Trading Baseball Cards in the Name of Love

As mentioned in my story about Honus Wagner's recent birthday, I collected baseball cards back in the 1980s. It was a lot of fun and left me with a decent collection — but nothing compared to Clyde Bone.

According to this AOL News article, Clyde has been collecting sports memorabilia since the mid-'50s and has more than a million cards. He also has a fiancee, Deb, whom he wants to live with in their very own home in San Diego. He's a retired firefighter who's been struggling to get a mortgage when he came to the realization that his card collection was the answer. So, he's putting up his entire collection, valued at more than $500,000, to trade it for a house with a nice view. You can see the ad on Craigslist. How'd he get the idea? He saw a video where a woman in San Diego County offered to marry for health insurance (you can see the video here) and probably figured this wasn't quite as unusual of a trade. And if that was the case, I might have to agree with him.

Clyde and Deb's story is a sweet one, too. They've known each other since junior high, but it took them reconnecting at a recent high school reunion to bring the couple together, and they've been dating for about a year. And, their story has struck a chord. According to this interview on Fox News, Clyde's gotten offers and has seen some houses, but hasn't made a deal as of yet. Hopefully that deal will come soon and, as a fellow baseball card collector, I hope the person that gets Clyde's collection appreciates it as much as Clyde probably has over the years.

Photo by griffithgreg via Flickr.