A Smorgasbord! 1990 Wonder Stars

From the 1970s through the 1990s, it seemed like you could find your favorite baseball stars on food product packaging everywhere you looked: supermarkets, corner stores, restaurants, and beyond. This past year, in an effort to capture a little more nostalgia, I set a goal to expand my own collection of these "food-issue" cards. In this series I'll show the specific examples I've acquired, and share a little bit of history about the food or beverage sponsor as well. 

Previous entries can be found here.

It's a cool November weekend, and you're excited because Grandma and Grandpa are coming over.

 

They've had a big, positive influence on you. Gramps, especially, is your favorite. He's always tinkering with something, teaching you something about the world, or showing you how some sort of device works. And today is no different.

 

Grams and Gramps come into the kitchen and say hello. Then Gramps puts down a brown paper grocery bag and takes out the contents. You see a loaf of Wonder bread and a cylindrical container of some sort of lunch meat. It's only a few seconds before you remember a conversation that you, mom, and Gramps had a few weeks ago.

 

Gramps had mentioned how he used to enjoy something called a liverwurst sandwich. Despite mom replying with "eww, dad!", you immediately agreed to try one when Gramps issued the challenge. It didn't matter what liverwurst was. You just knew Gramps was the man, and therefore, you needed to eat a liverwurst sandwich just like him.

 

And despite mom's scowling look toward Gramps, you never for a second thought that he was trying to fool you into thinking that he actually liked liverwurst just so he could get a load of your reaction when you tried it for yourself. Gramps was your guy, so if he wanted you to try a liverwurst sandwich, that's what you were going to do. Even if it was awful, you'd earn his respect at the end of it.

 

But that was a few weeks ago, and you'd forgotten all about it.

 

Now a stack of liverwurst and a loaf of bread was on the table. And with another frustrated, repulsed reaction from mom fresh in your ears, Gramps asked if you'd like a sandwich.

 

Time to man up. 

 

So there went Grandpa, into the fridge to get some mustard. That was the only other thing we needed, he said.

 

Then he opened the container of liverwurst, and cut off a few thick slices. The knife went through the meat much more easily than you thought it would, which changed your entire idea of what the texture would be like. Turns out this was not just some sort of bologna.

 

But you didn't have much time to think about it. Gramps was already slathering some yellow mustard on the bread, stacking the liverwurst on top, and slicing the sandwich in half. Then he made one for himself, and slid your serving over to you. 

 

 

  

So there it was. Liverwurst on Wonder bread with mustard. No frills. 

 

Mom was finished protesting the idea, and Grandma was nowhere to be found. Whether that was by design or not didn't matter. You were all-in. So you looked at Grandpa, looked down at the sandwich, picked it up, and went for it.

 

And the experience was . . .

 

. . . different.

 

Liverwurst was like nothing you'd tasted before. It was really soft, and had a strong flavor, that's for sure. But what was the flavor? You had no idea. Was there actually liver in it? Again, no idea.

 

The one thing you knew was that you were going to keep chewing, and once you finished that first bite, you were going to take another. This was an early test of your manhood, and it was going to earn you some points with your favorite dude. So heck yes, you were going to keep eating that sandwich—even after mom tells you that you don't have to finish it. You reply by telling her that it tastes good. (Even if you don't believe that yourself.)

 

Besides, your determination has just earned you a big smile of approval from Gramps. That's the victory right there.

 

And then you look over at the loaf of Wonder bread, and score an unexpected, second victory: 

 

 

 

 

There's a baseball card in there, and you can see through the cellophane wrapper that it's one of your favorite players—Ozzie Smith! 

 

The prospect of that card makes the liverwurst go down a little easier, you'll admit. So you keep eating, and trust your young digestive system to do its thing. Only after you finish, when mom and Grandpa are having a cup of Sanka and talking in the other room with Grandma, do you go over to the bread, reach in for the card, and remove it from its cellophane wrapper. 

It's so cool that a baseball card came with a loaf of bread that you don't even mind Ozzie's airbrushed hat. 

 

You flip it over to check out what the back looks like.

 

You know that's not a real autograph at the bottom, but you enjoy it anyway. It looks just like the one burned into the palm of your baseball mitt. (Yep, you've got a Rawlings Ozzie Smith model.) 

 

And overall, it's a pretty good card back. It was fun to learn that the switch-hitting Smith didn't hit his first left-handed home run until his 3,009th career at-bat! 

 

It's also fun to learn that this is card number 5 of 20. Mom doesn't buy Wonder bread, so you start thinking of ways to convince her to try it one time. There must be other star players in the set.

 

 

Now let's talk about Wonder Bread.

 

 

 

 

To the surprise of no one, Wonder Bread has a tremendous history, and has held an equally tremendous amount of nostalgia for generations of Americans.

 

The bread got its start in 1921, and became a national brand in 1925 when it was purchased by Continental Baking Company. By 1930, Continental began selling the loaves in sliced form, which was rather new at the time.

 

During the next decade, Continental would start fortifying their Wonder loaves with vitamins and minerals, and promoted this more nutritious product all over the place. In order to reach kids (and their health-conscious parents), Continental sponsored popular kids shows like Howdy Doody, and ran advertisements for Wonder Bread during the show. The ads focused on how Wonder Bread could help "build strong bodies 8 ways", which referred to the 8 nutrients that were added to the bread.

 

Fast forward to the present day, and Wonder is still going pretty strong, even with more and more health-conscious folks moving away from factory-made, processed foods. (There's a whole wheat option now, and Wonder's parent company, Flowers Foods, owns some healthier, less processed brands.) So there's certainly something to be said for the nostalgia factor and brand loyalty.

 

Back to trading cards now. The 1990 Wonder Stars set was not the company's first go at cards. From 1974 through 1976, Wonder issued a set of football cards. And even earlier than that, during the 1960-61 hockey season, Wonder included an offer for an autographed picture of stars like Gordie Howe and Bobby Hull.

Good on them!

 

Now a couple of questions for you readers and collectors:

 

(1) Do you have any Wonder Bread cards in your collection?

 

(2) Have you ever had a liverwurst sandwich? If so, what did you think?

 

Thanks for reading. I look forward to your answers!