July 26th, 2010 |
Published in
Football Card Trivia
I have always loved this photo of Carroll Hardy, and yesterday I did an eBay search to see if I could find him on any more 49er team issues. To my surprise, a bunch of baseball cards popped up! Not being a baseball card collector, I didn’t know that after a short NFL career, Hardy had played eight seasons in the major leagues. Perhaps, conversely, most baseball card collectors don’t know about his short NFL career?
According to his Wikipedia page, Hardy spent just one year with the 49ers, 1955, when this 49ers team issue photo was released. He gained 37 yards rushing and 338 yards receiving for the season, and four of his receptions were for touchdowns.
He went on, after two years in the minor leagues, to become a backup outfielder for the Indians, Red Sox, Colt .45s, and Twins. He has the distinction of being the only player to pinch-hit for Ted Williams, and he also pinch-hit for Roger Maris and Carl Yastrzemski.
You can see the rest of the 1955 49ers Team Issue photos in the Vintage Football Card Gallery.
February 8th, 2010 |
Published in
Player Deaths
Tom Wittum, who punted for the 49ers from 1973 to 1977, died on January 22. Wittum made the Pro Bowl his first two years in the league. In 1973 he also had a 63-yard run–I presume on a fake punt–but it did not go for a touchdown.
The card pictured here is Wittum’s rookie card, the 1973 Punting Leaders card from the 1974 Topps set. Oddly, he did not appear on a regular card in that set. His first appearance alone on a card was in the 1975 Topps set.
There is a nice tribute to Wittum on dailyherald.com; it includes a picture of his 1976 Topps card. An article at suburbanchicagonews.com has a photo of Wittum in his high school uniform. (Select the photo in the article to enlarge the image.)
December 21st, 2009 |
Published in
Funny Poses, New in the Gallery, Oddball
Yesterday I added 1955 49ers Team Issue photos to the Vintage Football Card Gallery. The photos are bigger than cards, at just under 5×7, and I had to order extra-large toploaders for storing them. They came in the original envelope, pictured below. The photos, amazingly, are in much better condition than the envelope.
The photos are sharp black-and-whites, and each includes a facsimile of the player’s signature. On the back of each photo is a glowing biography of the player on the front. (Hardy Brown‘s bio calls him “the most feared linebacker in the game because of his fantastic ‘shoulder tackle’ which uncoils like a pile driver and causes many fumbles”!) Most of the images of the well-known players are familiar, since they also appear in color on 1950s Bowman and Topps cards. Being a team issue, though, the set also includes numerous players who never appeared on cards. In the 50s and 60s, the major card companies printed cards of only 10-12 players from each team, and most linemen and defensive players were left out. I love team sets for this reason: I get to see players I’ve never seen before.
There are 38 photos in the set, and it includes photos of the 49ers’ coaches and their TV and radio announcers. I imagine that in the 50′s, the announcers for each team were as familiar to fans as the players, so it was natural to include them in a team set.
The set includes six Pro Football Hall of Fame players, including the four members of the 49ers’ “Million Dollar Backfield”: Y.A. Tittle, Hugh McElhenny, Joe Perry, and John Henry Johnson.
