In 1959 Ted Williams left Topps. Fleer, which had been kept out of baseball cards by Topps's contracts with the players, signed him to an exclusive of its own and built a whole set around him: 80 cards, nearly all in the order of his life, from a boy in San Diego to the start of the 1959 season, with stops along the way for a combat mission in Korea, a 1,200-pound black marlin and a business partnership with Sam Snead.
The fronts are hand-colored photographs with a soft-focus look, in a plain white border, with his name in a bat-and-ball device in one corner. Each back describes the picture on its front, beneath a crown that holds the card number.
Number 68 is captioned “Jan. 23, 1959—Ted Signs for 1959,” and it shows him about to sign his contract, with the Red Sox general manager, Bucky Harris, seated beside him.
Harris was under exclusive contract to Topps. Topps threatened to sue, and Fleer pulled the card from circulation where it could, though some had already gone out in packs early in the season. That August a Fleer letter to a collector mentioned the legal question and offered a free #68 to anyone who asked. The card was long described as the rare one in the set. It is less rare than was once believed, but it is still the card a set builder has to look for.
Topps had Bucky Harris under contract. Fleer had Ted Williams. Card #68 had them both.
It has also been counterfeited since the 1970s. The usual tells are a rosy cast to the color and a cross-hatched pattern over the picture, most visible on his suit coat. Centering and gum stains are the problems with authentic copies.
The season the contract was for went badly. A stiff neck in spring training put him in a brace, and he hit .254, the lowest average of his career.
