Stunners from the 1930s

So far this year, I've focused on adding more vintage cards to my collection. But I'm not talking about baseball, or any other major sport. It's the other stuff I've been after. And even more specifically that that, it's got to be real eye candy.

 

First I found a few cards from a 1956 set released by Gum Inc. called "Adventure". A couple of months later, I picked up a few more beauties from that same set.

 

Now I want to share a few cards from an even older set. I didn't know anything about it until the following image came up in a random online browsing session. 

 

 

I was floored. 

 

It's just such a cool scene. Three archers in uniform with bows drawn and aimed toward the sky, displaying their technique. On a trading card.

 

I had to do more research.

 

It turns out that the card was issued by a German margarine company called Sanella. One card was included inside each margarine wrapper, and there were 112 cards in the set. They measure 2 3/4 inches by 4 1/8 inches.

 

Here's another example: 

 

 

 

Total stunner.

 

And that's the thing about great artwork. It captivates you by freezing a moment in time. Think about it. If this card were an 8-foot by 4-foot painting in a museum and you saw it from across the room, it would stop you in your tracks and almost force you to take some time to look at it and appreciate it.

 

Here's another fantastic example: 

 

 

 

Great vantage point, right?

 

Now here's what you'll find on a card back:

 

 

 

Here's the first three lines of text, translated by online software: 

 

German fencing champion Helene Mayer (front right) against Hungarian champion Miss Bogen

As for the text after that, you're in for a pretty cool surprise. Check this out:  

 

The space for pasting in this picture is left blank under the keyword "Fencing" in the Handbook of Sports section.

Yeah, that's right. Back in 1932, you could have obtained a handbook of sports from Sanella, and slotted each collector's card into its very own section!

 

I found some images of it online. Here's the front cover:

 

 

 

And here are a couple of interior pages:

 

 

 

 

Now more translation from the card back:

  

This handbook, which contains space for 112 different colorful collectible pictures, provides alphabetical information on the entire field of sports on 120 pages and is also equipped with more than one hundred monochrome illustrations. It will be delivered postage-free upon receipt of a 70 Pfennig stamp addressed to "Sanella," P.O. Box No. 125, Berlin C2. Please clearly indicate your address.

These sports pictures are available when purchasing Sanella margarine, one picture for every half pound. A special exchange center will allow the exchange of any missing pictures starting in February 1933.

 

If you collected baseball stickers in your younger days and had the accompanying album to stick them in, those paragraphs will sound quite familiar.  

 

But back to the cards now. Here's the fourth one I purchased:

 

 

 

What a great study in light and dark, big and small. That climber is just a tiny speck of life, dangling in the shadows, compared with the enormous range of mountains surrounding him. I think the only sound he'd be hearing right there is the wind, and an occasional creaking of the rope that he's rappelling down. How much farther does he have to go? We've got no idea. But he's probably never breathed such fresh oxygen or felt more alive and aware.

 

And that's what I've been adding to my collection lately. These particular cards ran me between $5 and $12 each, which is quite affordable considering their age and foreign origin.

I think the next step is creating a binder for my growing vintage multi-sport and non-sport collection. Some of them, like these Sanella cards, are cut at an unconventional size, so I've got to find pages that will accommodate them. Might take some research, but it'll be worth the time spent. Cards like these need to be in a binder, not tucked away in a box somewhere.

How about you readers and collectors? Are you fans of the more obscure vintage cards like these? 

 

Let me know in the comment section, and thanks for reading! 

2025 Series Custom Cards: PRINTED (Plus a Giveaway)

Did you think all of the "2025 year in review" content out there on the internet was finally over?

 

Well, think again!

 

You're looking at a collage of the custom cards that I shared on the blog in 2025 (or thereabouts). Here's the list:

 

Standard Set 

1956 Jerry Seinfeld

1956 Cosmo Kramer

Beastie Boys In Action

The Jimi Hendrix Experience

The Princess Bride

Mel Gibson Film Stars

Top Gear Future Stars

 

Sitcom Subset

The Golden Girls

Married with Children

Seinfeld  

So, that makes 10 cards total, which is not quite up to the usual Nine Pockets numbers. However, I did create quite a few one-off customs for clients throughout the year, and I'm pretty happy with the way they turned out, so that's a plus.

 

Here's a closer look at a card front and a card back:

The Sitcom subset received special card backs that more closely resembled the style of the original set. Here's an example:

 

 

Those are always fun to do.

And as always, I'd like to get some of these cards into the hands of you fellow collectors. So let's do a giveaway.

The duck races that I've held for a couple of previous Nine Pockets giveaways seem to go over pretty well with readers, so I think I'll do that again. If enough folks enter, I'll award a custom card from the list above to the top 5 finishers. (Feel free to share this giveaway with other bloggers and collectors who might enjoy it.) Winners will get to choose which custom card they'd like.

To enter the giveaway, just add a comment to this post. That's all you have to do. I'll keep the entry period open through next Sunday, June 21st. Then I'll close it out and get those ducks ready to race. Results will be posted here on the blog on Sunday, June 28th.

  

Thanks so much to all you readers, fellow collectors, and fellow bloggers for spending some time here at Nine Pockets. You guys continue to provide great inspiration and entertainment, and I look forward to holding the giveaway and getting these custom cards out to the winners.

 

Great Hockey Photos AND Wise Advice? I'll Take It!

You know what I enjoy?

A good 1980s hockey police card set.

For one, they're rather plentiful.

They also provide excellent information on the card backs. Local police departments at the time would encourage kids to exercise, study hard in school, and develop self-esteem. They also warned us sternly about the dangers of hanging out with the wrong crowd, and of drugs and alcohol.

And a third reason? 

 

You'll find some surprisingly good photography. Check out this shot from the 1986-87 Washington Capitals Police set:

Now that's hockey action. 

Bob Carpenter is waiting for a shot to come in from the point. He'd love to try and redirect it with his stick blade or shaft and score a goal that way. But at very least, he's succeeded in making life difficult for Islanders goaltender Kelly Hrudey. Just look. Hrudey is trying his hardest to keep an eye on the play in front of him by crouching down and looking around Carpenter, while maintaining some sort of angle with the shooter. With all of that happening, the crowd behind the glass knows a scoring chance is coming. Just look at their focus!

Can you find this same kind of action in the 1986-87 Topps flagship hockey set? Fat chance!

And that's not all. Check out this next card:

 

 

 

I think more goal celebrations like this one should be featured on hockey cards. I love it because Lou Francheschetti and his teammates are not elated. They're not exuberant. They're just some blue collar players getting together after scoring a goal. 

 

Good job, guys.

 

And then it's back to work. 

 

The camera angle and proximity almost make you feel like you're celebrating right along with them. Fantastic.
 

 

Both of those cards are now in my collection, thanks to a small trade on TCDB. Here's the third card that was part of the trade.

 

 

 

Mike Gartner scored 708 career goals. He's a member of the Hall of Fame, and was selected as one of the NHL's 100 greatest players during the league's 100th anniversary in 2017-18. He was also one of the fastest skaters of his generation. Despite all this, I feel like he's underrated—or at least a little bit underappreciated. For all those reasons, I snatched up the card. I like how the image shows him in action, using that speed. 

 

Now here are the card backs, featuring some of that wise advice mentioned earlier.

 

 

Do police departments still have these kinds of programs today? If not, I think they should.

 

Regardless, I'm pretty happy to have these cards in my collection, and I think I might search around for examples from other teams to add.

 

With all that being said, however, I think it's only fair to mention that not every card in this police set is fantastic. The TCDB member I traded with was kind enough to add an extra card for me in the envelope. 

 

 

Who's there? Michal? Is that you? Tap your stick on the ice three times if that's you. 

(Taps stick on ice three times. Sound echoes through empty, dark hockey rink.)

 

Yep, that one's kind of a stinker. But think back to those flagship Topps and O-Pee-Chee sets of the era again. You'll find image after image of players standing around in warmups, or waiting for a face-off to start. So even with the few stinkers, you've still got to be impressed with police sets like these.

 

How about you readers and collectors? 

 

Do you have any police cards from a local team, be it hockey or another sport? Do any of the cards boast surprisingly good photography? 

 

Share in the comment section, and thanks for reading! 

Completed Set: 1989 Topps Baseball

Quick: Imagine the most generic baseball t-shirt you can.

It probably looks something like that one, right?

Well, I'll tell you something. It's exactly what the 1989 Topps design reminds me of. Just look at the bottom of this next card, for example.

It's so generic that Dallas Green appears to be wincing with disappointment.

And if you want to get the full thrust of it, here are the logos from the t-shirt and the card together, matched for color.

Same thing? 

Yeah. Pretty much.

And listen. It's not necessarily a bad thing. Baseball cards are about fun. And familiarity. And baseball. So if you were a baseball-playing kid back in 1989 and saw that the script team name on your Little League jersey looked very much like the script team names on the new Topps baseball cards that you were pulling from packs, you might have been psyched about it. After all, you can't have too much baseball in your life, right? So again, not a bad thing.

But for the 1989 version of Gregory Ninepockets, the design did seem a bit plain.

He had just started getting into the sport of ice hockey, and Topps hockey cards were much more interesting that year, with the pushpin design in the top corner and the Roy Lichtenstein–style dotted background underneath the player name.

So that didn't help young Gregory's opinion of 1989 Topps baseball cards.

You know what else didn't help?

The Upper Deck company.

They released their inaugural baseball card set that same year. And it was not plain.

I wonder how closely the new company kept everything under wraps back then. Just imagine the team at Topps finishing up production of their 1989 baseball set and feeling pretty good about it. Then imagine them seeing Upper Deck's set for the first time, with its foil pack wrappers, bright white card stock, hologram technology, and full-color images on the card backs.

I can picture a Topps exec opening his first Upper Deck pack that year, and reacting like this as he flipped through each card:

I know many of us kids back then reacted in a similar way when we saw Upper Deck cards for the first time.

In any case, let's look at some 1989 Topps cards, because that's really what we're here for today. And there's some goodness to be had.

Topps was always solid when it came to providing us with some classic batting stance photos.

Same for the pitching poses. The photographers made Goose look 10 feet tall. And Jim Gott looks rather heroic from that angle, don't you think?

Headshots abound in this set, which might seem boring. But oftentimes the players are very happy. I like that in a baseball card. To reiterate: Baseball is fun.

You know what else is fun?

Subsets!

And 1989 Topps gives us a few good ones.

The #1 Draft Pick cards were pretty cool for young collectors, and showed players in their college uniforms. (Or in the case of Steve Avery, high school!) Topps earns a little bit of credit there.

The rookie cup subset featured some big names at the time, too. (See how nice it is when the cup is always tucked in the bottom corner like that?)

The All-star design continued the generic script theme, but fancied things up a little bit.

The Team Leaders subset returned, and for the fourth year in a row, Topps went with the same cloud-like border. But that repetitiveness almost doesn't matter, because these cards tell the story of baseball so well. Bonus points to the Topps photographer who captured the "Bash Brothers" doing their thing on the Oakland A's card.

Topps also brought back some other favorite subsets, like Record Breakers and Turn Back the Clock. As for the checklist, it felt slightly more modern than standard.

Speaking of more modern, the Future Star cards received a new design. Sheffield, Jefferies, and Alomar were all highly sought after back then.

And on the subject of young stars, Topps did get some good rookies into the base set. In addition to Sheffield and Alomar up there, Biggio, Johnson, and Smoltz would all end up having Hall-of-Fame careers. 

The glaring omission, of course, was Ken Griffey Jr. Most of the other major brands did manage to get him into their base sets, so it was disappointing to young collectors that Topps missed the boat there. (The Topps Traded set was where you'd find Griffey Junior, along with other stars like Deion Sanders, Tom Gordon, and Omar Vizquel.)

But let's get back to the good stuff.

There are some nice action shots to be found throughout the base set.

And some cool cards featuring players with their choice of lumber.

Players with glasses were still a thing, too.

In addition, some excellent color matching occurs in this set. I think a binder page filled with 9 players from any of the teams above would look pretty sweet. (Other teams leave something to be desired. For example, the Angels have a magenta-purple-yellow thing going on, while the orange and blue Mets almost had something special until Topps gave them a red border for some reason.)

Anyway, let's look at a card back now.

The good stuff continues here. Not only is the black text fairly easy to read on that light pink background, but Topps added an interesting little table at the bottom of many cards. The "monthly scoreboard" section allowed us to go a little deeper into the stats of our favorite players, showing total home runs and RBI per month. For pitchers, the table displayed wins and strikeouts per month.

So that's 1989 Topps baseball. Fun, and some good qualities, but if I'm completely honest? A little bit underwhelming.

Regardless, I'm happy to have this set completed and checked off the list. 

How about you readers? If you were collecting back in 1989, how did you feel about the Topps baseball release? And how do you feel about it these days?

Share in the comment section, and thanks for reading!

More Adventures from a Time Gone By

A few months ago here on the blog, I shared four cards that I'd picked up from a 1956 set called Gum Inc. Adventure.

Combine the fantastic artwork on the fronts, the captivating stories on the backs, and the era in which the cards were released, and you get a set that I think quite a few of us would have been all over, had we been kids back then. (I know I would have!)

And actually, I'm kind of all over it now—so much so that I picked up a few more cards recently. So transport yourself back to 1956, and get a load of these five gems:

That's America right there, baby.

Just imagine a bald eagle (and its 7-foot wingspan) swooping down to land on your arm. That guy's leather glove had better be pretty thick and tough.

The write-up on the card back mentions how the bald eagle's territory and numbers had been in decline, and how it could only be found in Florida, and around the Great Lakes and the New England coast. I'm happy that things have noticeably improved for our national bird over the past decade or so. We've seen quite a bit of them here in New York.

The heading on the back of this card reads, "Mobile St. Bernards". Here are the details that appear underneath:

Negotiate 20-foot drifts, climb the steepest hills, slide and skid along impassable highways to effect rescue of many who find themselves snowbound in the north country—in the Rockies, the high Sierras, or New England’s wind-swept hills. Powered by mighty engines and propelled by cleated tracks, machines reduce blizzards to naught.

Now look at that image on the card front again—but this time do it as a kid in 1956 who's growing up in a warm climate like Southern California or Texas—and imagine you're plowing through a blizzard in that machine to rescue those folks in the background.

You're a hero.

 

I can't even describe the awesomeness shown on this card front, so I'll just share the entire card back.

 

A one-man flying platform could conceivably be the much desired airplane in every man's garage.

Imagine reading that as a wide-eyed kid in 1956? Outrageous!

If you've ever flipped through an issue of Popular Mechanics magazine from back in the day, this kind of stuff will feel familiar. If you haven't, I highly recommend finding a copy and giving it a read.

Here in 2026, some sort of committee would immediately flag about 35 safety violations evident in this illustration. And those two guys steering the bobsled would have immediately replied by saying, Outta the way, squares!

The card back mentions the 1932 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, New York, and refers to its bobsled track, complete with S-shaped curves and walls of ice banked to heights of 20 feet, as "spectacularly dangerous". I like how the two men pictured on the card front look more like everyday guys out to test their mettle than they do professional bobsled racers.

And finally, the scene on this card has everything fantastical to a kid who would have been growing up far from the ranches of the American West, tuning in to programs like The Roy Rogers Show and The Lone Ranger. 

Here's the card back:

Man, if I were a kid in 1956 I would have been all over this story, imagining myself on a ranch with some horse-breaking do to. Taming a horse seems like such a cool, noteworthy thing to accomplish. They're amazing creatures.

 

 

Anyhow, there you have it. Another five Gum Inc. Adventure cards for my collection.

 

There are other interesting and artful cards in this set as well, including a hockey version and some boxing stars. So at some point I might add a few more to the collection. Thankfully, many of them are fairly affordable, especially if you don't mind off-center cuts or a few little dings and creases. (None of the cards you see above cost more than $7.00, for example.) 

 

Ultimately, these Gum Inc. Adventure cards are the kind that energize my collecting batteries these days. 

 

How about you readers and collectors? Have any of you picked up some interesting or obscure vintage cards lately? Share in the comment section, and thanks for reading!

The 1989-90 OPC Hockey Sticker Album Project: Packs 7–12

We're going back to the 1989-90 NHL season, where young Gregory Ninepockets has been bitten by the hockey bug and is attempting to complete the current year's hockey sticker album. Previous entries in this series available here.

It's Sunday morning, and young Gregory has woken up early. Will he go into the kitchen to pour himself a bowl of cereal?

No.

Will he go into the living room, turn on the TV, and look for some cartoons?

No.

He's going straight over to his desk, where the 1989-90 O-Pee-Chee hockey album sits. The box of sticker packs is in the top-right drawer, and when he opens it up, he grabs 6 packs from the top-right segment of the box.

 

It's very quiet in the house, but young Gregory knows that wax packs aren't very loud if you open them carefully. So he gets right to work.

 

Pack 7

 

Sweet! A Brett Hull sticker, a Mario Lemieux Art Ross sticker, and a Mario Lemieux all-star! 

What did Super Mario do in order to win the Art Ross trophy the previous season? Are you ready for these numbers? 85 goals, 114 assists, 199 points. A remarkable 31 of those goals came on the power play, and another 13 came shorthanded. The total of 85 led the league, and the 114 assists tied for the lead with Wayne Gretzky. In his final game of the season, Lemieux scored 2 goals against the Flyers in a 6-5 overtime win. You'd have to imagine his teammates tried their hardest to get him to the 200-point mark. It's too bad they came up one point short!

As for Brett Hull, while young Gregory was finding sticker #22 above, The Golden Brett was starting to come into his own. He'd lead the entire league in goals with 72, which would be 10 more than his nearest competitor, Steve Yzerman.

  

 

Pack 8

 

Yes! A Wayne Gretzky base card! During the season these stickers were released, Mr. Gretzky (40 G, 102 A, 142 PTS) would reclaim the points leader position from Mr. Lemieux (45 G, 78 A, 123 PTS). And if these sticker hits keep coming, young Gregory might wake up the rest of the family. And the dog.

 

 

 

Pack 9

 

Alright! A Patrick Roy all-star sticker back, and a Chris Chelios all-star subset sticker! The Canadiens were popular at this time, and they had a very good team. Patrick Roy was a sensation in goal.

 

 

 

Pack 10

 

No way! It's Patrick Roy's base sticker! Hockey is awesome! The dog is now awake, and sniffing outside of Gregory's door.

 

 

 

Pack 11

 

There was nothing of much interest in this pack, and young Gregory is totally fine with that. He's found enough superstar stickers already this morning. He does notice that some of the stickers have trivia printed on the back, however. Some of the backs contain questions, while other backs contain the answers. It's just more hockey knowledge for Gregory to soak up. 

 

 

Pack 12

 

A Joe Sakic rookie base sticker? This is just too much, already. As for Guy Lafleur over there on the right, he came out of retirement for the 1988-89 season. Did three years away from the NHL slow his production down? Not much. He totaled 18 goals, 27 assists, and 45 points in 67 games played for the Rangers.

What a great run of 6 packs! 

 

 

Favorite Page

 

  

Young Gregory added the Wayne Gretzky base sticker to the Kings page, and the Wayne Gretzky all-star sticker to the all-star page across from it. Hard to beat that! 

Now here's the updated summary for the set build:

Main Set (182 total panels)

 

New panels: 33

New duplicates: 3

 

Total panels: 69

Total duplicates: 3

 

Panels needed: 113

Set completion: 38%

 

 

Future Star/All-Star Card Backs (34 total)

 

New backs: 4

New duplicates: 0

 

Total backs: 13

Total duplicates: 0

 

Backs needed: 21

Set completion: 38%

So far, the quest to complete this set is going rather well. I'm 38% of the way there—both for the main set and the sticker back set—and I've only opened 25% of the total packs. As I continue to fill the album, I'm sure the law of diminishing returns will make its appearance. But so far it seems like O-Pee-Chee did really well with the collation of their packs in 1989-90. A total of only 3 duplicate sticker panels across 12 whole packs is excellent!

Best Stickers

Wayne Gretzky, Joe Sakic, and Patrick Roy base stickers; Patrick Roy all-star sticker back; Mario Lemieux all-star sticker.

 

Which were your favorite stickers this time? Share in the comment section, and thanks for following along!