Though the quality of flavor is often debatable, sticks of bubblegum have been packed in alongside trading cards for decades now. And while baseball cards and gum are a common pairing, they weren’t always that way. In fact, it took many years before someone came up with the thought.

Baseball cards were first packed in with cigarettes in the 1880s, though the athletes weren’t the only stars featured on cards – some sets also included vaudeville actors and war heroes. But even at that time, laws were starting to be enacted that prohibited the sale of tobacco to children, and the cards themselves didn’t carry much of an appeal to adults.

By the 1930s, the Fleer Company and the Goudey Gum Company began packing in baseball cards with their gum. Topps began printing cards in 1951, and that first year also included candy – though it was taffy, not gum, which was considered disastrous as the taffy itself picked up the flavor of the card varnish. The next year, they too switched to gum. By the 1990s card companies had generally phased out packing in gum with their packs, largely because people had complained that the candy was staining the cards themselves; there have been a few attempts more recently to bring the trend back, to varying degrees of success.

Even non-sports cards have been packed with gum over the years, and Hake’s Auctions has plenty of options for the card collector in their current auction. Some highlights in the lineup of lots include Topps gum card wrappers from The Brady Bunch card set from 1971, an Outer Limits Topps gum card display box from 1964, an uncut sheet from the James Bond Philadelphia Gum set, and a complete Adams’ Yellow Kid Chewing Gum card set from 1896. These auctions will close on Thursday, November 7, 2019, so interested parties should get their bids in before it’s too late.