Sports Card Dealers
COUNTDOWN TO THE NATIONAL: Longtime dealers Tom and Anita Daniels set to attend their 43rd NSCC show
A high school business teacher who also coached the baseball team, Tom Daniels expanded his passion for sports through cards and memorabilia in August 1973: He pre-ordered five cases of Topps basketball cards.
“I just wanted something part-time to do in the summer,” said Daniels, now 76 and living in Waunakee, Wisc.
So started a collecting journey that will celebrate a 50-year run this summer.
Also See: 2023 NSCC show schedule, events
Tom and his wife, Anita, 75, are legends in the hobby. Just consider a few family facts:
• They first started selling sports collectibles at a show in 1974.
• They have attended every National Sports Collectors Convention since the inaugural edition in 1980, which was held in a small hotel ballroom at the Los Angeles International Airport Marriott. They have set up in the same location at The National in Chicago “for as long as I can remember,” he said, based on their ranking among National dealers.
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• They were members of the since-disbanded card clubs in Chicago, Milwaukee and Minneapolis.
• They have run card shops for decades, longer than a portion of their customers have even been alive.
“The hobby is fun and I love sports,” he said. “One time, I was dealing with an insurance adjuster and he asked me to describe my business. That was easy, I told him: ‘It’s like Cheers without the alcohol.’
“People may come in the store five days a week and not buy anything … they just want to talk sports.”
The Daniels run the Baseball Card Shoppe in Richland Center, Wisc., where they are comfortable and knowledgeable talking about a 1933 Goudey, a 1952 Topps, a 1989 Upper Deck or the 2023 Topps Baseball Series One.
“It doesn’t feel like 50 years. It’s been a lot of fun,” Daniels said. “Most of our friends are from the hobby.”
After all, back in the 1970s and ’80s, they did shows almost every weekend, attending post-show dinners and building lasting, lifelong friendships with fellow dealers.
They have long sold singles and were heavy into sets. When newcomers Donruss and Fleer arrived in 1981, “that really expanded the business,” he said.
The Internet also was a major game-changer, he said.
“In the early years, there were very few shows,” said Daniels, who went to two shows in 1974. “When I got into the hobby, I wanted something that, if I didn’t sell everything, it hopefully would be worth more in the future. It certainly turned out that way.”
Daniels has a collectibles encyclopedia of knowledge. After all, not many in the industry can talk with first-hand experience of buying trips in the late-1970s and early-80s.
In the late-1980s, the hobby went to Hawaii for the inaugural industry-wide powwow that quickly became a must-attend event.
“I always told my wife that, if there was a card show in Hawaii, I’d take her. They first one, unfortunately, we found out about it only two weeks before it started, so we didn’t go,” Daniels said. “I made good on my promise in year two. That was a fun event.”
Daniels has 40-plus years of National memories, stories and sales. He’s set up for Chicago for the 43rd annual Super Bowl of sports memorabilia July 26-30.
“There were years at The National when the manufacturers had dinners or parties and each tried to out-do the others. That was fun, mostly just being with your friends,” Daniels said. “The Anaheim National in 1991, with its promo card craze … that was when the hobby really exploded.
“And it’s still the biggest show of the year, every year. We’re very excited for it.”
Daniels admits that it wasn’t until recent years that he truly enjoyed the Chicago Nationals from a business standpoint.
“Until recent years, we didn’t do too well in Chicago because we had done so many shows in the city and many of the collectors knew us, knew what we had, and were looking for new items,” he said. “But, in recent years, it has been our best show.”
Daniels said the COVID pandemic certainly helped spike the hobby.
“Stuff that sat on the shelves for years from the ’80s and ’90s, now when I put [those items up for sale] on eBay, I’d get double or triple the [asking] price. It was amazing.”
Case in point: 2003-04 Topps Basketball, with LeBron James’ rookie card.
“It was in our store for $150 with a 50 percent off [sign]. I looked online, saw what they were selling for, and then sold it for more than $2,000,” he said.
The Daniels offer a variety of cards from all sports. He’s also sold eye-popping collectibles, such as Babe Ruth-signed baseballs.
Anita collects almost anything related to former Milwaukee Brewers Hall of Famer Paul Molitor.
Tom said there isn’t one main item for his personal collection.
“The joy of opening packs is still there,” he said.
For Christmas in 1989, which was the last before his father passed, the only present Tom gave his dad was boxes of cards.
“He always enjoyed opening cards, so that’s what he got,” Daniels said.
MAKING MEMORIES
The Daniels have singles, sets, boxes and more. Over the last two years, they also have sold more than $20,000 worth of empty boxes and tons of wrappers. A 1966 Topps empty box sold for $500, and he has sold wrappers for $300 or $350.
The Daniels set up at the Sports Card Show on March 4 in Oak Creek, Wisc. They likely were the oldest vendors, and two of the most respected hobbyists. With no sign of slowing or stopping.
They re-built their cottage and Daniels plans to line the walls of the basement with autographed photos from those acquired at past shows, golf tournaments and beyond.
“I told my wife that I was going to retire at age 70. That didn’t happen,” Daniels said. “As long as I’m enjoying it, making money, well, we might as well keep doing it.”
Daniels was a high school teacher from 1970-79, then transitioned to card collecting full time. Some of his students were card sorters when they had a free period.
Earlier this year, one of his past students called and asked Daniels to look at an early-1970s set.
“A memory that stands out was once doing a buying trip after a collector said he had a Honus Wagner T206 card, which was only selling for about $1,000 at the time.
“The T206s were in his bank vault and not accessible until Monday, except Christy Mathewson, and he had 56 Mathewson’s,” Daniels said. “I didn’t even make an offer because I just thought, ‘How will I ever sell that many?!’”
Then there was the buying trip that started at about 1 p.m.
“[This seller], he had to go back to work, so he said, ‘You can stay here [in my house] and look [at my collection] until I get back at 5 p.m.,” Davis said. “Would someone let you stay with their collection, in their home today? I don’t think so.
“We both had to go to the bathroom, but we didn’t want to go looking for the bathroom in case he came home and found us and thought we were searching the house,” Daniels said. The collection had seven Babe Ruth autographs, four or five Lou Gehrig autographs.”
The seller asked for $425 … sold!
“We’ve met so many people through the hobby — from soap opera stars to Baseball Hall of Famers,” Daniels said.
Tens of thousands have collected cards from the Daniels. The Daniels have simply collected memories.
