C.O.C.A. Times

"steal it" and BP suggested an absentee bid of $2000.
BP was never known as being one of the last of the big
spenders. The card on the Football Arcade was clearly
numbered 588, a number that would come to live in
infamy in the annals of my mind .
with him at the VIP suite at the Hotel Sheridan there.
Wherever he went, all he had to do was call the CIA
and things were set up for him. There I was with him in
the VIP suite. Another pastime of Tom's involved play-
ing jokes on dealer and friend Dick Delong. Some of
these jokes almost drove poor Dick nuts.
There was joy in Mudville when I returned home from
Atlantic City that weekend and called the auction house
to find that we indeed had "stolen" the Chester Pollard,
and for only $800. Incredulously, I confirmed that the
absentee bid was number 588 and thanked the gentle-
man for his honesty.
Tom was also a notorious diabetic. On one occasion
when Dick DeLong took a bunch of us to an all you can
eat buffet during a Chicagoland Show, I caught Tom
trying to sneak off with a Plateful of chocolate covered
strawberries. After I wrestled the plate from him, he
begrudgingly admitted that it probably would not have
been a good idea to eat the whole plateful.
I then conveyed the news of my good fortune to all
my collector buddies in Cleveland. Word spread like
wildfire. The Godfather called expressing doubts, and
prceeded to bet me that there was no such thing as a
decent Chester Pollard for $800. When I accepted his
bet and said I was going to Mahopic to pick up this
treasure the next weekend, he asked if he could drop
off a music box for me to deliver for him in Mechanic-
sburg, PA which was on my way. Then friend, Ken Ru-
ben called. Ever the one to want to protect the value of
his collection, he expressed fear that the arcade market
was falling through the basement and threatened bodily
harm to anyone who would offer a Chester Pollard for
that kind of money. When I gave him some free legal
advice that this might constitute a felony, he quickly
revised his threat to one of simply suing anyone who
would dare do that.
Over the years Tom and I became close. On occasion
he mentioned that he had the Chester Pollard Football
once used in Hershey Park. My ears lit up, and I asked
him to keep me in mind if he ever decided to part with
it.
The next part of this story shifts to the auction held
in Mahopic, New York, some years ago. Mahopic is
about 30 miles from New York City. My partner, "BP"
Peirce called to persuade me to attend the preview with
him the week before the auction. We needed merchan-
dise and old BP was always looking for bargains, so I
agreed to meet him Tuesday morning at Times Square
in New York City so we could go preview the auction
and maybe put in some absentee bids before proceeding
on to the Atlantic City Antique Show that weekend. The
hitch was that I had to find a way to New York City and
back to Akron by myself. My father discovered a non-
stop Greyhound bus route and I was on my way. Now
Dad had introduced me to many good ideas in his time,
but this was not one of them. Between the loud transis-
tor radios, horny sailors, and a fight I had to break up
just to get peace and quiet, I got little rest and arrived
at Times Square in a foul mood . Perhaps I should have
known what the auction had in store when we arrived
at the farm in Mahopic where the auction was to take
place and was greeted with daylong rain and some very
foul ducks, one of which proceeded to defecate on my
shoes. Nonetheless, BP tried to keep my spirits up, and
off we went to look for suitable bargains for absentee
bids. Along the way we came upon a traditional Ches-
ter Pollard Football that needed a little work, but was
in fairly good shape. We thought we might be able to
I was undeterred and found a friend with a small truck
with an overhead cab. When the Godfather arrived just
hours before we took off to drop off the music box, he
shook his head and informed me there was no way the
Chester Pollard would fit in the small cab truck. He of-
fered me his van and returned home in my hatchback.
What I forgot was that the hatchback had no gas in it.
Mike later described the whole ordeal as a "learning
experience" he always attempts to avoid.
In any event, my friend and I were off to the auction
warehouse in Mahopic. I had been told that my ma-
chine would be inside as the doors opened at 8:00 am.
But when the doors opened after the all night drive,
what did I find but a cheap 1950's formica constructed
"foosball" game. After some very testy conversation,
I found out that the auctioneer had decided to switch
31