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• A 1940 Gum Inc. Superman Gum Card #1 PSA • A 1935 Gum Inc. Mickey Mouse complete gum
6 Ex-Mint sold for $23,600. The Superman card set with the movie stars realized $6,359.42.
R145 set consists of 72 cards, with the #1 and #72 The 24 cards in this set are numbered 97-120 as
cards the most desirable in the set, which typically numbering continued from the standard set of 96
come to market showing more wear and tear. The cards. However, these cards are much rarer,
condition of this set makes it a truly rare example. making them one of the most desirable and
elusive gum card sets of any era. The cards are rare
• A 1970 Topps Hee Haw test card set based on due to licensing issues concerning the likenesses of
the popular country music/comedy variety TV the stars used on the cards, so these cards had a
program, Hee Haw, sold for $22,066, against a very short distribution run. Card fronts feature
$5,000-$10,000 estimated value. The cards choice art of Mickey with a movie star done in
feature photo and cartoon fronts with backs caricature style. Backs have text relating to the
showing a cartoon joke with a punch line that can front image/star with a blank line where the star’s
be seen by looking through a red tint screen, name was to be filled in. Stars included Groucho
which was also included with the set. and Harpo Marx, Charlie Chaplin, Mae West,
Jimmy Durante, Laurel and Hardy, Edward G.
• A 1940 Gum Inc. Superman Gum card sold for Robinson, Greta Garbo, Eddie Cantor, and more.
$10,994. The cards in this 48-card set display
amazingly detailed and colorful art of the Man of All prices include an 18% Buyer’s Premium and
Steel’s many heroic adventures. Text describing are PSA-graded.
the action shown on the front is on the reverse,
along with the card number, a black-and-white
Superman design, and information about the About Hake’s
Hake’s is America’s first collectibles auction
Supermen of America Club. house. Established in 1967, over the last 56 years
Hake’s has offered every type of pop culture
• A 1962 Topps Mars Attacks complete gum card collectible and all manner of Americana including
set sold for $6,649.65. Card fronts feature choice comic books, sports cards, political memorabilia,
art, in many cases quite gruesome such as #36 Mickey Mouse Set movie posters, original art, action figures,
“Destroying A Dog” in which a Martian disinte- autographs, coins, and more. Hake’s has authored
grates a dog with his ray gun, and #50 “Smashing The Enemy” in over 20 price guides and reference books over the
which a U.S. soldier splits open an alien’s head using the butt of his decades covering all aspects of the hobby. Founded
rifle. Cardbacks are black, white, and orange, featuring story text plus a by Ted Hake, Hake’s was acquired by Baltimore
preview image of the following card. The final card in the set #55 business mogul Steve Geppi in 2004. For more
features “A Short Synopsis Of The Story” on the front while on the information, visit their website at www.hakes.com
back is a checklist.

Great CollectionsContinued from page 27
Collections and Area to house books and
Studies Jenny Robb penned periodicals. For decades,
“Bill Blackbeard: The the building also served
Collector Who Rescued the as the residence of the
Comics” in the Journal of man responsible for
American Culture, 2009. collecting this mass of
The paper not only paper, Bill Blackbeard.
describes the lifelong pas- Blackbeard was living
sion behind the Blackbeard there with his wife,
collection but also talks Barbara, and more than
about the process of taking 75 tons of popular
on the task of gathering all culture material when
that paper in a short Bill Blackbeard, Funnies Collector he learned in 1997 that
amount of time. Here is a the home’s owner would not renew his lease.
taste of the task at hand: “Recognizing that the collection, known as the San Francisco
“In early January of Academy of Comic Art (SFACA), would have to be moved,
1998, a team of movers Black-beard began negotiations with Lucy Shelton Caswell, then
arrived at 2850 Ulloa Street curator of The Ohio State University Cartoon Library & Museum
in the quiet residential (then called the Cartoon Research Library). Caswell and Blackbeard
neighborhood known as the eventually agreed that the materials should be transferred to Ohio
‘Sunset District of San State. The movers faced the daunting task of packing the entire
When the Museum received the Bill Francisco.’ collection to be shipped across the country to its new home. It was by
Blackbeard collection, among it was this textile “Inside, they discovered far the largest collection ever acquired by the library and is one of its
of over 100 embroidered cartoon characters that the unassuming most important for the study of popular culture in general and graphic
Spanish stucco home was narrative – or sequential art in particular. Blackbeard’s story
literally filled from top to bottom with paper material of all shapes demonstrates that individual collectors have played a particularly
and sizes, books, magazines, comic books, pulps, story papers, prints, critical role in protecting and preserving our popular culture heritage,
drawings, and, most importantly, newspapers, bound newspapers, a heritage that, until relatively recently, was largely ignored by
individual newspapers, newspaper tear sheets, and newspaper clip- established academic institutions.”
pings. The massive collection filled most of the upstairs rooms and To date, a little more than half of the collection has been curated
the entire spacious, ground-floor garage below that ran the length of with much more work ahead. Without Bill Blackbeard working with
the building. The immense garage was a maze of narrow alleys created the Museum, this important archive of comic strip history and
by floor-to-ceiling stacks of bound newspaper volumes and individual commentary may have been lost to landfills.
tear sheets, boxes, and file cabinets containing millions of comic strip To learn more, visit the collection, or learn more about this
clippings; and rows of shelves made from crates turned on their sides important Library and Museum, visit https://cartoons.osu.edu/

30 Journal of Antiques and Collectibles