Berra card, was sold by Robert Edwards Auctions in October 2015 for $1320. The card was part of Al Johnson’s All-Time Finest Yogi Berra Master Set, but that was retired in July 2017, so I suspect he purchased it.
At the time of sale, that PSA 2.5 graded Berra was the only one that PSA or SGC had graded. Its sales history after the initial REA auction and I suspect the retirement of the Master Set, is fascinating.
Heritage Auctions resold the PSA 2.5 for $430.20 in November 2016. They noted that the card has a vertical crease.
Memory Lane Inc. then got its hands on the item in August 2017, but it went unsold with an opening bid of $300. It was still described as the only example ever graded by either PSA or SGC. But today, PSA shows five cards and two autographed cards in their pop report, while SGC shows a single copy.
Clean Sweep Auctions sold one of those signed PSA-encapsulated cards in February 2022 for $775.20.
The 1952 Shelby Bicycles Yogi Berra card is a particularly significant post-war collectible. It’s rare, features a Hall of Fame Yankee, and is directly connected to a classic American company and a post-war classic Bowman set.
