(Today is not only Columbus Day/Indigenous People Day/Canadian Thanksgiving it is also Moldy Cheese Day. I do not know if that refers to specific kinds of cheese with intended mold (blue cheese) or cheese left too long in the fridge with unintended mold. But what I do know is it's time for Cardboard Appreciation. This is the 326th in a series and there is no mold on this card):
Welcome to another card I should have had by now.
Yup, this famed 1989 Upper Deck Gary Pettis card is just arriving in my collection.
I've known about this card for a long time. You longtime bloggers probably remember Dinged Corners. One of Patricia's favorite kinds of cards were "recursive cards," what, in a more general way, also could be called "meta cards," or cards of cards.
But the recursive aspect is the mind-blowing part, and for that you need to see the back of Pettis' 1989 UD card.
Upper Deck has made it appear as if Pettis is holding his own 1989 Upper Deck card, showing the back of the card.
I don't think photoshop was around at that time, so the best guess -- which has been hashed out on blogs for years, particularly 12 or 13 years ago when this phenomenon traveled around the blogs quite a bit -- is that Pettis is holding a different card and Upper Deck somehow later in the card-making process, pasted the back photo image onto the photo where Pettis is holding the card. You can tell by close inspection of the card in Pettis' hand that the picture isn't exactly like Pettis' card back.
Upper Deck did this again with the front of Mike Perez's card in its 1993 set and I wrote about that on the blog a long time ago.
Since this is a rehash topic, I'll stop the post right here. I just wanted to mention that I finally got this card in my collection.
It came with a bunch of other cards from Mitch, who is a good source for cheap cards. Here is the rest of the group:
These showed up, along with several other long-awaited mail items (including a certain magazine), right before we were about to head out the door for a brief holiday excursion. I didn't even have time to open the package -- which almost never happens.
But now that I'm back I've got a whole bunch of stuff to show that should easily last me through this week. Aren't you lucky?
Comments
Pettis spent a few years in Detroit but never could hit enough to justify his great D and speed on the bases.
I heard about the story of his 85 topps (it's his younger brother) and how he won't sign that card but would sign other 85 issues.
Still pretty good for UD to do this. In 1989, I was in my mid 20s at Dow Chemical and still using floppy disks to "transfer" files from one computer to another. Also, used overhead transparencies to deliver training on safety standards.
"Meta cards" are a fun little mini-collection - I still have no idea how UD pulled off the Pettis and/or Mike Perez before Photoshop and such.