General Forum

I am at my dads house and over the years I have visited him I would always look at his collection, Since I lived in other states I had not seen his collection in a while. Way back in early 1990 I was looking through his cards and noticed the piles had gotten smaller. When I mentioned to my dad, that he was missing many cards he was are you sure. I said yes, I have a price guide from the 80's that I had put tick marks in it to show the cards he owned. So the next time I visited I showed it to him and he was a little upset.

Back story I have had two younger brothers at home. One pass away in 2011 from a heart attack.

Well next time I come back to visit my dad what did he do yup. He bought a 24x26 picture frame and glued some cards of various type, non-sports, baseball, football, boxing from the EARLY 50's to include a 1955 Bowman Whitey Ford, some 52 Bowmans, 51 Topps game pieces, railroad cards and plane cards. My heart cringed when I saw it.

Well after arriving last Thursday night in Rhode Island from my home in Colorado since my mom was in the hospital I noticed the framed cards  were not on the wall in the pool room. My dad had put it in the closet of the spare bedroom. The next day my Mom passed away at the ripe old age of 75. My parents had been together since they were 16. Very sad times.

So after all that I am sitting in the bedroom trying to figure out if there is a way to get these cards off the paper backing without damage. When I opened the frame the Ford dropped down but had paper loss from the glue. In 2012 my dad gave me what was left of his collection and they are loaded into this DB with scans. Proudest part of my collection.

Sorry for the ramble, but still trying to make sense of all this and the cards are the least of my worries but he is napping and I thought I would ask the members for advice.

Mark

Contact a paper conservator. They're professionals and can probably tell you if it's possible to recover them.

It's probably going to depend a lot on what glue was used.

-Tom

I don't know the answer to your question but I'm sorry for your loss

I have had some success soaking cards that have glue residue or paper on back, but have done that mostly with lower value cards, nothing expensive

I have found that it may be possible to upgrade from poor to fair or poor to good, but not much higher than that...and sometimes you get warping which can be resolved sometimes by putting a heavy book on them after dry

mark 

thank you Billy

First, I'm sorry for your loss.

As to soaking cards, I've never tried it, can't even imagine trying it, but who knows it could work. But I know grading companies notice that sort of thing and will either not grade or designate the card "altered."

If you're into the whole grading thing.

Which I'm not.

Good luck.

v3

right, soaking is not for everyone..just may make a really bad card into a kind of bad card...mark

If it's Elmer's glue, water will dissolve it.  When I get '50s cards that have been previously glued to a surface (but removed with the glue spots still on them), I put a drop of water, rub lightly, drop of water, rub lightly, etc.  Most of the time, I'm able to remove the glue stain without losing the readability of the card back.  I've done this with early '50s Topps and Bowman cards successfully.  If you oversoak, then you might get paperloss.  If there is too much glue, then you may have to do this over multiple drying cycles.  I've never gone more than 1 drying cycle.  

Hey Mark, hope all is going well there today, I am sure your pops will cherish the extra time! As for what to do, if the cards do hold a bit of value I'm with C2C. Its worth asking at the very least. If your not too worried about it then a bit of home remedy may be in order.