The Fleer Sticker Project

Saturday, June 7, 2008

1976: Fleer Pioneers of Baseball 2nd Printing and Baseball Iron Ons

I recently acquired an issue of Collectors Quarterly from 1976 which was an early hobby publication. In the magazine, I found some interesting information regarding the Pioneers of Baseball Set issued along with the 1975 Cloth Patches:

according to Bob Laughlin (who did the artwork for the Fleer World Series sets and other Fleer sets like Famous Feats) in the article "'Pioneers' Near Wipeout" below, Fleer did a second printing the Pioneers of Baseball set:

Apparently there were 2 short prints in the 2nd printing (#7 & # 21).

The other interesting item from Bob Laughlin is the discussion of an all new Fleer World Series set for 1977 that unfortunately never came to pass.

The above article appeared in the Fall 1976 issue of Collectors Quarterly (edited by none other than MSNBC Countdown anchor and former ESPN Sports Center anchor Keith Olbermann!)

Keith is a well known card collector, and is currently writing a series of articles that are appearing in Sports Collectors Digest (SCD) regarding Topps Proof Cards, (like the famous Reggie Jackson 1977 proof card showing him as an Oriole):

Turning back to Fleer, they released a new set of Iron Ons in 1976. Unlike the 1969 & 1970 Iron Ons which had 3 teams per sheet, the 1976 version contained 1 iron on, and was much larger in size.

The back of the wrapper includes instructions on how to apply the iron on:

There is a very unique Cardinals logo on the back that I have never seen anyplace else.

The Red Sox Iron On allows us to confirm that this was a 1976 issue as it shows them as American League Champs (from the 1975 season):

To give you an idea of how big the iron ons are, here is a comparison between an iron on and a Fleer logo sticker:

I haven't seen too many of these for sale, but here are the other teams that I have come across:

1976 was the final year that Fleer issued Iron Ons. I'm pretty sure these were never big sellers. I don't think too many kids wanted to spend money on a pack of iron ons when there was a 1 in 24 chance of getting their favorite team since there was only 1 iron on per pack. I don't think a kid who liked the Red Sox would be looking to iron on a Padres logo onto their shirt.

UPDATE April 2010:

Thanks to Randy, we've got a picture of the unusual St. Louis Cardinals logo that was apparently only used for a very short time back in the mid 1970s:

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

1974 Fleer Football Big Signs

Fleer's second Football Big Signs set is typically referred to as the 1974 set, although there are no dates on the Signs to confirm the year they were issued.

The second set is not nearly as colorful as the initial set, as the signs have a white background and feature either the team helmet

or the team logo

on the card with a generic player in the team's uniform. Once again the size is 8 x 11.5 inches (slightly taller than a 1 pocket sheet) and the backs are blank. There are 26 signs in the set.

Here is a sample of some of the team signs:

Atlanta Falcons

Baltimore Colts

Cincinnati Bengals

Dallas Cowboys

Houston Oilers

Kansas City Chiefs

Miami Dolphins

New Orleans Saints

New York Giants

New York Jets

San Diego Chargers

San Francisco 49ers

St. Louis Cardinals

Washington Redskins

And finally, here is a picture of 25 of the 26 teams (the picture is missing the Vikings):

Saturday, May 17, 2008

1968 Fleer Football Big Signs

Fleer's first Football Big Signs set is often referred to as the 1968 set due to the 1968 copyright at the bottom of the signs. Unlike the Baseball set which contained the team logos with generic baseball drawings, the Football set contained paintings depicting each team. The backs are blank.

The Big Signs contain the same images that were also used on posters marketed by NFL Properties, so it appears NFL Properties licensed these images to Fleer for their set. If you had any of these posters as a kid (which I think were available through Sports Illustrated and perhaps even through Scholastic as I remember ordering the Steelers poster through school), you'll recognize the pictures on these Big Signs.

Here is an example of the Steelers Big Sign:

And here is the Poster with the same image:

Even though these have a 1968 copyright, they were actually issued many years later. The evidence can be found on the Patriots Big Sign:

The Patriots were known as the Boston Patriots until February 18, 1971 when the became the BAY STATE PATRIOTS. That's right -The Bay State Patriots. Here is an article from Feb 27, 1971:

Obviously as this article points out, this was not a popular change, so they went back to the drawing board, and decided on the New England Patriots, as this article from The Bridgeport Post dated March 23, 1971 explains:

So if the Patriots are called the New England Patriots on their Big Sign, the absolute earliest these could have been released was the 1971 season.

However, we then run into the Redskins:

The uniform depicted on the Big Sign was not used until 1972. For the 1970 & 1971 seasons, the Redskins used the Vince Lombardi designed helmet (yellow helmet with a red R) that emulated the Packers design. Therefore, the earliest these Big Signs could have been issued is 1972.

Looking at the helmet designs depicted on the signs, the helmets are generally consistent with what was worn during the 1972 & 1973 seasons, so these could have been released either of these 2 years. The one exception is the Eagles. For some reason, they are shown with green helmets when they actually wore white helmets from 1969 - 1973. Perhaps the Eagles sign is based on artwork from 1968 when the Eagles were wearing green helmets, and new artwork was not created for the Eagles at the time to deal with the helmet difference.

While it is possible that this set may have been issued in 1974 (when the Eagles went back to a green helmet), the second Fleer Football Big Signs set that I will cover next time is generally thought to be from 1974, so that would most likely put this set in either 1972 or 1973.

The 1968 copyright therefore refers to when the images on the signs were copyrighted by NFL Properties and not when the cards were released.

Here are all the signs from the set for the 26 teams that were in the league at the time:

Atlanta Falcons