In the area of sporting popularity, there are many that could be classed as most popular amongst fans – soccer, football, and boxing being just three. However, as far as being truly popular, none is more so than baseball, and the huge market for selling and trading baseball cards is testament to that. Just looking at online auction sites as well as dedicated collector magazines will confirm this.

Not only can it be extremely fun, it can also be highly rewarding. From the earliest days of baseball trading cards that were printed in the 1800’s, to the golden age of the 1950’s from when cards for players like Mickey Mantle now sell for between $12,000 and $20,000, this is an extremely lucrative market. Indeed, if you imagine this price for just one card, you can calculate how profitable a collection can be to the right person.

But it’s not just the old cards that sell well today. The Topps Alex Gordon baseball trading card from 2006 now sells for $1000 - $4000, due to a printing error in that particular series. Proof indeed, if any were needed, that what can start out as a hobby can also be financially rewarding. And with so many memorable characters and teams to choose from, yet hard to locate, when a particular card does show up the value skyrockets.

If you do wish to pursue it as a genuine business venture, baseball cards is the way to go, and has never been easier. From the specialist stores to online traders like eBay, you will never be far from the next one you need for your collection. Nor will you be far from someone willing to pay you top dollar for those you may be looking to sell. Finding or possessing the relevant card is truly only the beginning.

For the truly serious sellers and traders, companies now hire people for whom this pastime is a hobby, and pay excellent recompense for doing something you love anyway! So, if you’ve ever looked at your own baseball cards and wondered just how rewarding this can be, there’s never been a better time to start finding out.

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Danny Brown is a well-respected freelance writer, and owner of PressRelease PR, a specialist press release and unique content company.

A Bachelor of English, he has had his work published in both online and offline publications, and is much sought-after for his expertise and research skills in a variety of fields.

A native of Edinburgh, Scotland, Danny now lives in Toronto with his wife Jacki and their two cats.

PressRelease PR

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A Mississippi River Rat

I was born and raised on the banks of the Mississippi River in La Grange Missouri. I am a grandson of one the few old lamplighters. For years my grandfather Ben would get up early on every Saturday morning and load up the boat with bottles of oil for the river navigation lamps. He would also load up big black tarred hoop fishing nets as he also fished for a living and to eat.

There was always had carp or catfish or buffalo fish to eat and we were never really hungry back in the 1940’s. I was born right at the end of the war and a few years later my grandfather turned over the job of lamplighter to my father. My dad bought a used Chriscraft inboard boat that had a six cylinder Chrysler flat head engine and it would go about thirty miles an hour. When my dad took over being the lamplighter they changed from the old oil lamps to electric lamps which used little light 6 volt light bulbs.

The lights needed batteries which my dad made up with a metal can that several plates of zinc were placed in along with some acid and river water. After a few years these made up batteries were replaced with plastic batteries. I used to go with my dad to replace the lights and batteries. We would load the boat up and go to every river light from Quincy Illinois to Keokuk Iowa. We continued this from the 1940s up and until the early 1950s.

My family almost lived on the Mississippi river. We spent a lot of time and almost every weekend with friends on the sandbars swimming and water skiing for a lot of years. This was probably the greatest time ever.

In the early 1950s my dad “Pete� decided to go into the boat and motor sales and services. He sold Evinrude motors and Duracraft boats. Boaters from all over came to his business to get their boat or have theirs repaired. Then, the boaters wanted to be able to get soda and beer, so my dad added coolers to keep it cold to sell. As more boaters came and wanted more, he added a grill to fix hamburgers and hotdogs too. Around the later 50’s he had a relative build a restaurant on top of the boat sales building and added boat docks for the boaters and also added gas pumps. I then became known all over as “Jerry on the dock�. We sold Skelly gas for years. The restaurant business overtook the boat sales and the business called “Pete’s Boat House� was born. For over 30 years, it was the place to stop on the Mississippi River. It was known by boaters and barge companies from St. Louis to St. Paul Minnesota.

Everyone who was boater for miles up and down the Mississippi River knew “Pete Brandt� at “Pete’s Boat House� in La Grange Missouri. A lot of this can be seen at HTTP://www.lagrangemissouri.com

Back in the 1950s and 1960s and 1970s the river was the place to be. Anyone who was anyone had boat and went to Pete’s Boat House. Dad had an all you can eat buffet and there still isn’t a place that had deep fried chicken as good as was found at Pete’s Boat House. I can remember that on many Sundays that the place was so busy, the customers would come into the kitchen and wash their own plates and get in line that ran down the length of the 80 foot long building and then out the front door and down the steps. Everyone loved the food at Pete’s Boat House. My dad “Pete� was so contentious about the quality of the food he prepared, he would watch the dirty plates when they came in to see if anything wasn’t eaten and then if he found a plate with food still on it, he would go out to see why the customer didn’t eat it. There was no better Catfish or Chicken or Carp prepared better anywhere during the years of Pete’s Boat House.

When I was growing up and going to the La Grange School, all the kids went to the Boat House after school to get sodas and dance to the music on the juke box. And, the boat house was the place where any kids could get a job for the summer. Pete would hire them all to do something. Pete added a bowling alley where the kids could go to bowl for ten cents and they took turns working setting pins for other bowlers. Pete also added a pool table and pinball machines. The town back then didn’t need a Teen Center, all they had to do was to meet at Pete’s Boat House.

Pete, my dad passed away in January 1980 and the place sold a year later and a year after that, the place burned down. Pete’s Boat House was the in place for thirty years.

This was a story about years of growing up by Jerry Brandt

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