Babe Ruth autographs are extremely rare, and a new pack of baseball cards might be the last place you would expect to find one. But that’s what happened to a young collector in Evansville, Ind., after a trip to his local card shop.
With school closed for President’s Day, Evansville resident Bob Kenning got a call from his 12-year-old grandson, Keegan: “Hey Pawpaw, why don’t we go to Hobby Den?” The local shop deals in sports and trading cards. While Bob Kenning wasn’t a collector as a child, telling Indiana station WFIE that “A lot of my cards wound up in my bicycle spokes to make my bike sound better,” he’s happy to share his grandson’s hobby. Keegan estimates he has “close to 10,000 cards.”
It turned out to be their lucky day when they opened a pack and pulled the “priceless” one-of-one card. David Nguyen, owner of The Hobby Den, was amazed by the find, pointing out that “Babe Ruth signatures just aren’t common in general.” Nguyen opened the shop in 2020, turning his hobby into a dream job after years of collecting, buying and selling cards.
When it comes to value in baseball collectibles, there’s not much that beats Babe Ruth. A rare 1933 Goudey Babe Ruth card sold for $1.6 million in 2024. The same year, Ruth’s “Called Shot” New York Yankees jersey sold for $24.1 million, a record price for sports memorabilia.
But Keegan isn’t planning to sell his card, saying, “It’s just a once in a lifetime pull, and I probably will never get anything just like it.” For him, the value is in the experience.
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