WHO: A 7
year-old Card Bored Collector
WHAT: 1981-1982 O-PEE-CHEE Paul Coffey's RC
WHERE: A card show in an empty store front in a strip mall
in Scarborough, Ontario.
WHEN: The summer of 1991
WHY: Because who didn't collect Hockey cards
in 1991?
HOW: The roll of a dice
In
1991 my family took me to a local card show hosted by small stores and private
collectors in the area. There were maybe 20 vendors crammed in an empty store
front, in a strip mall next to a grocery store. The doors opened at 9am but I
dragged my parents there for 7am because the flyer for the show stated
that the first 10 people in line would get a "prize" and there was no
chance I was missing out on the chance at a "prize". We were the
first one's there, if my memory serves me well we were there before most of the
vendors. When they finally open the doors my parents and I were presented with
our "prize" a raffle ticket to play a dice rolling game.
The game was simple you rolled 6 dice and the
sum of your roll got you a prize that corresponded with the total you
just rolled. Obviously the bigger prizes were located in the harder to
roll numbers and the junk prizes were located right in the middle. I was the
first on through the door so I went to the game with my ticket and asked if I
could take my roll. The guy took my ticket, handed me a cup with 6 dice in it
and wished me luck.
I shook the dice it the cup and rolled them
across the table, six 6's. I rolled the highest number you could possibly
roll. I was ecstatic. I was no more than 12 steps into the show and I just
won a huge card at the time. The guy reluctantly handed me my prize in one of
those massively thick screw down cases that looked like the card was embedded
in diamond. I remember taking the card and feeling like a king. I remember the guy
running the booth offering me 5 roles in exchange for the Coffey RC card and I
declined. I was just the owner of a card with a book value in the three digit
range and I couldn’t wait to show all my card collecting friends at school and
my cousins.
What my parents would tell me later in my
life was that the guy running the booth was no more than 18 and he that he was
on the verge of tears when I won the Coffey. That card was his main draw and he
was hoping the game would offset his costs of hosting the show and help him
turn a profit. They also told me that they turned in their door prize tickets
because “They felt bad for the kid.”
The Coffey rookie card will always hold a
special place in my collection and my heart. Every time I win something be it a
free coffee in Tim Horton’s roll-up the rim or a few dollars on a slot machine
my family always tells me that I am lucky and use this story as a bench
mark.
Great story... and that poor kid. :)
ReplyDeleteAs an adult I felt awful but when I was a kid that single event made my childhood.
ReplyDeleteHey, if he didn't want to lose it, he shouldn't have put it up for collateral. His loss, your gain. That's an awesome card that I still don't have a copy of.
ReplyDeleteGreat card and even greater story! This one is still on my to-get list. Someday...
ReplyDeleteDude, that's awesome. It kind of ruined his game, seeing as how you went first, but who cares? Plus, it TOTALLY made it worthwhile to drag your parents there at 7am.
ReplyDeleteI never win at those. Good on you, though I can feel bad for the kid running it.
ReplyDeleteI once traded away a stack of '80-81 and '81-82 cards that I purposely loaded down with Oilers. Wonder how many Coffeys were in that lot? :)
What are the chances of all 6s? If my math is correct, 1 in 46,656... and the first role, a seven year kid, wins it. No wonder the guy was in tears. That had to be his worst nightmare.
ReplyDeleteI remember when I was a kid there was a dice game at a flea market at where the top prize was a Patrick Roy rc. That seller must have had better luck since I am pretty sure the Roy was there for a couple of years.