The Sincerest Form Of Flattery

Was jonesing for some cardboard digging this weekend, so I drove the overland route to Rocky Ridge Collectibles Saturday and spent several hours.  Found these in a dollar box and had to have them.  They are an oddball vintage-ish item called Starliner Stickers. 

There are 16 stickers in the whole set.  I'm now just missing Aaron, Clemente, Mantle (a double print), Mays, Frank Robinson, and Pete Rose (another double print).

In the SCD Standard Catalog, the description reads:

This unauthorized collector's issue is based on 16 of the cards issued by Dexter Press in 1967 as Coca-Cola premiums.  In July 1983, a Midwestern card dealer produced these stickers by reprinting the 5½" x 7" Dexter Press cards in 2 7/16" x 3¼" format and eliminating the white border....

Summarizing further, they can be found with either white or tan backing.  In the early 90's, the story of their creation was largely forgotten, and dealers were overcharging for them.  From the rates listed in my 2009 book, I still might have underpaid at a buck a shot.

Authorized or not, I love oddball stuff like this, with the photos that you haven't seen on a hundred other products before.  Plus the choice of putting the autograph over the player's head is a cool one.

Here's what the tan backs look like.  It reminds me of the back of floor tile or something.  Not sure I've ever seen the white ones.  Hopefully the double-prints occured in both, but they're only listed as happening to the white backs.  I suppose I'll take either color for the last six to fill out the set.

Here's Palmer against his regular issue Donruss card (of the same production year).  Kind of surreal that both were made in 1983 but the phots were 16 years apart.

Interestingly, there are 20 sets of large cards in the '67 product, 19 of them teams sets, and one set of All-Stars.  Each set is 12 cards.  One exception is the Angels, which are only represented by one guy - Paul Schaal.  The set is listed under his name.  Apparently, he was the only participant in the promotion from his team, and there were also no takers from St. Louis at all.

The lineups of the '67 All-Star set and the '83s don't actually line up either...

Dexter Press All-Stars                         Starliner Stickers

Bunning                                                 Aaron

                                                                 Banks

Clemente                                               Clemente

Davis                                                      Colavito

Kaline                                                     Kaline

Killebrew                                               Killebrew

                                                                Mantle

Mays                                                       Mays

Pepitone                                                McCovey

                                                                Morgan

                                                                Palmer

Brooks Robinson                                 Brooks Robinson

Frank Robinson                                   Frank Robinson

Santo                                                      Rose

Torre                                                      Stargell

Yastrzemski                                          Yastrzemski

All players are with their respective team sets, though.  I would love to find a bunch of these.  Especially since they include about a dozen of my player collection guys among them.  But the stickers will do for now.