1948 Bowman Basketball #43 Chuck Halbert ROOKIE

Topps has tried many crazy products, called "test issues". Mostly distributed in limited areas, test issues were scarce. "Candy Lids" were little tubs of candy with player's photos on bottom of a 1-7/8" lid. 10 cents/tub, 24 tubs/box.

Topps first Candy Lids in 1970 and they are very, very hard to find. They had small photos of Tom Seaver, Carl Yastrzemski & Frank Howard.

1970 Topps Candy Lids were called "Baseball Stars Bubble Gum", had 24 players, the 1973 Topps Candy Lids had 55.

Topps planned 1972 Candy Lids but never released it, a few proofs do exist.

Topps 1973 Pinups & Comics share many of the same photos.

Auctioneer Guernsey's went thru Topps offices gathering over 3,000 items for the auction. Topps spokesman reported auction sales of OVER $1.5 million !!! Additional sales were made from a mail-only auction. Collector Keith Olbermann, at the auction, described it as an archaeological dig.

Topps archive material continued to accumulate after the auction ending up with another treasure of over 250,000 transparencies, uncut sheets, color separations, art, photos, slides, proof sheets & wrappers, canceled checks, contracts and one-of-a-kind items to sell.

In 1957 Topps created the modern day card by reducing the size of cards to current standard 2-1/2 x 3-1/2 inches. Topps also increased the set to 154 players and dramatically changed card format to a horizontal split-card. Player selection was awesome with (31) future Hall-of-Famers. 1957's top rookies were Bart Starr, Johnny Unitas & Paul Hornung. The only variation is card #58 Willard Sherman.