100th Post & Richie Ashburn Acquisition

This is my 100th post, made in my 99th day of running this blog (the first day, there were two posts, but otherwise it's been one post per day).  Thanks to everyone who has visited!  I really enjoy telling what stories I have about my cards, and developing my collection further.

I might as well say now that I'm sure I can't keep up the pace of daily posting.  I originally thought I would post daily for the first 3 months.  I am extending that a little, and I think now that I'll keep posting daily into December.  After that, I'll move down to about 3 times per week.  I view myself as buying some more cards to complete my collection, getting some things that I always wanted but couldn't afford when I was a kid, or getting things that I would have wanted if I had known about them at the time.  My posts are either about cards I've had for years, or the cards I'm getting to complete the collection, and so I see myself as running out of things to talk about at some point.  While I don't plan this to be a permanent endeavor, I also don't want it to run out too soon.  If I go down to three posts a week, I won't run out of material as fast.

1951 Bowman Richie Ashburn, graded PSA 7.

For this 100th post, I will celebrate this acquisition of a 1951 Bowman Richie Ashburn.  I've said before that I only have about a dozen cards from the 1950s, and this now becomes the oldest card in my collection.  I'm adding it to my collection in honor of Dad, who died almost 5 years ago, and who was a little kid when the Whiz Kids were in the World Series.  Dad always talked more about Robin Roberts, who I've featured a few times on the blog.  But Richie Ashburn was the other star of the team.

I'll say that even though I can't handle the card myself because of the slab, I am very impressed with what I can tell of its condition.  A card graded 7 looks almost perfect to me.  That this card has survived since 1951, with that being 66 years now, in such pristine shape is amazing to me.

Richie Ashburn card back.

The back says that Ashburn was "one of the speed boys of the National League."  He was a good hitter and a good runner, and eventually made the Hall of Fame via the Veterans Committee.  That was a good day for Phillies fans, as Mike Schmidt and Richie Ashburn entered the Hall together.  Ashburn, nicknamed Whitey, was a longtime Phillies broadcaster, too, and that's how I was familiar with him when I was growing up.  Richie Ashburn and Harry Kalas were a legendary team calling games, and Kalas later entered the Hall as a broadcaster.

I only have a few original Bowman cards, but I like seeing that they're marked as being from Philadelphia.  Philadelphia was also home to Fleer, and the Topps packs I opened always were marked with Duryea, PA, which is in the Scranton area, not too far away.  It's nice to know our corner of the world has had its influence on the hobby.