Here's #22 from the 24-card "Mister Softee's Pop Parade" set from 1969. It's an interesting mix of pop performers in the UK a few of whom I'm not that familiar even now. I don't know how the cards were distributed. I've heard that Mister Softee is an American company but read before that it actually started in England.

The cards measure just under 3 1/2 inches long in either dimension (or 88 x 88mm).

Traffic was an interesting band. I've never seen them play outside of an old video but have seen Steve Winwood in concert a few times (twice in the 80's) and he played a few songs from those days. At least one of his concerts has played on the AXS channel.

Jess
They were issued in with ice cream throughout the 1960's and 1970's. There were at least 10+ sets just on Pop Stars with cards in different shapes and sizes. They distributed other themes as well some of which would fit in with this blog. Look up the LCCC web site at least 15 different sets can be seen.

regards

John

Thanks, John. I was hoping you'd have more info on these. It doesn't appear that collectors have talked about them online even though prices have gone up.

quote:

Originally posted by JOHN LEVITT:
Jess
They were issued in with ice cream throughout the 1960's and 1970's. There were at least 10+ sets just on Pop Stars with cards in different shapes and sizes. They distributed other themes as well some of which would fit in with this blog. Look up the LCCC web site at least 15 different sets can be seen.

regards

John

Jesse
I have a book called A History of J. Lyons & Co "The First Food Empire" In the late 1950's they formed a company along with the company that made the UK Ice Cream vans and acquired the franchise from the US Company for Mr Softee ice cream sales in the UK. Lyons and Walls in the 1960/70's were the main sellers of ice cream in the UK. this being the boom period. I remember that I rarely had ice cream bought from a roadside van instead my parents would buy an ice cream block and a packet of wafers or cornets for us children. In the road where I lived as a child most families did the same, this meant that I rarely managed to collect any of the cards given out by the van salesmen. After the boom had died down I seem to recall that a lot of cards suddenly became available.

Note that Lyons Maid was also part of set-up and they introduced some of the first Gerry Anderson themed cards in special ice lollies.

regards

John

Not exactly a nonsports card, but interesting nonetheless.

Available here

There's an easy-to-find 9-card Desert Storm promo pack (Pro Set, 1991) and there's a less-common 10-card version too, the difference being a specially-printed header card shown here. The 10-card pack was given out only at the Spirit of America Rally (honoring America's troops during Desert Storm) in Texas Stadium on March 3, 1991.

For years, the 10-card pack wasn't always easy to find. Collectors paid as much as $15-20 to get one 15-20 years ago but I've seen them sell for just a buck or two this year. It could be a case of every longtime collector who wanted one already having it and it's just not in-demand with newer collectors who might not be aware of its relative rarity.

Twenty years ago, I would have posted the header in the "Rare" thread because you couldn't always find it when you wanted it. Today, it seems to be more of an overlooked oddity.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: catskilleagle,

Back in 1994, Kurt "Monsterwax" Kuersteiner had an article in "The Wrapper" about a few "not-for-sale" sets and two of them were made by The French Paper Company. They weren't actually distributed as they were made as printer's samples which may have been in-house prototypes to see how a design ends up looking on real paper - not meant to be released.

I had heard of the article but didn't actually read it until earlier this year. It notes the French Paper Company cards as being designed by Charles S. Anderson, an award-winning artist specializing in, among other things, designing unique printed promotional items and packaging. I hadn't seen the card sets noted so I looked online to see if any were available. I didn't find any of them but did discover another set made by the company.

It's a 28 card set made up of 4 information cards and 24 puzzle cards) with an overall construction theme. The puzzle cards have notches in the edges so they can be interlocked to build one of four provided designs or you can do your own thing. One of the designs looks like a robot holding a hammer. The only other set like this that I've seen is the promo set for "Mr Magorium's Wonder Emporium."

The set was sent out to members of the "Run of the Mill Club" (a group you could join by filling out a form made by photocopying/enlarging one of the info cards) as a promotion to show the range of colors and quality of paper made by the company. The set is inside a custom fold-up envelope/box and sealed with an actual nut and bolt to further support the theme of a construction project. That's an artist for you.

The seller of the set didn't know when the set was made but thought it was early in the series of Anderson-designed sets so perhaps dating from the early-mid 80's. It seems to me that it's more recent than that as I think the Run of the Mill Club didn't exist until after the company had already created more than a few sets but I don't really know. In any case, I hope to find more of these just because they are so unusual.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: catskilleagle,

Not sure if this is best thread for this, but anyway this is one of my few rarities. It is one of a limited number of examples printed for a series but never issued. These cards are like film cells in appearence and a little longer then standard cards. They fit in 6 pocket pages.

The series was given out at video stores like Suncoast, I believe when you pre-ordered a Disney Film in the program, called Disney Classics and which eventually totally about 50 cards (roughly numbered 101 to 150). This card is numbered #135. The program ran from 90s to 00s.

There is sometimes a note when you see this mentioned, saying only 13 known but I think it is possible there were more then that. I bought mine off Ebay one of at least 2 listed maybe 10-15 years ago. The seller listed them as rare but not as one of 13 or unproduced. The only info I have seen on why it was not issued was that Disney did not approve the product.

All the cards that have shown up for sale in the last 20 years have come from that initial 13 card discovery. Probably the one you found as well. I study the promo card market daily and have done so since 1996. This card is truly very rare. I had not heard that Disney hadn't approved the product as the reason for its rarity. Can you share your source for that info?

Hi, thanks for response. Always like to learn all I can about the cards I have. I definately spend much more time doing that then procuring new cards.

I found that on one of Jeff Allender's card list. It says:

135 The Lion King (Hakuna Matata) 2003

"Card was not approved by Disney for release, but copies that were not intended for distribution have surfaced; 13 are known to exist."
https://nslists.com/discel.htm

Is 13 feasible in your estimation? I would have guessed a test run would have been somewhat larger. Considering the effort required to configure the machines, something more like 100-200. But I trully do not know as I have never seen the figures for test runs to have something to compare it to.

I believe so, there are several other well-known fully licensed promo-type cards of which only 1 to 20 exemplars are believed to exist. I say 'believed to exist" because when it comes to rarity (not desirability) with these cards, time is the true barometer rather than print run.


This topic was broached in another thread in the promo section but suffice it to say that it is quite unlikely, after 30 years, and the explosion of non-sports card sales online due to COVID, that had there existed a secret stash somewhere it wouldn't have already been unearthed.

It's always tough to say what's rarer than something else when we don't know the print run. On one hand we have a case of the E.T. prototype of which only two 9-card sheets were made and only one was cut into singles. Something like this Lion King cel promo might have a similar print run but we don't have anyone from Suncoast or Disney who was in a position to know ever saying anything in public about it.

We also have cases of a card that was considered to be super-rare with less than 20 in existence only to have several more surface in later years. I'm thinking of the "Coca-Cola Sign of the Times." Those "Nightmare on Elm Street" samples represent another example.

All we have is that it appears the Lion King #135 cel is one of those "less-than-20 cards because so few have surfaced in the past 20 years. We might question how there would be 13 because that's not how sheets generally break down unless it was just part of one large sheet, or like the E.T. prototype, it came from one or two small sheets made for approval and never officially released. Maybe some Disney employees were allowed to keep one or someone saved them all from the trash. As a card collector, I hope we all get the story on this and other cards someday.

Here's the 14-card "Major League Poet Cards: All Star Series" set (Mille Grazie Press, 1995). It includes 12 cards featuring award-winning poets alive at the time the cards were being made. There are also a title card and a checklist/order form card. Not shown, is promo/business card that feature four cards from the set.

The card fronts show artwork by David Oliveira who also created the set. He says 2000 sets were printed and were sold through independent bookstores and "Poets and Writers" magazine and catalog. It's a tough-to-find set these days but not expensive when you find it (under $10).

I'd love to run up on a set of those for ten bucks.

Here's another set of poetry cards.

https://fact-simile.com/books-...oetry-trading-cards/

And here are some other cards of writers, some of whom dabbled in pootry.

Those are great. They're using various borders from baseball series going back at least to the 60's. Ann Waldman has two Booksmith cards (634, 719).

Oliveira did another set - sort of a "dead poets society" of his own. He calls it "Major League Poets: Hall of Fame Series. I'll get scans up for that sometime soon.

And now...a 12-card set featuring the immortal Bruce Lee (NGP, undated). There's a mystery with this one. At least two collectors and PCE2008 have reported that the set was given out at a Bruce Lee movie marathon sometime in the 90's. However, another collector claims it actually dates back to the 70's promoting Lee's movie "Fist of Fury" which was released in the U.S. as "The Chinese Connection"). The cards erroneously say "Fists of Fury" - maybe just a typo or maybe an indicator that they are not connected to the original studio or U.S. distributor in any way.

The cards, standard-sized, follow a simple b/w design with blank backs so it looks like a small company set from the 70's but cards like that were still coming out in the 90's too.

I hadn't seen nor heard of these cards until the late 90's/early 2000's so I tend to lean toward a 90's origin but maybe they are older. Maybe someone else knows more about them.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: catskilleagle,

Here's an oddball card I've wondered about for years. It's unnumbered and shows Lt. Colonel Oliver "Ollie" North on the front. It appeared on the market by the mid-late 90's and it seemed like only promo collectors/dealers had it for sale/trade. At the time, some thought it was associated with the "Iran-Contra Scandal" set (Eclipse, 1988). However, that set featured artwork of the various figures from that political scandal rather than photographs. The back is filled with text but nothing to identify the manufacturer nor publication date.

Some collectors consider it a promo of sorts and it's possible that it's an unmarked prototype for a set that was never made or maybe just something given out at a political event as the text offers support for North.

The back doesn't quite match up to the front because I had to assemble the image from different sources and adjust the sizes which distorted the back.

quote:

Originally posted by catskilleagle:
Here's an oddball card I've wondered about for years. It's unnumbered and shows Lt. Colonel Oliver "Ollie" North on the front.

Looks like a Broder, maybe.

quote:

Originally posted by Bill Mullins:

quote:

Originally posted by catskilleagle:
Here's an oddball card I've wondered about for years. It's unnumbered and shows Lt. Colonel Oliver "Ollie" North on the front.

Looks like a Broder, maybe.

Now raise your hand if you know what that means.

Non-sport card collectors under a certain age have never even heard of the 70's sports card term Broders. To be fair the actual Broders, though unlicensed, named for the maker and eventually disgraced by the hobby powers that be, were fairly well-done cards for their time.

Hey Raven,

I stopped at a flea market on Saturday and saw a few apparent Broders in a mini bargain box of a seller with 80's-90's toys. One of them was a Shaquille O'Neal card with a prismatic border. Maybe I should have bought it to show everyone. It's like you said, a rather showy card for the time so it looks like a promo for an official release.