Only in Cooperstown can you go into a baseball card store and find inexpensive genuine autographed cards. Baseball Nostalgia, right next to Doubleday Field, is a frequent haunt of mine. They’ve been around for 40 years, were once the flagship of TCMA, and remain as the depository of awesome things. They have rows and rows of autographed cards, not only big stars but nobodies. Maybe nobodies is unfair; let’s say non-stars.
Last year I bought a handful of signed cards, but in the little pile of goodies were a few photos (Jim Bibby, Buddy Bradford) circa 1974 and a postcard of Jack Brohamer from 1975. Why would anybody buy a signed Jack Brohamer postcard? Readers of this blog know the answer to that.
The Brohamer card is pretty sweet and, as I was researching for a new book proposal, I stumbled on the fact that Ken Berry (outfielder, not F Troop star) finished his career on the Indians. I didn’t recall that, Googled, and came across the one card of Berry in brilliant mid-‘70’s Cleveland garb. It was from the same postcard set as the Brohamer! It took time, but I finally got the full set last week, shipped in sheets.
I grabbed an album off the shelf that would be appropriate housing for this set. It’s an album of misfit cards – oddball sets, different shapes and sizes, in 2-pocket, 4-pocket and 9-pocket sheets. Besides the 1975 Cleveland Indians set (here’s a photo of one page, not with Brohamer but with Ed Crosby, Frank Duffy, John Ellis and Oscar Gamble, for Dan Epstein), the other sets are:
1963 Pepsi-Cola Tulsa Oilers
12 panels, 2 cards per panel, 24 cards with a big loop above to hang on bottle tops – what more could you ask! The Pepper Martin card is the coolest, but for my card collecting age group (I’m 54), a minor league set with Jim Beauchamp, Tom Hilgendorf, Chuck Taylor and some batboys, is hard to resist. It’s not a very pricey set, I have no idea when I got it and how much I paid, but it’s way cool.
1966 East Hills Pirates
There are a few great regional sets featuring the Pirates of the 1960’s – KDKA, Grenier Tires and East Hills. Produced and distributed by a big mall outside Pittsburgh, the East Hills set is very nice and essential for Al McBean completists. Sure, Clemente and Stargell are the highlights, but every Bucco picture is a gem. There’s something about Matty Alou that fascinates me. He seems a bit like an alien, if an alien could hit .342.
1961 Nu-Card Baseball Scoops
Not odd in size, the Nu-Card cards are odd in content. Contemporary quasi-achievements are sprinkled amongst all-time moments. Was Roy Sievers’ 1957 American League Home Run title equivalent to Lou Gehrig’s streak or Willie Mays’ 1954 World Series catch? If you’ve got an 80 card set to fill, you bet it is!
1966 St. Petersburg Cardinals
A bit larger than regular postcards (they peek out above a regular 4-pocket sleeve), this 20 card set was put out by Foremost Milk. Of course, nothing screams hot summer in Florida more than a glass of milk. Sparky Anderson’s card is the key, and here he is. You can’t tell me this dude was only 32 at the time.
There’s something about these sets that resonate with me – there’s a romantic vision I have of suburban Pittsburgh 10-year olds bugging their Mom to take them to East Hills for a Gene Michael card, or some kid deciding to buy a pack of Nu-Cards instead of Topps and insisting that Nu-Cards were better. The very idea of seeing shelves of Pepsi bottles with Tulsa Oiler card hanging from the necks makes me light-headed.
SABR's Baseball Cards Research Committee 
I love oddballs — almost more (maybe even more) than the base Topps sets themselves. I think it’s the chase that I love about them…finding something forgotten from years ago, or something that wasn’t forgotten but wasn’t easily available back in the pre-internet days.
These are awesome.
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There’s definitely a lot of enjoyment in the offbeat.
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As a kid I wrote to all the teams to ask for schedules, stickers etc. The Indians sent me the Crosby card. I still have it. The odd ball cards are great. I found a Wonder Bread card with Mantle and Musical on it last week at a junk shop. The find made my day. Enjoy all your posts.
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I have always loved the East Hills cards. I fear I have to get them now. What is their “size”? I store post card sized cards in sleeves (like my other cards) and I have a lot of post card sleeves.
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3-1/4″ x 4-1/4″
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Love the oddballs. Just had to invest in numerous oddball type pages. Between different size postcards and team issue items you have to get creative
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As always the answer is: different sized sleeves, and store them all in a cardboard box so you can riff through them and resort them daily.
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I grew up an hour south of Pittsburgh and lived there for a couple of years. What I loved about this was the “East Hills” cards. It didn’t ring a bell so I had to fire up the google machine. Turns out that it was all but gone by the time I was born. I miss these local, oddball regional issues. They help tell the history of the area, as well as the sport.
I’m into vintage IndyCar/Indy 5oo related cards. Two of the available sets were Indianapolis companies (Marhoeffer and Stark & Wetzel) that no longer exist. Sometimes I feel I was born into the world too late.
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Outstanding article! Baseball Nostalgia, is, by far, the greatest baseball card and memorabilia shack i have ever visited. I make a point of going there whenever in Cooperstown. I scored a set of the Russian baseball team a few years ago. These oddball sets are great!
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Baseball Nostalgia does have more oddball stuff than any store I’ve ever been to.
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