Nearmint's Vintage Football Card Blog

I mentioned in F is for Fleer that the logo is reversed on every one of the 1961 Fleer Green Bay Packers cards. Fleer didn’t employ any geography majors, apparently. Other than the logo problem, the cards are great. It appears that all of the photos except Bill Forester’s were taken on the same day, since the players are all wearing the same sweater, and most of the images show the stadium in the background.

Here are a few of them, all Hall of Famers. You can see the whole 1961 Fleer Packers team set in the Vintage Football Card Gallery. (Incidentally, some collectors consider the Jim Taylor card pictured here and his 1961 Topps card to be his true rookie cards, since his 1959 and 1960 Topps cards picture another Jim Taylor.)

Here is the Packers logo in its correct orientation, with Green Bay and Door County in the east, from Chris Creamer’s sportslogos.net. Later variations of the logo, such as the one on the 1967 Philadelphia Packers insignia card, had dots on the little Wisconsin map for both Green Bay and Milwaukee, since the Packers played home games in both cities.

I found this “customized” 1962 Topps Jim Ringo card buried in my junk card drawer today. The Packers traded Ringo to the Eagles after the 1963 season (because he asked for a raise, according to a Packers legend), and whoever owned this card adjusted it for the trade. It reminded me of a thread in the Collectors Universe forums about cards that kids had “improved.” A couple are pretty funny–check them out!