The Unusual and Unique History of Basketball Cards
Christmas Day is next week, a day of Santa, gifts… and the NBA. Closing out our series looking at the history of the earliest Basketball cards brings us to the very first Basketball-exclusive set, 1948 Bowman Basketball.
Part 1 of this series looked at the first depiction of Basketball on a collectible, the Murad T51 ‘College Sports’ series. Part 2 of this series looked at the first depiction of Basketball on a collectible, the Murad T51 ‘College Sports’ series. looked at the 1933 Goudey ‘Sport Kings Gum’ cards that contained the first players.
Jumping ahead 15 years brings us to 1948. The Basketball Association of America was 2 years old (later renamed the National Basketball Association in 1949), and stars of the day included George Milan, Bob Davies, and Ed Macauley.
The 1948 Bowman Basketball cards are typical in design for the day. A black and white player that was highlighted with color on a solid background.
Interesting side note, for more than 50 years the 1948 Bowman Basketball was the only full Bowman branded basketball set produced. In the early 1950s Topps purchased the Bowman brand and all future cards were produced under the Topps name. There wasn’t another national basketball set at all for 10 more years. The Bowman brand was later reintroduced in 2002 to the Basketball collecting community.
While being hobby-significant as the first full set of basketball cards, the set was otherwise very typical for the day. It remains a highly collectible set due to the unique significance of the set. The key card in the set, the George Mikan rookie, is typically multiple thousands of dollars even in poor grades. A PSA 9 sold for $800,000 in 2022 indicating the investment demand for the set.
This concludes our look back at some of the hobby’s earliest Basketball cards. Thanks for reading! What should we look at next? Football? Hockey?
Patrick is a lifelong sportscards and collectables fan. He's passionate about the Mets and Eagles (yes, really), pre-war tobacco and caramel cards, and writing. You can follow his often neglected account at @pg.sportscards