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RONALD S. KORDA COLLECTION OF SPORTS AND
TRADING CARDS, 1952-1996
#545
(57 cubic feet: 233 binder boxes, 18 Paige boxes, 8
DB,
1 F/O, 1 O/S)
by Cathy Keen, 2000
Ronald Korda, an employee of NBC television and a man of modest,
middle class means, began assembling his card collection in childhood
after receiving a pack of cards as a party favor. After that initial
inspiration, he began his collecting hobby which was his passion until
his death in March, 1996. In the early years of his hobby, he collected
baseball cards, later expanding to other sports as well as cards on
diverse popular culture topics. Among these topics are films,
television, popular music, science and nature, comics and magazines,
toys and action figures, games, and products, and in addition to cards,
there are stickers, sticker albums, tattoos, gum wrappers, puzzles,
games and other novelty items. Numerous foreign issues are included. He
amassed his collection by attending cards and collectibles shows and
seeking out reputable dealers, and by purchasing factory sets when they
became available. He was selective and careful, and in the case of the
sports cards, succeeded in acquiring complete sets of virtually every
series which he collected. (With the non-sports cards, he tended to
collect samples rather than entire sets.) This thoroughness is what
makes this collection rare and possibly unique among any card
collections in public or private hands. With few exceptions, there are
no cards missing, and virtually all are in mint or near mint condition.
The Kordas could have sold their collection for a fortune, but felt it
important that the collection stay together as a unit. Mr. Korda, in an
emotional article entitled "Collections Should Live Forever"
written for Baseball Hobby News, referred to his collection as
"my card family" and expressed the fear that the family would
be split up after he died. He approached the Smithsonian late in 1995.
Just days before the Archives Center was to acquire the collection, Mr.
Korda died. Finalization of his gift was completed by his wife.
Although baseball and other trading cards date back to the nineteenth
century, with some of the earliest accompanying packages of tobacco,
they gained great popularity during the Depression with the advent of
the bubble gum card. In the post-World War II years, and especially
during the prosperous decade of the 1950s, they began to enjoy
tremendous popularity, as the technology for producing them improved.
The market rapidly expanded, and cards for other sports and other topics
became popular, just as competition among manufacturers was heating up.
The earliest trading cards accompanied packs of tobacco, but were
eventually used to advertise gum, cookies, soft drinks, baked goods, hot
dogs, and numerous other products. Card manufacturers, such as Topps,
changed card formats with each new set, varying the presentation of
statistics, vertical and horizontal orientation, use of action shots,
candid shots and portraits, and inclusion of puzzles, games, fold-outs,
and other novelties. They also added new features, such as trivia
questions, cartoons, and holograms. As the hobby has changed, so have
trading cards. Today's glossy, high-tech trading cards bear little
resemblance to the tobacco cards of the 19th century or even to the
cards produced during the "golden age" of cards in the 1950s.
This collection represents a very diverse sampling of the card hobby
from the 1950s to the 1990s.
The entire collection was donated to the Archives Center in April,
1996 by Mr. Korda's widow, Catherine Korda. Some of the card packaging
was transferred by the Archives Center to the Division of Cultural
History.
This collection is divided into two main series, Series I, Sports;
and Series II, Non-Sports.
Series I, Sports, comprises more than 90% of the collection. Within
Series I, the collection is divided into seven subseries:
Subseries A: Baseball;
Subseries B: Football;
Subseries C: Hockey;
Subseries D: Basketball;
Subseries E: Other Sports;
Subseries F: Sports programs, schedules and other paper ephemera;
toys, souvenirs and novelty items;
Subseries G: Sports card packaging.
Subseries A is the largest, with baseball cards making up
approximately 70% of the entire Korda collection. Within the first three
subseries, the cards are further subdivided into cards in sets, which
are sleeved, and cards in packs, which are stored in card-sized boxes.
Subseries D and E are in packs only. Both cards in sets and in packs
have been arranged alphabetically by manufacturer, and thereunder,
chronologically. Within sets, cards are arranged in numerical order by
card number. In cases where, for baseball cards, titles of sets were
unclear or ambiguous, the reference book Sports Collector's Digest's
Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards (which in this finding aid will
be referred to as Standard Catalog) was used to determine how
card sets should be titled. Likewise, in the rare cases in which cards
were not numbered within sets, the order used was that given in Standard
Catalog. In the case of football and hockey, Beckett's Football
Card Monthly and Beckett's Hockey Card Monthly were used
as reference guides.
Series II: Non-Sports, is arranged into twenty three
subseries:
Subseries A: Mass Media and Entertainment
Subseries B: Education
Subseries C: Comic Books and Strips
Subseries D: Toys and action figures
Subseries E: Literature
Subseries F: Automotive Themes
Subseries G: Crime and Law Enforcement
Subseries H: Military Topics
Subseries I: Biography
Subseries J: Fine Arts
Subseries K: Adult Themes
Subseries L: Beauty Contests
Subseries M: Video Games
Subseries N: Parodies
Subseries O: Product Advertising
Subseries P: Fantasy Art
Subseries Q: Monsters
Subseries R: Card Games
Subseries S: Stickers, patches and tattoos
Subseries T: Toys, games, puzzles, post cards and posters
Subseries U: Pogs, caps and gum wrappers
Subseries V: Oversize of above topics
Subseries W: Non-card items, relating to above topics
Subseries 1, Mass media and entertainment, is the largest of the
non-sports categories, comprising movies, television and music. Other
subseries are similarly subdivided. Unlike the majority of the sports
cards, the non-sports cards are stored in small, card-sized cartons,
which have been assigned the letters A through DD, and are stored in 4
Paige boxes and 1 DB. They are listed here according to titles of packs.
The enormous task of re-housing and processing this collection was
enabled by a generous grant from the Smithsonian Research Resources
Program in 1997, which made possible the purchase of large quantities of
extremely specialized supplies. Many persons helped with the processing
of the Korda collection, including interns Erik Willer and Scott
Hertzberg, and volunteers Grace Meyer and Andrea Teyssier, and
especially David Abelow.
Use of this collection by researchers requires compliance with
security procedures more stringent than those required for other
collections in the Archives Center. This is due to the high value and
rarity of some of the items in this collection. Autographed items, and
cards valued at higher than $300 by Standard Catalog and Beckett's
are stored separately, and may be seen only with special permission from
the Reference Archivist, and then only in cases (such as photography or
scanning) where it is deemed a necessity. Color photocopies have been
placed in sleeves where these items would normally be stored. When using
card boxes, only six at a time may be requested from the Reference
Archivist, and unlike other collections, may not be reserved in advance,
i.e., on each separate research visit, a researcher must request boxes
only for that visit. Card sleeves may be taken out of the binders for
photocopying only with the permission and the supervision of the
Reference Archivist. Cards may not be taken from sleeves, except with
the permission and supervision of the Collection Specialist. This may
involve making advance arrangements with the Collection Specialist.
These procedures are necessary for the preservation of this exceptional
collection in perpetuity.
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