Cardboard heritage never tasted so good as it did with the advent of 1976 Hostess Baseball Cards.
I mean …
Baseball cards and food have enjoyed a long and happy marriage dating back to the candy issues of the early 20th century.
So, by the mid-1970s, attentive collectors must have had their cardboard radars turned on full throttle every time they walked into their local grocery stores or 7-Elevens.
Those hobbyists who were on top of their games would have stumbled into a special treat starting in May of 1975 when they discovered that boxes of their favorite Hostess pastries featured panels of three cards on the side. And the non-junk-fooders amongst the collecting crowd surely found their sweet tooth that summer since there were 150 different cards in the offing.
What’s a little tooth decay and spiking blood sugar when there are baseball cards in the offing, right?
The casual sweets or cardboard fan may not have realized it at the time, but these cards were produced for Hostess by Topps themselves, which explains how they were able to leave team logos visible on the cards since Topps had all the necessary licensing to show pretty much whatever they wanted.
Collectors eager for a few more pieces of branded cardboard in those days of the Topps monopoly gobbled up the Hostess cards faster than you could say, “Suzy Q.”
Red, White, and Blue Snack Cakes
Bolstered by the success of their initial offering in 1975, Topps and Hostess teamed up again for another set of box-side cards in 1976.
In case you don’t remember, that was the summer that America celebrated our Bicentennial, and the whole nation was awash in patriotic deckings. The Hostess cards played right into that theme by featuring the greatest baseball players in the land set atop Red, White, and Blue stripes that denoted the player name, his team, and his position.
In many ways, the design was similar to the base 1976 Topps set, which also presented player and team information in a set of card-bottom bands, these in all sorts of hues.
Astute collectors also may have noticed other similarities between the Topps and Hostess cards — in particular, several of the player photos were very similar (or identical) between the two issues.
Hostess card backs are as simple as can be, showing the card number, player name and bio information, and five years of stats (plus lifetime line).
As in 1975, Hostess issued their set in three-card panels on the box sides of various snack cakes products, with 50 different panels comprising the set. Falling in line with other food issues, the card borders included dashed lines that encouraged collectors to cut the panels into individual cards.
Also as in 1975, Hostess designated 60 single cards for inclusion directly into individual Twinkies packages. While the Twinkies parallel skipped around in 1975, though, Hostess kept it simple in 1976 and simply used the first 60 cards from their base set for the Twinkies issue. Each Twinkies card is distinguished from its panel-born counterpart by the thick black bar running down its backside.
As you might expect from a set this size and from the 1970s, the Hostess issue is loaded with superstars and Hall of Famers, including George Brett, Pete Rose, Mike Schmidt, Reggie Jackson, Rod Carew, Dennis Eckersley, Hank Aaron, and many others.
(The complete checklist is included below.)
Aside from the 150 cards that made it to the primetime of store shelves, Topps also created nine proof cards that never saw the side of a box. Among those phantoms are:
- Ferguson Jenkins
- Mike Cuellar
- Tom Murphy
- Al Cowens
- Barry Foote
- Steve Carlton
- Richie Zisk
- Ken Holtzman
- Cliff Johnson
Get Your Red Hot Hostess Baseball Cards Here!
You might think that rushing out to load up on new baseball cards or hoarding those little cardboard rectangles is a modern phenomenon with its origins no earlier than the hobby boom of the 1980s.
But, according to Rich Mueller at Sports Collectors Daily, the Hostess cards lit a fire under collectors.
The hobby was beginning to get organized, and communication among collector groups was fairly fluid considering this was way before the advent of the Internet.
With only one major set — Topps — available each year, hobbyists were hungry for more and were quick to chase the Hostess cards. There were various reports of guys filling their freezers with box after box of Hostess goodies in the hopes that they or their family would eventually slug them all down without causing irreparable damage to their health.
You have to figure that some of these boxes were eventually gutted of their freezer-burned contents, but the cards were most likely clipped carefully away and stored in more reasonable climes for safe keeping.
These days, you can find 1976 Hostess baseball cards on eBay in decent quantities and reasonable condition, with most singles available for a few bucks, complete panels under $20, and complete sets for well under $200.
Heck, you can even find the special album designed to hold the cards, available by send-in offer, for around $10.
Quite a tasty proposition for 40-year-old cards that put you in the mood for a celebration … don’t you think?
1976 HOSTESS CHECKLIST
1 Fred Lynn
2 Joe Morgan
3 Phil Niekro
4 Gaylord Perry
5 Bob Watson
6 Bill Freehan
7 Lou Brock
8 Al Fitzmorris
9 Rennie Stennett
10 Tony Oliva
11 Robin Yount
12 Rick Manning
13 Bob Grich
14 Terry Forster
15 Dave Kingman
16 Thurman Munson
17 Rick Reuschel
18 Bobby Bonds
19 Steve Garvey
20 Vida Blue
21 Dave Rader
22 Johnny Bench
23 Luis Tiant
24 Darrell Evans
25 Larry Dierker
26 Willie Horton
27 John Ellis
28 Al Cowens
29 Jerry Reuss
30 Reggie Smith
31 Bobby Darwin
32 Fritz Peterson
33 Rod Carew
34 Carlos May
35 Tom Seaver
36 Brooks Robinson
37 Jose Cardenal
38 Ron Blomberg
39 Leroy Stanton
40 Dave Cash
41 John Montefusco
42 Bob Tolan
43 Carl Morton
44 Rick Burleson
45 Don Gullett
46 Vern Ruhle
47 Cesar Cedeno
48 Toby Harrah
49 Willie Stargell
50 Al Hrabosky
51 Amos Otis
52 Bud Harrelson
53 Jim Hughes
54 George Scott
55 Mike Vail
56 Jim Palmer
57 Jorge Orta
58 Chris Chambliss
59 Dave Chalk
60 Ray Burris
61 Bert Campaneris
62 Gary Carter
63 Ron Cey
64 Carlton Fisk
65 Marty Perez
66 Pete Rose
67 Roger Metzger
68 Jim Sundberg
69 Ron LeFlore
70 Ted Sizemore
71 Steve Busby
72 Manny Sanguillen
73 Larry Hisle
74 Pete Broberg
75 Boog Powell
76 Ken Singleton
77 Goose Gossage
78 Jerry Grote
79 Nolan Ryan
80 Rick Monday
81 Graig Nettles
82 Chris Speier
83 Dave Winfield
84 Mike Schmidt
85 Buzz Capra
86 Tony Perez
87 Dwight Evans
88 Mike Hargrove
89 Joe Coleman
90 Greg Gross
91 John Mayberry
92 John Candelaria
93 Bake McBride
94 Hank Aaron
95 Buddy Bell
96 Steve Braun
97 Jon Matlack
98 Lee May
99 Wilbur Wood
100 Bill Madlock
101 Frank Tanana
102 Mickey Rivers
103 Mike Ivie
104 Rollie Fingers
105 Davey Lopes
106 George Foster
107 Denny Doyle
108 Earl Williams
109 Tom Veryzer
110 J.R. Richard
111 Jeff Burroughs
112 Al Oliver
113 Ted Simmons
114 George Brett
115 Frank Duffy
116 Bert Blyleven
117 Darrell Porter
118 Don Baylor
119 Bucky Dent
120 Felix Millan
121 Mike Cuellar
122 Gene Tenace
123 Bobby Murcer
124 Willie McCovey
125 Greg Luzinski
126 Larry Parrish
127 Jim Rice
128 Dave Concepcion
129 Jim Wynn
130 Tom Grieve
131 Mike Cosgrove
132 Dan Meyer
133 Dave Parker
134 Don Kessinger
135 Hal McRae
136 Don Money
137 Dennis Eckersley
138 Fergie Jenkins
139 Mike Torrez
140 Jerry Morales
141 Jim Hunter
142 Gary Matthews
143 Randy Jones
144 Mike Jorgensen
145 Larry Bowa
146 Reggie Jackson
147 Steve Yeager
148 Dave May
149 Carl Yastrzemski
150 Cesar Geronimo
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