Mis-Adventure

I always have a chuckle when I see a 1956 Harry Agganis Adventure card attributed to Topps. While the set includes 100 colorful, reasonably well executed paintings of various subjects, including Agganis, it is definitely not a Topps product.

Here is the Golden Greek, already dead when the set was issued (as noted on his card):

You can clearly see the Gum Products Inc. copyright, belying a Topps connection. There is however, a connection to an old baseball card set, namely  1941 Double Play, also produced by the same company:

The Boston connection in that scan is intentional on my part as Gum Products Inc. was based there (in Cambridge). GPI also produced a 175 cards set of airplane cards in 1940-41 called Zoom:

GPI also made gumballs sold under the name Jaw Teasers and a few other confectionery products as well in addition to a short series of flip movies issued around the time of Adventure.  Boston was a hotbed of candy and gum manufacturers and card issuers in the years leading up to World War 2 and Gum Products looks like they would have been an earnest player had the conflict not come along.

So Adventure, while being a well-executed set, was not a Topps product, despite dozens of eBay listings to the contrary!