Thursday, September 25, 2014

A big Gavin, just in time for Christmas

As you may know, I collect cards of guys named Gavin; My Greatest Gavins collection, as I call it. I landed a big dog recently, perhaps the best-known Gavin out there (at least to people over age 35 or so), Gavin MacLeod. I know him from Love Boat syndication, and some of you may also know him from the Mary Tyler Moore Show. My aunt claims I was named after him, though my mom's story is that she picked it out of a book of baby names, and she's not one to lie, so I don't consider myself named after Mr. MacLeod, though he may have provided subconscious inspiration of the choice. If nothing else, he really put the name on the map in the US.

Anyways, he was always prominently represented in my eBay searches for "autogavphs" (autographed Gavins), but never trading cards.. always just stuff like 8x10s and note cards, neither of which I have much interest in collecting.

But then this summer he was included in a Leaf "Pop Century" set with a bunch of autographed cards (3 or 4 different cards, plus various parallels). Unfortunately, they're all sticker autos. And the pictures Leaf selected are kinda ugly. So I was holding out pulling the trigger on one until I either found one super cheap.. or there was something else enticing about the card... something such as.. say.. being a Christmas Card!


As you can see, Mr. MacLeod has a big signature and is not about to shrink it down to fit it onto a tiny sticker. In the dozens of his cards I've seen from this set, nary a one is actually confined to the borders of the sticker. Just another reason why on-card is better and why I was hesitant to bother picking up one of these cards. But as I say, that 12/25 serial number drew me in on this particular one, so I put in a bid and won it. I love hitting 2 quirky minicollections with one card. But then you have the question of which to group them with: the other Gavin cards or the other Christmas Cards?

I've got 3 Gavin Christmas Cards now, with this Gavin MacLeod joining 12/25 serial numbered cards of Gavin Floyd and Gavin Escobar, both showed off on the blog back in March.

Happy Holidays, and keep on Gavin'.

8 comments:

  1. here (in France), we put the day before the month. So to have a Christmas card, it would have to be 25/12. Which isn't too easy to find...

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    1. Ha no, the card company's quality control department might need a long look if they put out a 25/12 card. But at least you do have other holidays that could be celebrated in serial number form that are impossible otherwise.. like the Fourth of July.. though I realize that's probably not too big in France. lol

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  2. A new mini-mini collection. 12/25 Gavins. 6 more and you'll have a full page.

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  3. Awesome addition to your collection. I think I would add it to the Gavin collection, but that's just me. It's nice to see some of these card companies trying to get other people to sign instead of what seems like the same 5 people.

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  4. Great card! Depends on how you store them if they are in a box or binder then I would just have them in between the Gavins and the Christmas Cards, that way they can be part of both.

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  5. I guess I'll be the oddball, put it with the Christmas cards. You can always find another signed one, but you can not find another 12/25 signed one of that card. Nice add either way!

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  6. That is awesome! Now you have to find Love Boat actors with autographs serial numbered 12/25. New mini collection!

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