Before my interest in baseball buttons disappears completely -- as most of my non-card interests eventually do -- I thought I'd dig up this beauty.
Does anyone remember these? I'm really hoping someone does because my memories of how I acquired this are almost non-existent. And there are no markings on it to help me dig up any information.
I remember these buttons featured stars of the time period -- late 1970s, I'm guessing -- because I think my brothers each had a button of player on their favorite team, too, and I think my youngest brother had a button of Eddie Murray.
I know the number on the right, the 159, is the "button number," like a card number.
I know nothing else.
What I do know is these things are huge. They're just shy of the size of a hockey puck. It seems ridiculous that anyone would wear these in public. But because I was a kid and because it was the '70s, I did wear this in public.
I was a little kid, and this was a big button, so the button took up just about the whole right quadrant of my body. I was deathly afraid of pins back then, so I'm sure I was very careful with what I did and how I moved when I was wearing it. And I'm sure I took it off as soon as I could. But I also know there's probably a picture somewhere of me wearing it. No doubt, I'm tilting to the left in the photo.
I valued that Ron Cey button so much that it's one of the few non-card pieces of memorabilia to survive from my childhood. I remember keeping it in a box, with a few other key trinkets that I can't recall.
Anyway, it's another item of The Penguin, with his grand looping signature, so that automatically makes it phenomenal. Just wish I knew more about it.
Comments
http://fleersticker.blogspot.com/2008/07/1981-fleer-baseball-card-set.html
I'm guessing that the list on the back of the wrapper was not the complete list of players given the Penguin is not listed.
I vaguely recall the buttons, including the Cey, being listed by button number in an advertisement in a baseball card catalog or something similar.
Each pin had the player's name, facsimile autograph and number on the front.
Besides Ron Cey, two Steve Garvey pins and a Fernando Valenzuela pin were included in that set.
Below is a link to Fernando Valenzuela's button on eBay.
http://images.auctionhelper.com/images/9666//bbpinbacks09252009/LP%20230.jpg
http://fleersticker.blogspot.com/2011/08/1981-fleer-and-sports-photo-association.html
Many of the button pictures match or are very close to the pictures found on 1981 Fleer cards.