Customer Reviews

Mint Condition: How Baseball Cards Became an American Obsession

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As a kid growing up in the '50s & '60s, collecting baseball cards was a natural part of our existence. Abusing our prized possessions was also a part of the process; a '56 Yogi Berra made my Schwinn sound like a Harley (not really). At the time, I didn't realize that was a very costly sound effect; who knew that shoebox full of Musials, Williams, and Mantles could someday pay for junior's college education, if the owner of those gems had sense enough to keep them in "mint condition"? Needless to say, I didn't catch on until twenty some odd years later; and like everything that has a "market value", baseball card portfolios have been whacked in recent years; just like everything else.

Dave Jamieson has compiled a wonderfully researched history of the baseball card phenomenon, which brought back many memories for me; not only of my innocent youth, but of my not so innocent adulthood, when I tried to grab the hottest cards at the best possible prices. I used to buy 'em by the set, and horde them like a miser, hoping they'd increase in value. Naturally, I now keep my collection in mint condition, and I'll spend hours gazing at baseball's not so distant past, and wonder why Roger Maris isn't in the Hall of Fame.

If you're a baseball fan, regardless of your obsession with collecting cards, you'll certainly enjoy this book. It's a home run.

Gran Torino left me thirsty for Pabst; this book left me jonesing for gum, smokes and a '52 Topps Mickey Mantle. Mint Condition wonderfully explains the incredible journey of the baseball card from its early tobacco days to the wax packs of today. It provides a unique education in American history by showing how tobacco, MLB & chewing gum owe a huge debt to baseball cards and the kids who bought (or forced their parents to buy) them. But my favorite thing about reading Mint Condition is that it caused me to pull out my own stash of prized cards from 20yrs ago which evoked so many great memories.

If, like me, you are a baseball fan who collected baseball cards as a kid, you will find this account of the history of the baseball card industry to be a good read. It occurrs to me that there are characteristic differences between how a journalist and an academic approach a book like this (I'm assuming from his bio on the flap of the dust jacket that Jamieson is a journalist). With an academic, you are likely to get a rather dry discussion, but one that is thorough. With a journalist, you are likely to get a lively discussion, but one that leaves some holes in the narrative. Jamieson's discussion is certainly lively. He spends considerable time on some of the oddball characters who have been involved in the baseball card industry over the years. Getting to know something about these people makes the story more interesting, which is why journalists always include the "personal element" in a news story. If you want to write a newspaper article about an increase in foreclosures, you start the article with an account of the Smith family being forced out of their home. Only then do you give the reader the big picture. Jamieson takes this approach.

An academic is more likely to be concerned with nailing down all the facts, and adds color only as an afterthought. In a book like this, the journalistic approach is probably the better way to go. But there were a number of points where I wished Jamieson had taken more trouble with the facts. For example, he spends some time on the boom and crash in baseball card production and in the prices of collectible cards during the late 1980s and early 1990s. But I didn't feel I was getting the complete story. It would have been nice to have had some more details on how high the prices of particular cards went and how far they crashed. I was also a little unclear about the transition from the collapse in the mid-1990s to the current situation. What I can gather from the book is that since the mid-1990s, only older cards (pre-1960?) in excellent condition have much value. But for these cards, values have soared. I think that is what he is saying happened, but he never quite spells it out, focusing instead on giving accounts of the some of the big dealers in the current market. Similarly, he gives the impression that when Marvin Miller became director of the Major League Players Association, the MLPA had complete authority to negotiate contracts with baseball card companies. Was that really the case? Even though the photographs of the players show them in team uniforms, MLB had no right to receive payments from the card companies? When discussing more recent years, though, he gives the impression that both the MLPA and MLB negotiate (jointly) with the card companies. Seems as if the rules changed somehow. It would have been worthwhile to have straightened out this story. Finally, although he provides a Notes section that gives his sources -- somewhat unusual in a book like this -- the book does not have an index, which greatly reduces its usefulness as a reference.

This is a remarkable and singular achievement. The author makes reading who makes the business and history of baseball cards much fun as collecting them once was. For fans of baseball and sports collectibles it's a must -- but even those who discarded their shoe boxes of cards long ago will delight in the author's portrait of an industry's obsession. As with all manias, it's magnetic.

As a kid growing up during the last height of baseball cards (late 80's early 90's) this book was a real insight into what was really going in the industry at that time. Not only did the book cover this period, it also did a great job of describing how and why baseball cards got huge during the early 20th Century and the 1950's - 60's. I thought I knew a lot about the hobby growing up, but this book really was fascinating and a great read. I encourage anyone that ever collected, bought, sold and traded cards to pick this book up!

My brother recommended this book to me as we both collected cards starting back in 1985, right at the moment of its meteoric rise to financial frenzy and ultimate collapse in the 90's. I, too, like so many saw the industry fall apart right in front of my eyes and walked away, putting away much of my collection hoping one day it will find a place in the market years to come.

I not only collected, but professed myself as a dealer for about 5 years in that period of time, so I got to meet some interesting people. Never accumulated or collected any of the real rarities of the industry, mostly dealt with the up to date stuff. Also parallel with comic books I was interested in as well, and saw both industries matching each other at equal pace.

MINT CONDITION, which looks at how cards came into being at the end of the 1800's and why they existed to begin with. It's interesting that tobacco companies used them to advertise their products and that, while they were fun to collect, they were ultimately used to sell tobacco. Tobacco companies today really cant do anything of that nature. If we remember the Camel dollars which sported Camel Joe and was slapped down for promoting a cartoon that supposedly gave the demographic to kids and was put a halt on using the character. So, yes, its not the product, its what it is paired with. But I digress.

The book MINT CONDITION goes further than any complaints about the matter, but mostly discusses how cards were used as points of advertising. Fleer, Bowman and Leaf, all early bubble gum companies rode the wave to make money. But it was Topps who saw the cards themselves as more valuable than the gum itself. Once Topps secured its place as the only manufacturer of baseball cards, they rode that wave for about 20 more years all the way into the early 80's.

From this point, new card companies broke into the business and competed, but with success for all companies. It seemed a blessing at first as Fleer and Donruss benefitted Topps, rather than take away business. This grew exponentially every year and as prices increased, notoriety of their value became a public issue. Once this happened, the business exploded in and around 1986. Most notably are the famous cards like the T206 Honus Wagner and the Topps Mickey Mantle. Star cards, rookies and classic cards were looked for at every card shop or convention.

The book itself is a fun read, especially if you have been there. It did explain to me, at least, why I have an unopened case of Topps 1996 sitting in my attic that is worth considerably less than what I paid. This is because Topps and the other companies have printed in excess some 80 million cards each year!! Thats an insane amount when you get down to it. While no numbers of how many were actually printed ever got released officially, that is an assumed amount (from what I read).

Aside from this, the author explores other issues that has tarnished the industry, most of it dealing with taking away the industry from kids and giving it to adults. Higher end cards, chase cards, raising the price per cards, are among some of the issues. That with forgeries, counterfeits, pricing, grading, doctoring and, in general, turning it into an everyman's wall street. The book tries to explore in a journalistic perspective, but the author being a former card collector has been jaded and so it lies in the attitude that the business is just that - a business. And kids are just a demographic as are adults. More is better.

Companies that produce collectibles never learn to maintain rarity. But its a double edged sword. A company cannot grow without more sales or more product. If you cut production to maintain rarity, you need to create more products. Or you are forced to increase production on the one thing you sell. So, I leave the business as it is. Its fun to revisit and buy a few packs here and there, but I am not interested in "chasing" the hot cards. I like to see the new designs that come out more than anything.

Some of the new stuff are very nice looking, but I dont find them personally valuable to me like I did when I was younger. So this book was a nice walk down my own personal past and discover what really happened to an industry that I was fascinated with as a kid.

This book is a fantastic read. It gives you an in depth and colorful history of baseball cards from the beginning to the present. The history of the baseball cards and card collecting laid out in this book brings back a nostalgia that makes you want to be a kid again looking for that perfect card. It made me look at my old collection and remember how much fun it was collecting, organizing and trading cards as a kid. The history on cards from the 1800-early 1900 is fantastic. Laying out how the old Tobacco and Gum companies started putting cards in their products as a selling point. How Other cards such as Horrors of War and the Mars Attacks cards were put out. You will learn about the famous Wagner card and the history of the card as it moved from owner to owner and eventually sold for a record $ amount. The book even touches on cards that are altered and counterfeit.

Again, a great read for collector and non-collectors alike. I loan this book out to whomever is willing to give it a try.

What can I say, this book is simply amazing. Very quick read, tons of insight and interviews, it is not your high school history book. It made me think why I got into baseball cards and out of it. Towards the end of the book he has an angle (pretty much why he thinks bseball cards started to tank).

Goes from very first baseball cards (and collectable cards) to the exclusive deal Topps made in 2009.

Some of the problems I came across were that there was no index (would help with important names), no timeline (for a quick reference), and his notes section was frustrating.

What a joy this book is. It brought me back to my childhood in the 1970's and explained a lot about the hobby that I have largely ignored during my adult years.

Recently I asked my two young nephews ages 8 and 6 if they collected cards in the hopes of foisting off a steamer trunk full of mostly worthless common cards and thereby freeing up my spare room closet. I was expecting to see wild excitement but I received a blank look in return. This book tells the story of why kids are no longer interested in the hobby.

It also delves deep into the collector psyche and mindset and there are many basic principles the author reveals which can be applied to other collecting fields. This is a fantastic book and one of these best I have read this year.

You don't have to like baseball cards to love this book. Hell, you don't even have to like baseball. I collected Star Wars and Charlie's Angels cards myself. "Mint Condition" comes highly recommended to anyone who cares about popular culture, printed ephemera, and the history, psychology, and business of collecting. Also to obsessives, crooks, monopolists, fakers, vigilantes, and the good folk who enjoy reading about them.