Santa/Mom Kicks Off Collecting the 1955 Bowman Set (Again)

Alternate Post Title:  Family Tradition - Collecting the 1955 Bowman Set for the Third or Fourth Time

Having re-entered the realm of the baseball card set-builder a few years ago, I've so far completed our 1965 Topps set and made an impressive dent in the daunting 1934-36 Diamond Stars set.  My main focus will now turn to the 1969 Topps set, and once we've polished off that 664-card collection we'll have a complete Topps flagship 54-set run from 1969 to 2022.

In the background, and unofficially, I've started lists for three other sets I'm kind of collecting and I'll gladly add a card or two to these collections in the coming years if the opportunity presents itself.  The 1959 Topps set is next.  After the design of the 1965 Topps set, this is my favorite vintage set design from the golden age of baseball cards.  As of this writing, I already have 15 cards accumulated for that set.

The 1966 Topps set may be collected concurrently with 1959 or after that pricer set is near completion.  The hard-to-find and expensive high numbers from 1966 are going to be an issue, but having briefly started to collect the set in 1988, we already have the Mickey Mantle card.  ("We've already got the Mantle," is something I can still hear my Dad saying.)  I don't remember the specifics of how or why my Dad and I added this particular Mantle card, but it's in my collection and ready to have a set built around it.

And then there's the 1955 Bowman set, with its wood-grained color TV borders, its gorgeous photography and its iconic baseball cards that define the sport from the mid-1950s.  My Dad once told me he had built this set several times over, as this was his favorite growing up, and "I had them all, Jimmy."  He would have been 11 years old at the time these cards were first for sale at corner stores and five and dimes.  Seven years later when he departed for college, his mother, my Mom-Mom, bundled the entire collection, including his treasured 1955 Bowman sets, in trash bags and took them to the curb in front of their duplex on Oak Street.  The thought of that still gives me chills.  Cleaning out my Mom-Mom's attic in early 1985 after she had passed away, my parents found only one remnant of my Dad's lost collection - the torn off back of a 1955 Bowman Mickey Mantle card, its front lost forever as it had been separated and likely affixed to a notebook or tacked to a bulletin board.  Horrifying.

In the summer of 1983 (or 1984), when the Magic Shoebox of vintage baseball cards arrived in my life, and I spent several glorious afternoons in our screened-in porch on 12th Street sorting and documenting those treasures, I first learned of my Dad's fondness for the 1955 Bowman set.  There were 44 cards in the box from the 1956 Topps set, but 18 cards in the box from the 1955 Bowman set.  Had those quantities been reversed, we probably would have started a 25-year journey collecting the 1955 Bowman set.  But with '56s more than doubling '55s, the decision was made to keep the wood-grained cards in the Magic Shoebox and begin our 1956 Topps set quest.  A few decades later, with the help of my Mom over several Christmases, I did ultimately finish off a 1955 Bowman Phillies team set.

A month or so ago, not having any baseball cards to wrap and present to me on December 26th, the day my sister and I officially exchange gifts with our families, my Mom asked me for a list.  Over the past decade, she's single-handedly crossed off most vintage Phillies baseball cards I've needed, leaving only a handful of expensive high numbers from the 1952 Topps set and one elusive 1967 Topps Rookie Stars card for Gary Sutherland.  I'll add those cards one day, but they're way too expensive to ask Santa/Mom to track down.

I didn't want to give her my 1969 Topps or Diamond Stars lists, as I planned on adding a few of those to our sets at the December Philly Show.  So I put together a list for our 1955 Bowman set, crossing off 17 cards (one card from the Magic Shoebox was a double) and highlighting the Phillies in the set.  True, I've collected the Phillies cards from the set once, but those are secure within my 1950s Phillies baseball card binder.  The baseball card set builder's paradox is adding cards for a set build that could already be included in another part of his collection.  But I digress.

On Monday, as our families gathered at my Mom's, among the laughter, joking and piles of cast off wrapping paper, I spotted the box likely containing baseball cards and saved that present to open last.  As suspected, inside was my baseball card haul from Santa for the year - nine 1955 Bowman cards, including eight Phillies cards, and one Athletics card purchased by accident since the text with team names on my list was hard for Santa to read.  These nine cards mark the official start of collecting the 1955 Bowman set, 67 years after my Dad had built the set several times.  ("I had them all, Jimmy!")  Once again, my Mom outdid herself this Christmas - not only because of these cards but with every thoughtful gift she presented to her entire family.  She shines every day of the year, but always a little brighter on December 26th.

I hope you and your family had a wonderful holiday season, and I wish you all the best for 2023!  Go ahead and get yourself some vintage baseball cards in the coming year - Mel Clark and his many bats would approve.

1955 Bowman #41