Collector's Corner

One of my holy grail Orr items is a game worn jersey. Unless I hit the lottery I know that it’s never going to happen as it would probably cost around $100,000 to acquire one.

This week though I got the next best thing; a jersey that Orr actually wore, but not from his playing days. Thankfully it was only at a fraction of the cost of a game worn one.

While I love the jersey, it is unfortunately associated with a tragic event. On December 3, 1999, a warehouse fire in Worcester, Mass. claimed the lives of 6 firefighters. One of them happened to be Mass. native Denis Leary’s cousin. The following spring Leary established the Leary Firefighters Foundation. This jersey comes from a charity game for the foundation. You can read about the foundation here.

Orr didn’t play in the game, but he did coach one of the teams and wore this jersey behind the bench.

This is a unique Orr item for sure. While it is associated with a tragic event, the game served as a stepping stone for Leary’s foundation, which has done a lot to raise money for firefighters not only is Massachusetts, but around the country.

There you have my first (and hopefully not last) Orr game jersey. See you again next Sunday. Go Bruins!

Over the years I’ve met many former Boston Bruins players from the 1960’s and 70’s at autograph shows. If I had to guess, I’d say that I have at least twenty to thirty autographed items from most of the guys who were on the ‘70 and ‘72 Stanley Cup teams. I’m happy to say that every piece of memorabilia I’ve had signed still reside in my collection.

Unfortunately, Bobby Orr does not do autograph shows. He can’t. It would be a mob scene. He’s made appearances for different companies from time to time, but no card shows. He does do private signings however.

A private signing is where you send your item in to the company sponsoring the signing and Orr will sign it. You don’t get to meet him, but you have a nice autographed piece.

Around seven or eight years ago I sent in some Bruins team posters for Orr to sign. He was the last signature I needed on them. They are now framed and hanging on my wall. I figured that it’s about time to get a few more items autographed. I just picked them up yesterday.

First up was place mat commemorating the 1972 Stanley Cup Champs. Orr was the last signature I needed to complete it as best as possible. The only two signatures not on it are Ace Bailey who died during the 9/11 terrorist attacks and Ted Green who just does not sign at all.

This is a rare original International House of Pancakes place mat from around 1970. I can’t imagine many of these have survived. Underneath each player’s photo was a line where they could sign their name. Once again Orr was the last signature I needed to complete it. This is definitely one of my favorite pieces just for the sheer rarity of it.

This original posted was an advertisement for a charity game sometime around 1968. Orr was a special guest referee for it. I had previously had it signed by John McKenzie and Eddie Shack, who are also on the poster, so Orr’s signature completes it. You can see my original post here.

The last two items I’m going to show you are particular favorites of mine.

Here are two of my favorite programs. The first is from a Bruins – Oakland Seals game on February 9, 1969. The cover shows Orr being pursued around the net by Gordie Howe. I met Howe at an autograph show a few years ago and had him sign it figuring that I could get Orr to sign it eventually.

The second is a Goal magazine which happens to contain my favorite quote of all time about Orr.

“Bobby Orr was not just a player. He was an era unto himself, a genre, an institution, a criterion against which all other hockey players could measure themselves, just to see how close to them they weren’t.”

I love that. I had to have it signed.

I sent in a few other things as well. One was one of his game used stick that he signed on the blade. The other is an item that coincides with the Stanley Cup playoffs. I’ll be showing that within the next few weeks.

I have many more pieces from my collection that I would like to get signed, but they are going to have to wait, if I send them in at all. Orr’s signature is not cheap. Depending on the item, it could cost you $150 – $200 per signature. Some people might think that’s crazy, but it’s worth it to me.

That’s all for this week. See you again next Sunday with some other vintage Orr items from my collection. Until then, Go Bruins!

When you think of the footwear that Bobby Orr wore back in the 70’s you immediately think hockey skates. Well Orr was also a pretty good recreational tennis player. You can’t wear skates for that. So this week thanks to fellow Orr collector extraordinaire Bob, I have another type of footwear to show you this week that Orr very well could have worn on the tennis court.

Here we have an ad showing Orr endorsing Pony footwear. This ad also happens to be autographed by him in blue pen off to the bottom left.

Not only did he endorse Pony, but these shoes were also made.

Signature Orr sneakers. A pair of these are near the top of my wish list of Orr items that I don’t have but want. I have never seen these offered for sale anywhere.

What really intrigues me about these sneakers is that nowadays you take a sneaker being named after an athlete for granted, like Air Jordans. Many other basketball players have had shoes named for them. Not so sure about hockey players. And I also don’t believe that it happened to often in the 1970’s.

So be on the lookout for these. If you see them, definitely grab them.

Thanks for reading this week. See you all again soon with some more vintage Bobby Orr items.

I’ve long said that my favorite hockey players are from the 1960’s and 70’s. Now I wasn’t born until 1969 so you would think that it should be the 1980’s, but that just isn’t the case. Consequently, anything written about that time period I love to read, especially if Bobby Orr is mentioned.

This week I have two books to show you. One talks about Orr and other NHL stars of that era. The other actually features athletes from other sports.

Both books are pretty self explanatory. The Who’s Who is definitely my favorite as it contains stats for every NHL player for the 1971-72 season. Four future Hall of Famers grace the cover which is an added bonus. What also intrigues me is declaration that for the first time ever, scoring averages of every player are included. I guess it’s nice to know the goals, assists and points per game for each player.

Here is Orr’s bio on the inside.

The second book is one of those Scholastic paperbacks that I’m sure most of us remember getting in elementary school. The other three athletes on the cover need no introduction. Out of the four, only Roger Staubach seems a bit out of place. While he had a great career, it’s not on par with those of Orr, Abdul-Jabbar and Aaron.

The inside contains very brief cookie cutter biographies of each athlete. Perfect for a 10 year old.

Here is the beginning of Orr’s story.

Now it’s strange to me that the picture they chose to use is one of Orr skating in an exhibition game between the Bruins and their minor league affiliate the Boston Braves. Orr played for the Braves that game. Also they chose to air brush out the Braves logo on the jersey. I guess they did that as to not confuse people.

If you are interested in other Orr books like this, check out these past posts on Orr books here and here.

That’s all for this week. See you again next Sunday with more Bobby Orr.

Forgive me if this weeks post is on the short side, but I’m having my condo worked on and literally have stuff all over the place. That being said, let’s get right too it.

I have two items for you this week that are in a friends Orr collection and that I hope to someday find for myself.

Up first is this original Phil Bissell drawing of Orr from what looks like to be from the 1975 season judging from the fact that on the broken ice it says that Espo has departed. That of course refers to Phil Esposito being traded in November of 1975. It appears that Orr was just returning from injury.

This appears to be another original drawing of Orr from around 1971. Not sure who the artist is but it’s a nice portrayal of Orr in mid-stride. I also love the accomplishments that are added in like most points and goals by a defenseman in a season. Just an outstanding piece.

Since I’ve never seen these before offered for sale it’s tough to put a price on them, but I would say that they would sell for at least a few hundred dollars each.

There you have this weeks Bobby Orr items. I’ll be back next Sunday with something from my collection. See you then.

It occurred to me recently that one particular part of my Bobby Orr collection I’ve never written about before: All Star game programs.

Orr programs are some of my favorite pieces of memorabilia. All Star programs are especially sweet because besides Orr, they also feature some of my favorite hockey players of all time.

Orr was selected to play in the All Star game every year from 1968 to 1975. He didn’t play in the 1974 game because he was injured. I’ve been trying to get a program from each year that he was selected. So far I have five of the eight programs. Today I’m going to show you the a program that I just picked up.

This is from the 1972 game which was held in Minnesota. The cover features Gordie Howe and Jean Beliveau, even though both had retired the previous season. Between them the played in a total of 35 All Star games.

Here are the rosters for each team. Besides Orr, other future Hall of Famer’s who played in this game include Bobby Hull, Phil and Tony Esposito, Brad Park, Jean Ratelle and Gump Worsley just to name a few.

Each player had a brief career write-up as well as a picture.

Lastly, this is my favorite part of the program.

This caricature was drawn by Jim Nelson and covers a full page. Every starter from each conference has one of these done for him in the program. I would love to get my hands on the original drawing of this.

Out of the five All Star programs I currently have I have to say this is my favorite because the program is filled with information and pictures of not only the current All Stars but of past ones also.

I’ll roll out the other programs that I have over the course of the next few months.

By the way, in case you were wondering, Orr’s Eastern Conference team won the game 3 – 2. Orr had an assist and was named the games MVP.

Until next week, happy Orr collecting.

Make no mistake, I hated typing those words. I have made it well known that I don’t acknowledge that part of Orr’s career. Being from Boston I just can’t. Should never have happened. I still despise Alan Eagleson for lying to Orr about the Bruins contract offer.

That being said, past guest blogger Danny wrote me saying that he’s like to do a write-up on Orr’s Chicago memorabilia because there are a decent number of items out there. I agreed, figuring that other Orr collectors would like to see what is out there for Chicago items.

Here’s Danny in his own words.

On June 8 1976 the Boston Bruins Superstar became a free agent and signed with the Chicago Blackhawks.

We all know Gary the owner of this blog is not exactly a fan of seeing anything Red, Black and White on Orr’s Body but when I suggested I do a blog about Orr’s Hawk items he thought it would be a great idea.

Although Orr has a ton of stuff as a Bruin, he does not have that many pieces as a Hawk.

There were only two retarded looking hockey cards that were air brushed for OPC/Topps in 1976-77 and 1977-78.

But aside from those hockey cards Orr also had some really neat oddball items that are worth taking a look at in this blog.

-First off is the most expensive piece and very well-known Bally Pinball Machine “Power Play” from 1977 which ranges from $1000-$2000.

-Second would be his 1976 “7-11” Glass which is a very rare piece to find as i have only seen two in about 20 years and price range can be easily $500 or more.

-Third the 1977 Coffee Mug only offered by the Orr/Walton Camp Sport shop which does come up every few years selling at about $300-$400 and the matching brochure pictured above the mug at about $25.

-Fourth we have his “Dr. Pepper” Poster from an unknown premium Price Range $75-$150.

-Fifth is the tiny mini card from 1977-78 “Coke/Coca Cola”, Yearly Beckett Book Value is set at $125.

-Sixth is the fold out poster series #14 “Farewell To Bobby Orr” not sure which hockey magazine it comes from, Value ?

-Seventh is a 1978 Promotional 8×10″ photo, Value $45

-Eighth is six different postcards 3 in color and 3 in black and white, they all have stats on the back and two of the black and white “Mystery Sleuth” postcards comes in English or bi-lingual (One is underneath the other. If you look closely you can see it sticking out). Years range from 1976 to 1978. Value $10-$30

-Finally the last photo shows one of the six post cards mentioned earlier that was part of a mail away package with large team photo, original mailer and order form, value $50, also a 1977 Team Xmas card done by artist R. Pelkowski value $75, and a 1976-77 Hockey Digest which was Orr’s first appearance on anything as a Chicago Blackhawk value $10-$20.

I remember being a 13 year old kid seeing this on the newsstand and i could not believe my eyes that Orr was wearing a Hawks Jersey.

Bobby only played 26 games for the Hawks do to his bad knees in 3 years, 20 games in 1976-77, took the year off in 1977-78 to try and heal up and in 1978-79 he only got in 6 games. He still managed to get 27 points in 26 games for the hawks. Keep in mind that in 1975-76 his last year as a Bruin he only played 10 games, so his days to quitting was already coming his way do to his bad knees.

So as you can see there are plenty of neat items you can collect of Orr in a hawks jersey along with many front cover appearances on magazines which I have not included in the photos as there are too many!

Thanks Danny for that look into Bobby Orr memorabilia in that other jersey, which now will never be spoken about again.

See you again next week Orr for some items from his Bruins days.

While it would only makes sense that a majority of Bobby Orr memorabilia available would come from either the United States or Canada, there is actually a smattering of items that were produced overseas.

This week I have a pretty cool item to show you that I picked up in an auction last month. It doesn’t focus strictly on Orr, but that really doesn’t matter to me in regards to this piece.

Here we have a program from a two game series in 1972 between Team Canada and a  Swedish all star team. These games took place during a break in the famous Canada-Russia Summit series that year.

Now Orr didn’t play that series because he was still recovering from a knee operation, but he is still listed on the roster and included in the biographies of the players.

The entire program is in Swedish so I have no idea what anything says.

Some collectors would consider this more of a Team Canada item than an Orr piece. I like the crossover aspect of it because the 1972 Summit Series is one of the greatest ever played and there are other items out there that show Orr as a member of the team. Check out the last item from this post.

I can’t tell you how many of these programs are out there, but this is the first one that I’ve ever seen and I was determined to win this on auction night.

That’s all for this week. Be sure to check out next weeks post. Guest poster Danny is back and he is going to feature some Orr items that I have said I would never ever right about. This will be a one time only thing so don’t miss it.

By the title of this post you might be thinking that I’m going to show you books about Orr, which there have been many. Well that’s not exactly what I’m going to talk about this week. Instead I have a couple of items to show you that deal with books, but not just Bobby Orr.

What we have here is an advertising pamphlet for the Sports Illustrated Book Club. Measuring 5 1/2 x 8 1/2, it contains 8 pages and gives brief descriptions of sports books that are available through the Sports Illustrated Book Club.

This particular issue features Orr’s book My Game. Here are some photos from the pamphlets inside.

I had no idea that Sports Illustrated had their own book club. They also gave a discount on the books. For Orr’s book, the publisher’s price is $9.95, but members can buy it for $8.95.

Here is another one that I picked up.

This is far and away my favorite one of the two mainly because of the great action shot of Orr. In this issue they use Orr to promote a book on the history of the NHL.

Before winning these two items on Ebay, I never knew that they existed. I assume that they were sent out to all book club members but I’m not really sure. Regardless, I’m thrilled to have these two Orr items in my collection.

That’s all for this week. More Orr coming your way in seven days.

It’s Easter Sunday so forgive me, but this is going to be a short post.

The most plentiful Bobby Orr items are those depicting him as a Boston Bruin. There are also items from the 1976 Canada Cup, his charitable work (skate-a-thons etc…), various appearances for business and of course for that other NHL team that will not be named and never should have happened.

Another aspect of Orr’s career that I didn’t mention above but is highly collectable and less frequently seen is from his days with the Oshawa Generals.

This is a section of a Montreal newspaper from April 3, 1966. Now I don’t speak French, but I believe the headline is asking if Bobby Orr is the second coming of Eddie Shore. I also like that fact that it shows a few photos of Orr skating for the Generals.

The inside article most likely talks about Orr’s days in Oshawa, as they were winding down right around this time.

Most of the Oshawa Orr items I have are either programs/magazines or newspaper articles like this one. The newspaper clipping are particular favorites of mine because I’m assuming that not a lot of these papers were saved. I always try to get them no matter if I see them listed on Ebay (which this one was) or for sale at a show or memorabilia store.

This particular paper cost me $30. Besides me there were three other bidders vying for it.

That’s all for this week. Hope you all have a Happy Easter. More Bobby Orr items coming your way next Sunday.