as a reminder, i have reinstated my sampler sets for the vintage topps flagship sets that i have not completed. more details were provided in this post featuring my 1952 topps sampler. i am maintaining my topps flagship through the years mini-collection, so the 1953 topps ralph kiner card from the original sampler remains there and not in this updated sampler.
in 1953, there were 16 teams represented. there weren't any subsets in the way that we think of them today, but there were some other things to showcase. unlike 1952, it's an all-portrait oriented set. the card design features both red and black boxes for the name, position (moved to the card front after being on the back in 1952), and team text, and the box and team logo positions flip flop throughout the set. the facsimile autographs that were on the front of the 1952 cards have moved to the back in 1953. the most interesting element, to me, is that the set documents the braves' move from boston to milwaukee with cards featuring both cities.
enough now. let's see what the 1953 sampler set looks like, starting with an ai generated needlepoint sampler for the set.
it's so wrong that i like it.
i will start these posts by going through the representative for each team (starting with the american league) followed by the subsets. then, i'll show any other cards that i have to fill out the remainder of the last binder page.
st. louis browns - roy sievers
the card backs are all the same format - no gray back or white back, and no red back or black back as in 1952 (there are some cards with white bio and black bio text variations) - and with the first cartoons! here, sievers' card shows some players following a home run. given the answer to the quiz is the 1936 yankees, i looked up number 20 on that team and found that it was pitcher johnny broaca. if we pretend that the player waiting his turn at bat is broaca, then it could be that the player who hit the homer is phil rizzuto who hit in the 8 spot (and slugged two homers in one of broaca's 1936 starts).
as for sievers, he was the 1949 american league rookie of the year as the card back tells us, and in 1953 he spent his last season with the browns organization. traded near the beginning of spring training in 1954, sievers came into his own with the senators over the following seasons.
one other note - according to chris creamer's fantastic sports logos site, the browns changed their logo from the crusader on horseback to the martian (both are my descriptions) in 1952. topps updated the logo on the 1953 cards.
chicago white sox - harry dorish
i have had this card in my collection for a long time. i picked it up at a card show from a vintage bargain bin courtesy of longtime twin cities card dealer curt (more on him in a bit). i wanted it because the back features a drawing of babe ruth (his first topps appearance?) and the front features billboards that say "harry" and "dorish". i thought that was clever or at least interesting. his nickname was "fritz" as you can see on the card back, and that is how he is listed at baseball reference. used mainly as a reliever, he set a career high in wins in 1953 with 10, and would have had 17 saves for the white sox had that been a stat back then.
detroit tigers - hal newhouser
card #228
i've had this card of the two-time american league mvp since my first go at the samplers. i bought it, and many of these other cards, from one of my all-time favorite card dealers - a guy named curt who was known for his vintage bargain boxes. unfortunately for my collection, he relocated to the carolinas but last i heard (from a couple of guys at the national last year) he was still actively selling cards. this one has a pinhole in the top which is probably why it was in the bargain bins, but today it would not qualify for a bargain bin of any sort. anyway, 1953 was newhouser's last season in detroit. he went 0-1 in seven appearances, four of which were starts.
new york yankees - ed lopat
card #87
it's worth noting, at this point, that the bio text - "home", "born", etc - are sometimes printed in black ink and sometimes in white ink. in the case of lopat's cards, both ink colors were used, making this the more common white ink variety. lopat had a great 1953 season, leading the league in win percentage (thanks to his 16-4 record) and era. he helped the yankees to their fifth consecutive world series championship, pitching a complete game in the yanks' game 2 victory.
philadelphia athletics - billy hitchcock
card #17
this card is a relatively new addition to my collection. once i decided to reconstitute the samplers, i went looking through some cards and decided that this one needed to be a part of things. the fence background is reminiscent (to me) of some of the 1950's bowman cards. it's not really a baseball background and so it stands out among the other cards i have. hitchcock was traded to the tigers in january of 1953, so he didn't appear with the a's that year. in fact, 1953 turned out to be his last season in the majors.
washington senators - bob porterfield
card #108
like lopat, porterfield had a big year in 1953. he led the league in wins with 22, and threw 24 complete games while starting 32 times for the "nationals". included in those complete games were nine shutouts and two one-hitters. one of my multi-great-great-grandfathers taught at what was known as harvard college a long time ago, but he wasn't smart enough to invent the catcher's mask i guess.
boston braves - vern bickford
card #161
with the national league cards, we get into the black box on the front rather than the red box that denoted american league cards. i'm not sure that bickford is in "the pitcher's hall of fame", but he did indeed no-hit the dodgers in 1950. in 1953, bickford posted a 2-5 record. he made two starts against the dodgers, but didn't make it out of the third inning either time.
milwaukee braves - jim pendleton
card #185
the braves moved from boston to milwaukee in march of 1953. too late for the early series, but in time for the later series to reflect the move. so, i have a card to represent each city in the sampler. in fact, bickford is the highest numbered boston brave in the set, and pendleton is the lowest numbered milwaukee brave. pendleton had been signed by the dodgers out of the negro leagues in the late 1940's, but didn't appear in the major leagues until 1953 with the braves. he hit seven homers in '53, with three of them coming in the same game against the pirates on august 30.
chicago cubs - gene hermanski
card #179
speaking of three homers in one game, hermanski accomplished the feat as a dodger in 1948 as his card back mentions. what is odd, however, is that topps referred to that as the "modern national league record" when, in fact, hermanski's former teammate gil hodges had launched four homers in a game in 1950 to set the post-war national league record. strange. in 1953, hermanski played a bit for the cubs but was traded during the season to the pirates in the ralph kiner deal, and finished the season (and his playing career) in pittsburgh.
cincinnati reds - joe nuxhall
card #105
i was pretty happy to find this card of nuxhall in one of those vintage bargain bins in the early 2000's. my friends and i all knew who he was because he debuted in the major leagues as a 15 year old and we would point out to each other that fact during our little league and babe ruth years. nuxhall's debut came in 1944 and he didn't return to the majors until 1952. 1953 was his second full season, and he went 9-11 and pitched his first major league shutout.
brooklyn dodgers - bobby morgan
card #85
contrary to what topps would have us believe based on the bio text there on the back, bobby's first name was robert (at least according to baseball reference) and not bobby. 1953 was morgan's third year in the majors, and it was the third year that he hit exactly seven home runs. he made just one appearance in the 1953 world series against the yankees, going 0 for 1 as a pinch-hitter in the final game.
philadelphia phillies - granville hamner
card #146
better known as "granny", hamner had a good year in 1953 for the phillies. he set career highs in homers and rbi while being named to the all-star team and receiving some down-ballot mvp consideration. as the card back notes, he made his professional baseball debut in the major leagues, bypassing the minors altogether, although he later spent time there. what really got me looking into things was the cartoon. why was the browns' manager nicknamed "reindeer"? it turns out that bill killefer was just a fast runner.
pittsburgh pirates - cal abrams
card #98
as the back states, abrams split 1952 between the dodgers and reds, but was dealt to the pirates in october of that year, giving topps' artist plenty of time to paint abrams in pittsburgh gear. his 1953 season saw him hit .286 with 15 homers as the pirates' primarily right fielder. he lost that job in 1954 to sid gordon who then lost it to roberto clemente in 1955.
st. louis cardinals - gerald staley
card #56
staley had the distinction of being the starting pitcher for the visiting team in the very first major league game played in milwaukee. it was the 1953 home opener for the braves (they had played a single game in cincinnati the day before) and staley was matched up against warren spahn. he kept pace with spahn through nine innings, but surrendered a walk-off home run with one out in the 10th. overall, staley went 18-9 in 1953, and so he continued to "pile up victories".
new york giants - bill connelly
card #126
connelly's card back gives us a pretty good likeness of abner doubleday. the front makes it look as though connelly is out on the back 40 of his farm somewhere. as for his 1953 season, connelly made only eight appearances and was 0-1 for the giants.
that's the end of the "teams" portion of the sampler. 16 teams (17 cards), two 8-pocket pages plus one slot on a third sheet. for most of the sets in these samplers, there are obvious subsets to share, but that is not the case with 1953. still, there are some cards that align with future subsets or themes that i am including in these samplers.
first, however, i decided to try to find a card from each set to include in the teams section that showed the yankee stadium facade in the background, and for the 1953 set, the yankee stadium facade card is roy sievers.
representing the browns. the painted image aspect of the 1953 set makes it difficult to discern, but i believe that is the facade behind sievers. the light stanchion is missing, but it otherwise makes sense to me. it doesn't look like sportsmans' park to me, anyway.
manager (and coach) cards show up in many of these vintage sets, often with a different design from the base. that was not the case in 1953, but there were still a few of these non-players featured. here's a manager:
fred hutchinson
card #72
while the card only lists him as a manager, hutchinson was still a player-manager in 1953, as he inserted himself into three games in late august, all in mopup duty. i have no idea what the "c" that some former owner of this card added to the number on the back means.
here's a coach:
dixie walker
card #190
one of the other things i try to find for each of these samplers is a sort of "o-pee-chee" style card where the card's subject is identified as being a member of a team that is different from the uniform worn by that player. in the 1953 set, i found one such card:
johhny groth
card #36
the rest of the cards are ones that i already had and are used to fill out that third page in the binder.
don kolloway
card #97
kolloway's card back says he broke in with the white sox in 1941, but he debuted with them a year earlier, appearing in 10 games. in 1953, he saw the last of his big league action, appearing in two april games for the a's as a defensive replacement and a pinch hitter. i liked this card because the billboards show a "d" and a "k", so i assume the artist was doing something similar to what was done on harry dorish's card.
hank sauer
card #111
there were no league leader cards in the 1953 set, but if there were, sauer would have been on a couple. he led the national league in home runs and rbi in 1952, and was named the league's mvp as well. his 1953 season was an off year as he missed a third of the campaign and managed only 19 home runs. he rebounded in 1954, however to slug 41 dingers for the cubs.
mike sandlock
card #247
the full body images are rare in the set, so i added this one (in addition to the newhouser above) and the next card that i'll get to in a moment. i recently posted a steve garvey card that featured a mop bucket on it and now we have this card with that cartoon on the back - the second cartoon in this post dealing with a cleanup hitter. the 1953 pirates had a number of catchers on their roster over the course of the season (including a young joe garagiola) but the 37-year old sandlock, in his first major league season since 1946, appeared in more games than any of them.
henry foiles
card #252
better known as hank, foiles began his major league career with the reds in 1953 but was quickly moved to the indians in may of 1953. the cartoon on the back reminds us that night games were a fairly new construct at the time, having started in the mid 1930's, and were still nowhere near as prevalent as they are today.
that's my 1953 sampler - all 24 cards of it. stay tuned for 1954!
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