I made a remarkable discovery! "New" 70 year old Bob Cousy card!

I was looking through some of my obscure foreign cards recently when a particular image jogged my memory. The photo on one card was part of the 1950s Album No. 1 collection released by Chocolates Amattler of Spain. I knew that I had seen a photograph that looked exactly like the drawing on the card, but I wasn’t sure where. As is often the case with foreign issues, the player wasn’t identified.

I let the question fester as I continued to comb through some other cards until it hit me. Was the player featured in this action image turned into a color illustration….Bob Cousy?

I thumbed back to the card.

Number 14 on the jersey – now I was intrigued. I got online and a quick image search confirmed my recollection.

This photograph is from a game between the Boston Celtics and the Milwaukee Hawks on November 11, 1954 at Madison Square Garden in New York (Cousy, by the way, scored 27 of Boston’s 85 points that day). As you can see, it’s an exact match.

The team names were omitted from the card, likely because of potential licensing issues, but the jersey numbers are all identical.

Now I was excited. My initial thought was that surely the identification work had been done by a collector sometime in the last 70 years, but after some extensive searching, I came up empty. So, with that, I will assume that this is the first time the “Spanish Bob Cousy card” will be introduced to the collecting world.

His name doesn’t appear anywhere on the card, just the simple title “Partido de Baloncesto” (“Basketball Game”) on the reverse. The colored illustration is rather crude and if you didn’t know the photo, you might never make the connection between the card and Cooz but it’s a slam dunk.

It becomes remarkable when you actually overlay the images of both the illustrated card and photograph. It’s so similar that I assume the artist may have even replicated the photo by painting directly on top of it.

Card #17 was part of the Olympic Sports subset (“Juegos Olimpicos” in the Amattler album), but obviously this image represents the sport itself and not a scene from the Olympics.

Although it’s not necessarily difficult to find examples of “Album No 1” by Chocolates Amatller, pinpointing the exact date of release has proven to be more challenging. It’s often referred to as a “1950s” release, but Spanish collectors have told me it likely dates to 1956-57. I’m sure the exact date will be confirmed with more research. I have found the original photographs of two other illustrations that also both date to 1954. The Olympics section mentions the next Olympics will be held in 1960 in Rome, so the earliest this album would have been published is late 1956. If it indeed 1957, it would coincide with his 1957 Topps card, often considered his rookie card, to those that don’t see the 1951 Berk Ross as his true RC. Either way, it’s one of precious few cards issued during Cousy’s prime.

The Juegos Olimpicos section featured a variety of sports. There were 22 total sports cards and 190 cards in the entire set. It is important to note that these cards were meant to be adhered to an album, so finding them without residue would be a challenge.

These examples have no mention or suggestion of the players, and are not directly replicated from known images. They have been labeled due to the assumptions based on collectors consensus. I definitely think both these examples do in fact represent these players, but just wanted to share examples to bolster the argument for this Bob Cousy card, which unlike these examples, is replicated directly from a well known Cousy photograph.

I’m thrilled to introduce this old “new” find with collectors, and it’s inspired me to continue to dig through the past. You can see this card as part of my collection here. You never know what you may find. Happy Hunting to you all!

I don’t think there can be any dispute that the card replicates the 1954 photograph of Bob Cousy. I now wonder if the grading companies will decide to label it as such? There has been precedence set with other foreign cards that do not include a players name on the card but are labeled as such. Two examples that come to mind are the 1950 Menko George Mikan, and the 1959 Chocolates Torras Ted Williams. They have both been graded and labeled including the players names by both PSA & SGC. Further back, there’s the 1929 Churchman’s Babe Ruth.