1955 bowman complete through 208!

it's time for the next installment of my 1955 bowman set build.

sheet 24, cards 185-192

we are off to a good start with teammate pairings featuring cardinals, tigers, reds, and indians. bob lemon in the lone hall of famer on this sheet. here are the backs:

vic raschi counts joe dimaggio as the greatest hitter he has seen on the back of his card. it's pretty cool to have a card that features a guy who was a teammate of dimaggio's for several seasons. fred baczewski counters with a more typical response for the set with stan musial as the greatest hitter he's seen. lemon's back is the only other non-biographical back, and he says that the 155th game of the 1948 season is the most exciting contest he's witnessed. the indians beat the red sox to claim the pennant in that winner take all game.

sheet 25, cards 193-200

more teammate pairings featuring reds, dodgers, indians, and pirates. ralph kiner (in a cleveland uniform) is the lone hall of famer here - that's indian hall of famers on consecutive sheets. here are the backs:

both dodger card backs are worth mentioning here. russ meyer hits on a bunch of topics as he names musial as the best hitter he's seen and robin roberts the best pitcher while also giving advice to kids and sharing his biggest thrill, most exciting game, and funniest thing that has happened to him. the other dodger, erv palica, has a variant back. the regular version which is in the sheet above, end with the text "had a 13-8 record in 1950". the variant back

adds the sentence "sent to baltimore when preacher roe retired". i have this variant along with the other errors in a sheet at the back of my set binder. and, because palica is still listed as a dodger, i have two of each of his cards in my collection - one of each for the team set and one of each for the set build. here's the front of the variant

which is the same as the base version. 

i would be remiss if i didn't mention vern law's advice to youngsters which starts with "live clean lives".

sheet 26, cards 201-208

yes, there is a missing card and i will get to that in a moment. i assure you, however, that these are teammate pairs. here are the backs:

some familiar names to me, including allie reynolds (because he was a yankee who pitched against the dodgers in multiple world series), eddy fitzgerald (he's from the 805, like me), and rip repulski (who went on to play for the dodgers and i later learned is from sauk rapids which is not too far from where i currently reside, and is perhaps best known for its hot air balloon water tower).

as far as the cards go, fitzgerald identifies ted williams as the greatest hitter he's seen (with a reference to the williams shift), but repulski hits things out of the park with his advice to youngsters: "my advice is never give up".

back to the missing card - yes, there is a blank space in the sheet, but that's because i have card #202 in a psa holder. it's none other than mickey mantle!

it's not a bad psa 1.5 specimen. the detractors are the creases in the lower left and just off of mantle himself. it's a kick to have a early career mantle card in hand - the earliest one i had previously was his 1957 topps card. here's the back:

"he is a highly regarded young player". spot on. i left the card in the ebay authentication bag but will likely remove it at some point.

finally, the frank bolling card has an error thanks to his brother milt being in the set as well. the error uses frank's photo

but has milt's back

we saw the reverse of this error when i shared the sheet that featured milt's card. 

stay tuned for the next installment of the set build. just 112 cards left in the set!

dressen for success

i decided just after new year's to complete my 1953 bowman color dodger team set. one of the five cards i needed at the beginning of the year was charlie dressen's.

i wound up winning an auction for this psa 2 card for cheap, and i picked up the other three non-duke cards i needed on comc.

that's billy loes, russ meyer, and george shuba.  duke came last, thanks to a bargain from fritsch cards.

glad to see they are still going strong.

anyway, the highlight of the dressen card is the copy on the back:

there is an "away in a manger" joke in there somewhere.  obviously, bowman meant that dressen was a cocky little manager, and while he was at the helm of the dodgers, he surely could back that up with on-field success. as the card notes, his dodgers won the pennant in 1952 after losing to the "shot heard 'round the world" in 1951, and he also led the team to the pennant in 1953. however, that turned out to be his last year managing the dodgers, as he wanted a multi-year contract and was denied. so, the cocky little "manger" was out and walter alston took over.  alston wound up managing the dodgers until the final days of the 1976 season, and never had a multi-year contract.

dressen's post-dodger managerial career is outlined on the back of his 1965 topps card

which was another recent pick-up for my set build (i'm close!). here's what that card had to say:

there are a couple of issues here. first, it should end with him joining the tigers in 1963, not 1953. second, his stint as dodger manager is referenced as being with the "old" dodgers, but his stint with the senators does not get the same qualifier. i assume topps was referring to the brooklyn dodgers as the "old" team, but the senators that dressen managed were the twins by the time this card came out, with a "new" version of the senators having joined the league in 1961. just a quirk that i would expect an editor to pick up on.  and, i realize that they are only recognizing his managerial stints, but it is worth noting that dressen was a coach and/or scout for the dodgers in 1958 and 1959, as well as in  1963 prior to becoming the tiger skipper.

dressen passed away during the 1966 season while managing the tigers, and they wore black armbands in his honor for the remainder of the season. no cards exist that i have found showing the armband, but there is this photo

of earl wilson with the armband on full display.

i am thinking that i will work to complete my 1953 topps dodger team set next, but i already have dressen's card (it's just a few of the high numbers, including the johnny podres rookie, that are left). that means that the only other charlie/chuck dressen card that i need for my collection is his 1952 topps high number card, so my guess is that the cards shown above are the last cards of his that i will add.