Here’s some finds from a spot in NDG I’ve been tracking since before the pandemic. There’s never much out on the curb, but every week I pick up a few good bits.
So far the spot is most notable for tossing large quantities of trading / sports cards. I’ve found maybe four shopping bags full, including the two seen above. There are some Topps Chrome cards in there, which are worth a bit more than the average, but these are still relatively modern cards that don’t have much value
However, two weeks back I spotted a hoard of older cards at the bottom of the recycling bin. I spent some time picking them all out, making sure I didn’t miss any.
All these cards were from the late 50s or early 60s. That doesn’t make them automatically super valuable, but from I can tell (via eBay research) these cards tend to be worth a few bucks each, as opposed to a few pennies each for the modern ones. Most were also in pretty good condition for their age.
Maybe 1/3 of these cards featured CFL players. I divided them into three lots, and listed them a couple days ago for 100$, 65$, and 60$.
The Normie Kwong card (top left) stuck out to me. I figured that there wouldn’t have been too many Chinese football players at this time, and as it turns out he was the first in the history of the CFL. “The China Clipper” later became part owner of the Calgary Flames and Lieutenant Governor of Alberta.
Here’s a collection of 1962 “Civil War News” trading cards by Topps. The most valuable card here is the checklist in the middle – apparently these cards are less common because they tended to get marked up and thrown away. This example is in only fair condition, but it’s still worth somewhere around 80$.
5 Elvis cards were part of the collection. They were printed in 1956, and in this condition are worth around 5-10$ each.
Hockey-hungry Canadians will probably appreciate these late 1950s NHL cards. Oddly enough, there’s not a Canadien among them, but there were two Gordie (or Gordy) Howe cards from 1958 and 1959. A card like the middle one, in excellent condition recently sold for 650$, but in this condition (which is still fairly good) they’re probably worth “only” 60-80$ each
Otherwise, I saved several Fabian Forte cards (I hadn’t heard of him before finding these), four from the NFL, a bunch featuring Robin Hood, maybe 20 from various CBS TV shows, and another 20 or so Goofy Series cards. None of these are worth too much individually, so I’ll probably bring them to the auction house when they finally open again. I still have to research the value of the car series, with the Corvette as the lede, which seems to have been given out by a “Mother’s Cookies” company in 1955.
I’ve never found trading cards of this vintage before, so this is definitely my best card haul to date. Tonight I go back to this spot, and if I’m lucky maybe I’ll find some more.