Mortality

 The dean of the (dwindling) population of card bloggers, Night Owl, has been musing recently on topics that derive from the advance of time and our position in that flow. He and I are of the same generational cohort.  My 60th birthday approaches rapidly, but I cannot really wrap my mind around it. I am healthy, active, and at the peak of my professional career (which is a source of great satisfaction.) I don't feel 60 and I don't expect I will in a few short weeks when that number becomes reality.

But there are events that give me pause to consider the advance of time.  Today brought one of those events: the death of Bernie Parent.

It has been a while since I followed hockey.  But, following it was part of my childhood, and it was mostly driven by collecting NHL stickers that were given away at my local Loblaws grocery store in 1974 and 1975. Bernie Parent was 80 years old. I struggle more that he was that old than I do with my own age. I suppose it may have something to do with having moved my mother into assisted living recently and seeing the recent decline in her health. Anyways, before this post becomes even more maudlin, I'll sign off.

What I am listening to: Landslide by Fleetwood Mac

Stickers

I try to remain focused with my collecting.  Because I am mostly a vintage collector, I try to preserve my cash because bargains are few and far between.  However, I do try to leave a little room for serendipity.  One such serendi[pitous diversion was the 1974-75 Loblaw's hockey sticker album a couple years ago.  You can read more about this set here. Along the way, I picked up the Acme SuperSaver version of the book and mostly completed that.  I still needed about a half dozen stickers to finish it.

I keep two EBay searches active in order to keep an eye on what is out there and be ready, should I decide to finish the second book. But, I've been generally focusing on other areas of my collection over the last year.  However, recently I saw an auction for what was clearly these hockey stickers, but was mistitled as being from 1972.  The lot consisted of 75 - 8 sticker panels and 50 - 7 stamp panels (I am not aware of 7 stamp panels ever being issued, so I have to assume it had one stamp removed. I haven't really looked into who was missing from the panels to see what the deal was.)  The lot also claimed to include around a thousand loose single stickers.

I ended up winning at the starting price, which meant I got all these stickers for about $20 delivered.

For context, around same time someone auctioned a lot of 134 (correctly identified) panels with a final price of $260 or $2 each panel.  So, conservatively, I won my lot for less than a tenth of what it should have gone for. I figured that the lot would mainly be devoid of stars, but I was wrong.  The Bobby Orr sticker can sell individually for up to $25. I felt lucky when I won a panel including Orr for around $15.    As it turned out this lot had 6 Bobby Orr individual stickers and 2 complete panels that included Orr.

There were precious few Flyers stickers. Oddly few. Until I looked at the return address.

I did manage to complete the ACME album with stickers from this group.  But that wasn't all.  The lot also included football stickers!

So, naturally, I went out and found the corresponding album, which was distributed by Sunoco and DX gas stations.  I'll probably do research on this sticker set and post about it in the future.

Now I have a larger task ahead of me.  The album includes 144 stickers. However, it covers all 28 26 teams, with 32 24 player stickers per team.  That adds up to 896 624 stickers.  So, this will probably end up being a long term project. I haven't really done any research on how much the stickers cost yet. I don't expect them to be expensive, since the album in pristine condition only cost $15.  But, we'll see.

P.S. I also found another Loblaw's hockey sticker album for fairly cheap. It is coming from Canada, so it will be a while before it arrives, but, I'll get to work on that (again) too.

Added in Edit:  There were only 26 NFL teams in 1972, so I have updated the math.

Joy of a Completed Set - 1974-75 Loblaws Hockey Stickers

Here they are. The last 4 Loblaws hockey stickers I needed to finish my album.

By way of review, I grew up in the suburbs of Rochester, NY and my mother used to do her shopping at Loblaw's, a Canadian grocer that made incursions into the states.  During the 1974-1975 hockey season, Loblaw's gave away hockey stickers with each purchase. They also had an album, although I don't remember if it was free or needed to be purchased.

I did have the album and, while the promotion lasted, tried to complete it.  Of course, I didn't then.  But now I have.

I still have a fair number of duplicate stickers and will keep my eye out for another album to complete. But, for now, I am scratching this one off.

Closing in on Completion....Sorta

I really should have been using the proceeds from selling off my Heritage sets on finishing my 1971 set, but I ended up spending a fair amount working on the Loblaws 1974/75 Hockey stickers.

This set is composed of 324 individual player stickers (18 players for each of 18 teams) that are sold in strips of 8. They were distributed through both Loblaw's and Acme Super Saver grocery stores in Canada and the Northeast US.  You can see what the sticker strip looked like when the cashier handed one to your mom:

The Loblaws variety, shown above, came with a coupon.  Please note that the two images above are not the same scale.  The upper image is equivalent to 3 stickers (or 1 sticker and the coupon) on the lower image.

The Acme version,shown below did not come with a coupon.

As you might expect, there was also an album for the stickers.

The Acme  version of the album was identical in content, but had a different cover that was basically a slight variation of the sticker strip front seen above.

Now, the more astute observer (which is all of you, amirite?), will say "Hey wait!  324 is not divisible by 8? What gives?"  Well, I'll tell you that your math is correct and something does give.  There were 40 unique strips covering 320 of the individual stickers, leaving 4 unaccounted for.  So to speak. The albums actually came with a page of 20 stickers in the back.  And the 4 stickers not found in the strips were found at the bottom of that page of 20.  That is right, short prints!  Or as I like to call them "@#$$%&#$%!!!!"

Thankfully, the four players on the short print stickers were not huge names or they would be ungodly expensive.  As it is, recently, an intact sheet of 20 sold on EBay for $18.49 plus shipping.  So, those SP stickers would have cost me $5 each. Since I actually managed to have one already (Guy Charron -Detroit Redwings), I would have been paying over $7 for each sticker I needed. Since my Paypal account was empty, I wasn't ready to pay that much, so I didn't bid. 

But, prior to that I managed to pick up some strips of stickers at reasonable prices and have knocked my want list down from 46 players down to 18. I even got a fairly reasonable price on the strip that includes Bobby Orr.

I ended up paying $18 for the strip and another couple bucks for shipping.  It seems like a lot, but they usually sell for more (recent sales of unbroken strips has been between $24 and $41 and a recent KSA graded individual Orr sticker has sold for $45), so I think I did pretty well. Particularly considering I also needed most of the other players on that strip.  Among the other strips, I also got the stars Bobby Clarke and Stan Mikita.

So, although I now have all the big stars, finishing the set will get (relatively) expensive.  Sure the three remaining SPs I need will probably set me back $5 or more each. But, I also expect the other 15 will be expensive since I will likely need to buy a bunch of stickers I don't need to get the ones I do. Plus, since the only source I have for the stickers is EBay, the shipping costs factor in.

It has been fun to date and it will be fun to complete. But, as any set collector knows, the last few cards towards completion can be painful.  You have the end in site, but it seems to never get there. Kinda like one of those dreams where you are being chased down a corridor while the door at the end keeps moving away from you. I have no idea how long it will take to finish, but I don't expect it to happen any time in the next few months.  So, I can't avoid 1971 any more. I have to push through on that set....

Coming up: A trade pack arrives and the monthly Mini-show.

Joy of Completed Pages

The "Joy of a Completed Page" post is not original to me.  So many card bloggers use it that I suppose that it's origins have been lost in the mists of time. Nonetheless, since I have few original ideas and little to talk about, I am going to appropriate it's use and add my own little twist.

Part of my morning routine, apart from feeding our horses, is to check the new EBay auctions that cropped up over the previous 24 hours for various items I am looking for.  One of the saved searches I have is for the 1974/75 Loblaws hockey stickers.  My progress had stopped when I couldn't any reasonably priced lots of stickers. I would see a lot of single stickers posted for the low, low price of 1.29 and 3.00 shipping. But, having vowed to spend no more than a dime on commons, I gave them a pass.  There was also auctions for small groups of 3 to 12, and for single strips of unperforated stickers.  But, again, the prices were too high for my liking.

But, one day last week, while reviewing the new auctions, I came across one that I couldn't refuse. It was for about 40 unperforated strips and several hundred individual stickers.  It was an auction, but had a Buy-It-Now price of $25.  So, without hesitating, I hit the BIN and bought them. They arrived on Monday, and I have spent most of the past two evening sorting through them and updating my album. I have made excellent progress overall.  There are 324 total stickers in the set and, after this auction win, I am down to needing 46 to go to complete it.  I still have some big names to go like Bobby Clarke, Bobby Orr, and Stan Makita.  And the Bobby Orr will be expensive as I have never seen one on EBay for less than $10. But, luckily, I have other big names like the entire Sabre's French Connection line (Rick Martin, Rene Robert, and Gilbert Perreault), Guy Lafleur and Bernie Parent.

But, the real joy of this lot was the completed pages.

Interestingly, I have completed both expansion teams that joined the NHL in the 1974-75 season.

The Washington Capitals still exist, although they have never won a Stanley Cup. They did actually make it to the finals in 1998, but were swept by the Detroit Red Wings.

The Kansas City Scouts only played for two years and, after the 1975-76, season moved to Denver and became the Rockies.  In 1982, the team moved again, becoming the still active New Jersey Devils.

So, there you have it. Three (3!) completed pages. Things may get quiet around here. Due to some some unforeseen circumstances, my wife and I have some family obligations we need to deal with.  And, since I am lousy at coming up with original content when pressed for time (which is all of the time now,) I probably won't have a lot to talk about.  But, I will still be reading your blogs!

Fond Remembrances....with Stickers!

As you may recall, I grew up in Rochester, New York. The main local grocery store in my suburban town was Loblaw's, which I know now is a Canadian company (and still in business the last time I was in Toronto on business.)  As you likely also know, hockey is the Canadian sport*.  Well, during the 1974-1975 hockey season, Loblaw's passed out strips of hockey stickers and coupons. Seeing as how my mother shopped at Loblaw;s, I came to acquire the stickers.  My mother, usually frugal to the point of making Mr. Lincoln cry, did spring for the sticker album.

And, so I spent that hockey season carefully pasting stickers in the album.  I never did finish it and, my mother also being quite unsentimental, it was thrown out at some point in the intervening years.  I occasionally think about it and, during a recent bout of nostalgia, looked for the stickers on EBay. Sure enough they are out there.  So,  I found an auction with a reasonable starting point and made my bid.  As you can guess, I won and now I am going to show you. In no particular order:

 Ross Brooks' NHL career only lasted three seasons. However, in that time he accumulated a 37-7-6 record and a 2.64 GAA with Boston. His career was so short because he was a 35 year old rookie.

 Living in Rochester, I was a Sabres fan, even though the local team, the Americans or Amerks, were the Boston farm club. Dontcha just love that old time goalie mask?

 Oooh! An error sticker!  He last name is actually spelled McAneeley.  I'm guessing it isn't worth any more because of it.

Another crazy mask! Cesare had a 190-257-97 record with 3.27 Goals Against Average in 16 NHL seasons.

 One of two Hockey Hall of Fame inductees I got with the lot of stickers.

Another goalie with a long career. The only reason I am showing this, though, is that wild mask.  It just makes me laugh.

This picture was taken as Mohns was entering his last NHL season. He was 41 at the time and had been in the league since 1953. Some of the people he played against probably weren't even alive when Mohns  started in the NHL.

The other Hall of Famer in the group.

 One of these things is not like the other.

Marson was the only black player in the album.  Come to find out, he wasn't the first player of African descent in the NHL.  That honor went to Willie O'Ree, also known as the "Jackie Robinson of ice hockey" who played in the NHL in the 1957-58 and 1960-61 seasons. Marson was, I suppose you could say, the Larry Doby of ice hockey, being the second black player in the NHL.  This was his rookie card/sticker.

I swear a lot of the players look like they had auditioned for the lead role in the movie Joe Dirt. I was the 1970's, after all.

I just can't get enough of those masks.

I guess I am going to have to try and put the set together.  The albums are as scarce as hen's teeth, so at the moment, these stickers are going into Ultra Pro sheets.

*True Story: One time I was in Toronto on business and ended up going out to a very fancy restaurant for dinner with group of associates. We are talking art on the wall fancy.  The waiters dressed head to toe in black fancy.  Nonetheless there was a large TV on one wall playing the Leafs game. That is when I finally grasped what hockey meant to Canada.

Question: Anyone interested in the duplicates?

Up Next:  I finally (hopefully) get that card I spent a buttload of money on.

What I am listening to:  Polk County by Della Mae