1974 Wonder Bread Football Update

1974 Wonder Bread Football Cards 1-9

1974 Wonder Bread Football Cards 10-18

1974 Wonder Bread Football Cards 19-27

1974 Wonder Bread Football Cards 28-30

Catching up on an old update on my 1970s NFL Wonder Bread hunt. It is now over. I have edited what I originally drafted for posting since it was written when I still had some of the cards incoming..

As I previously stated at one time (see links below at end of this post) I have been pursuing the football sets put out by Wonder Bread in the mid-1970s. It took me quite a long time to finally complete the 1975 set. I had started out with just two cards (Franco Harris and Ted Hendricks) I had acquired back in '75 and for the longest time just sat on them without looking for the rest. I eventually found the rest I needed mostly from Ebay Auctions in small lots of a handful here and a handful there I think I also hit sportlots for the some of the final ones. I lucked out on Ebay when I found and bought the 1976 full set.

After that it was onto the 1974 set they are the ones that look like 1971 Topps Football.

1971 Topps Football 257 Mark Moseley RC - Eagles

Except they don't have the little position player guys (in the early 80s when McDonalds did their "Build a Big Mac" game the little characters building the Big Mac reminded me of those 1971 Topps guys - I found the image below of the ad for the game here at flickr).

I thought the actual characters on the game pieces looked more like the position characters and were more "cartoony", but maybe I was wrong. I haven't seen those since '81/82 when they had the game running so maybe my memory is just too fuzzy on this one.

At the time of my original writing  I only had 2: My first card from that set was #15 Tom Mack Rams.

 

I now have 2 because in the mad rush of bidding on Ebay and ordering through Sportlots to complete the set I forgot I had it, I thought I just had the next card as my only card. That second card is #19 Jim Plunkett Patriots his name looks pink from a big ol' bread stain on the card that looks like a huge storm cloud rolling in behind Jim there.

I ordered most of what I needed of the '74 set from sportlots.com individually because that is how they roll there. The rest of the cards I bid on Ebay for 9 of them (and won) and the remaining 3 I ordered "Buy It Now" from one Ebay Store. The cards from Sportlots came in 3s and 5s and how many I ordered from individual sellers again that is how they roll. The three cards I used the BIN feature on at Ebay, I requested confirmation on the shipping and the dealer only discounted. 75cents on the shipping. If I recall correctly they were $2.50 per card and total shipping came out to $6.75 which means I paid $2.25 per card. UGH dealers need to COMBINE shipping for small numbers of cards. That's par for the course though because this particular dealer specializes in vintage cards no newer than 1972. His prices for most stuff is outrageous  but these cards were $5.00 a piece (one was $4.00).

With this set the Offensive players have a red border and the Defensive players have a yellow border. Yes the color combination reminds one of McDonalds.

1974 Wonder Bread Football - 16 Jim Otto - Raiders

1974 Wonder Bread Football - 9 Chris Hanburger - Redskins

THE CHECKLIST:

Back of Card 2 Cool Pic Huh?

01 Jim Bakken - Cardinals
02 Forrest Blue - 49ers
03 Bill Bradley - Eagles
04 Willie Brown - Raiders
05 Larry Csonka - Dolphins
06 Ken Ellis - Packers
07 Bruce Gossett - 49ers
08 Bob Griese - Dolphins
09 Chris Hanburger - Redskins
10 Winston Hill - Jets
11 Jim Johnson - 49ers
12 Paul Krause - Vikings
13 Ted Kwalick - 49ers
14 Willie Lanier - Chiefs
15 Tom Mack - Rams
16 Jim Otto - Raiders
17 Alan Page - Vikings
18 Frank Pitts - Browns
19 Jim Plunkett - Patriots
20 Mike Reid - Bengals
21 Paul Smith - Broncos
22 Bob Tucker - Giants
23 Jim Tyrer - Chiefs
24 Eugene Upshaw - Raiders
25 Phil Villapiano - Raiders
26 Paul Warfield - Dolphins
27 Dwight White - Steelers
28 Steve Owens - Lions
29 Jerrel Wilson - Chiefs
30 Ron Yary - Vikings

Previous Wonder Bread posts:
 Mid 1970s Wonder Bread NFL
Mailday Mostly 1972 Topps  (at bottom of post)

Mailday Mostly 1972 Topps

I haven't scanned any of these cards from today but I got a boat load of 1972 Topps Baseball from sportlots.com and a couple of 1974 Football Cards from Ebay.

The Baseball Onslaught.

1964 Topps
154 Dick Tracewski Dodgers

1966 Topps
298 Rico Petrocelli Red Sox

1972 Topps Some of these are off center.

20 Don Wilson Astros
150 Norm Cash Tigers
152 Gene Clines Pirates
154 Ted Simmons Cardinals (I might have 3 of this card, not sure)
156 Twins Team Card
160 Andy Messersmith Angels
162 Jerry Bell Darrell Porter Bob Reynolds 1972 Rookie Stars Brewers
164 Tug McGraw Mets IN ACTION (very cool super PC card, YES! I do have his regular card as well - see below)
165 Chris Speier Giants
166 Chris Speier IN ACTION
167 Deron Johnson Phillies
169 Vida Blue A's
173 Clay Kirby Padres
174 Clay Kirby IN ACTION
175 Tom Haller Tigers
176 Tom Haller IN ACTION
178 Paul Schaal IN ACTION
179 Dock Ellis Pirates
182 Ed Kranepool IN ACTION
183 Bill Melton White Sox
184 Bill Melton IN ACTION
185 Ron Bryant Giants
187 Gates Brown Tigers
189 Gene Tenace A's
190 Dave Giusti Pirates
191 Jeff Burroughs Rangers

192 Cubs Team Card - A couple of times in the 1970s it seemed that only the Cubs did this cut-out heads team thing on the team cards. I think I had a poster of this once as a kid, not 100% sure such a product existed let alone if I actually had it.

201 Phil Roof Twins (way off center)
202 Scipio Spinks Astros
204 Tommy Helms Astros
206 Dal Maxvill Cardinals
209 Joe Rudi A's
212 Grant Jackson Orioles
213 Billy Parker Art Kusnyer Tom Silverio 1972 Rookie Stars Angels
214 Mike McQueen Braves
215 Alex Johnson Indians (Off Center)
216 Joe Niekro Tigers
217 Roger Metzger Astros
218 Eddie Kasko Red Sox
219 Rennie Stennett Pirates
220 Jim Perry Twins

The 1972 Topps Baseball is the ultimate in 1970s design style, here are a couple of examples of the styling. The following cards I already had, I had forgotten that I had scanned the second two.

One of my fave Old-Time Players Frank Howard, began his career with the Los Angeles Dodgers but is most remembered as a Washington Senator (They then became the Texas Rangers and the 1972 is the Debut of the Texas Rangers on Cards)

Frank Howard # 350

Even though Tug McGraw played on two teams I'm not very big on. The Phillies and The Mets (Since some trades of some Nationals to the Mets I am more appreciative of them) If you are old enough to remember the 1970s you may remember Tugs comic strip based on his MLB career "Scroogie". The main character played for a team call the PETS. Somewhere I have a Scroogie book and a couple of comic strip clippings when I find them I'll try to remember to scan them.

Tug McGraw # 163

Just because he is the Home Run King Here is Hammerin' Hank IN ACTION.

Hank Aaron IN ACTION # 300

Now the Football Cards I got:

1974 Topps
148 John Matuszak Oilers RC.

1974 Wonder Bread
15 Tom Mack Rams - My first 1974 Wonder Bread Football card.

Mid 1970s Wonder Bread NFL

Back in the day one of the biggest food companies and Topps produced some nice card sets that were included in the food product. I am talking about WONDER BREAD. In 1974 -76 they made some nice, although small, Football sets.

The designs are both nice and pretty plain. The 1974 set takes the design of the 1971 Topps Football set, while the 1975 and 1976 seem to be unique to themselves.

I will concentrate this post on the 1975 set as that was the only one I had any cards of way back then. My mom wasn't much of a fan of the bleached white Wonder bread so we would usually get either the store brand or Whole Wheat breads when I was a kid. So it was sort of rare when I would get some of these things. Wonder Bread also did some non-sport sets the most popular would probably be the STAR WARS and maybe the BATTLESTAR GALACTICA (The original series) sets. (I'll try to post some pics of those sometime later, I don't think I have any scanned).

OK so way back in '75 I managed to get these two cards from this 24 card set:

#21 TED HENDRICKS

#17 FRANCO HARRIS

Those two cards were pulled directly from the product, the only way to get these cards back then. A few years later when trading card shops started popping up during the hobby boom of the early 1980s it was possible to start getting these from other sorces and even some of the factory sets. So my copies of these cards are pretty yellowed on the back and the white parts on the front from being in actual contact with the bread. I forget if they put them in those little plastic packs back then or not. Even if they did cards pulled directly from the bread bags are most likely never going to be anywhere near NM.

For the longest time those were the only two cards from this set that I had. It also seemed that I would be forever doomed to only having just those two, um this was before the internet and places like Ebay where now if you are patient enough you can find a decent set for a pretty good price, but I had to do things the hard way and find the set in bits and pieces So I do have a few cards from this set for trade (I'll list those toward the bottom of this post). OK so I pieced the set together mostly by winning some Ebay auctions, and I think maybe one or two purchases from sportlots.com (either in the direct stock, or in the 1,2,3 Auctions they have).

Here are a few of my fave cards from this set:

#4 KEN HOUSTON#7 TOM MACK

#13 BOB GRIESE

The Bob Griese card was not too difficult to get with today's internet. I got it from Ebay and the seller appologized for it being in such poor condition. When I got it I was like "What's wrong?" OK so the corners are not prestine sharp and the edges have a tiny bit of wear, but that doesn't make me sad about it.

Now the cards that eluded me the most and I had Dicken's of a time trying to pin down. They were cards #15 Chuck Forman and the first card #1 Alan Page. Since they both are Vikings maybe it was an ancient Viking curse I was a victim of. I would keep finding partial sets, that had almost everyone but these two, especially Mr. Page. He was the very last card I managed to find. Odd as often people manage to get the first card of a set or some of the early ones and decide to acquire them in order. Anyway it took about 34 years to complete this 24 card set, with probably only about 10 years of actually trying hard to find the cards other than in passing.

#15 CHUCK FOREMAN

#1 ALAN PAGE

One thing about the design of this set that for several years I couldn't place since I only had the two cards was how they were organized. I haven't quite figured out the reason for the numbering but I eventually discovered the pattern to the RED and BLUE borders. At first I thought it may be the traditional AFC/NFC thing, but after getting more cards from teams of the same conference with different color schemes I knew that wasn't it. It isn't by team either as there are a couple of teams that have 2 players as you can see there are two Vikings and one is Red the other Blue. Well with the full set and studying the cards carefully, I discovered that The DEFENSE is RED and the OFFENSE is BLUE. Mystery Solved.

I don't have any of the 1974 set yet. I'd like to start getting some of those or find a nice conditioned set. UPDATE: I now have my first 1974 Wonder Bread Card: # 15 Tom Mack - Rams. Received in mail on 13 Nov.

I do have a complete 1976 set. Over the years, now many of the players from each of these sets are now in the NFL Hall of Fame.


Here are my Duplicates from this set and also my lone duplicate from the 1976 set that are up for trade.

1975 Wonder Bread
#2 Emmitt Thomas - Chiefs
#7 Tom Mack - Rams (2)
#9 Isaac Curtis - Bengals (2)
#22 Levi Johnson - Lions (2)

1976 Wonder Bread

#14 Jack Youngblood - Rams