1956 Topps - A Special Project

Ever since I started collecting baseball cards, the 1956 Topps cards have stood out as special.  I have probably mentioned it before in passing, but I used to buy random 50's cards at some of the local card shops in the 80's.  I say random, because at that time, I didn't know who most of the players were.  However, for anywhere from $1-3, I could own these vintage beauties from a time well before I was born.  Often my targets were Dodgers or I would look for a player who's name I recognized, but mostly to stay within the $3 or less category, I looked to the backs to help guide my purchases.  Statistics would help me decide if a player was worthy.  20-30 or more HRs and they were in.  Batting .300 and I wanted it.  18+ wins = a winner!  I can't remember much of what else got the card elected, but I had amassed a small hoard of these cards that I still own to this day while the rest of my collection consisted of pack fresh late 70s/early 80s cards.  Jackie Robinson was my favorite card in my favorite set though and I didn't own one.  I had to own the Jackie some day.

Discovering ebay in the late 90's helped my collection grow more than I could have imagined.  I was able to pick up a lot of cool, vintage cards I had always wanted, but could either not find or afford.  The collection really started to shape up nicely.  One early goal was to slowly build the 1956 set.  I had a number of key players, which helps, but my set building desires are next to none.  I just have a hard time spending big money on commons and high numbers/short prints just to complete a set when I would otherwise not care to have a card one way or another.  Still, picking up most of the biggies was a priority for me early on.  I was lucky in that I started to buy them at a pretty good time and tried to find a decent condition, while still keeping the budget in check.  Sometimes there would be a flaw that might cause other collectors to pass, other times I stumbled upon really nice cards for a song.  Here are a few of the key cards I scanned a number of years back.



At some point, the desire to complete the set was overtaken by a desire to complete the set, signed.  I could find many of the common to semi-star players signed for $10 or less.  I landed a nice lot of signed Dodger cards in the very early ebay days and a few key HOFers, but the big score was landing a lot of several hundred signed 56 Topps cards in one shot.  Still, the realization was there that getting all of them would be cost prohibitive.  I didn't have Clemente, Aaron, Williams, Campanella, Hodges, Koufax and a number of other star players and knew that finding them, let alone affording them, wouldn't happen.  I settled on adding what I could find and afford for the entire set and trying my best in completing the Dodgers team set, but even that would be daunting.  I have since been able to gather up all but the big three (Campy, Hodges and Koufax), however there is doubt that the Robinson I have is legitimate as well, although in my mind I'd like to think it is, but otherwise I should consider my team set 4 from complete.

Anyone got any good leads on signed 56 Topps Hodges and Campy cards?  Koufax is out there, but they are a little expensive for my taste.  However, that card becomes unattainable the moment Mr. Koufax passes.