Night Owl Cards

I came home from work after another crazy fall Friday night and, as I do every night, hopped on the internets to unwind. It didn't work this time. About one minute into bliss, I learned that Chris Stufflestreet, owner of the Vintage Sportscards blog and the 1973 Topps Photography blog , had died from a heart attack earlier this week, at the age of 39. Whoa. I didn't know Chris as well as some others in the hobby. He was active on the Old Baseball Cards site and many other vintage sites long before I ever created this blog. He was a regular in those circles, known by other vintage collectors, by people on the Net54 forum , who would see him at The National every year. Chris had other card sites, including the very informative Vintage Baseball Cards , which spawned his Vintage Sportscards blog in 2010. Collectors and non-collectors would write to him looking for answers about old cards. He knew and wrote about vintage cards that I never knew existed. T204 Ramly, 193...

I received this card from Chris, creator of the very informative Vintage Sportscards and 1973 Topps Photography blogs. Even though there is writing on the card, I jumped at the chance to obtain it because 1) it's a '56 Topps card that I didn't have; 2) it's a Dodger; 3) the writing is quite amusing. I wonder if the person who carefully crossed out the Ed Roebuck name and printed "Don Drysdale," with an extra "Don" just in case, actually believed he had converted the card into a Drysdale card? Drysdale, as you may know, did not have a card in the 1956 Topps set. His rookie card is in the 1957 set. I was never one for writing on cards. I did a lot of things to my cards as a kid. But writing wasn't one of them. So, I thought I'd try it out, about 35 years after I was supposed to be doing stuff like that. And I decided to do it on a modern card, just because you NEVER see scrawling on today's cards. Here is what I came up with:...

I have one thing in common with young Mr. Clayton. We are both spending our Wednesdays vacationing. But while he has to return to work tomorrow, or maybe even later today, I'm free and clear for the rest of the week. This particular week of July is fantastic. Every year. Tremendous. I wonder if Kershaw went back home to Texas. It's got to be boiling there now. It's been in the 80s all week here. I can't imagine what it's like in Texas or in Florida, which is where this schedule originated. It's from Kershaw's time with the Dodgers' Double A team, the Jacksonville Suns. Chris of Vintage Sportscards and 1973 Topps Photography was kind enough to send it along to me. Chris and I have a cool connection that we discovered a few months ago. Chris lives in Florida. But he is from the north country, which is what us residents call the upper portion of New York state. He lived in the same city that I did and actually worked at the same collectibles shop...