Buzz Break: 2021 Historic Autographs Famous Americans (E.S.)

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The box: 2021 Historic Autographs Famous Americans -- Employee Set (parallel edition + bonuses)
Where to buy: BlowoutCards.com (when available ... click for all other H.A. releases)
First Buzz preview: Click here (checklist is in gallery below)

Keep reading for a full breakdown and gallery of what was in this one.

Cards per set: 342
Base set completion: 
330 of 330 Employee parallel (all cards have "EMPLOYEE" gloss on front and are /25 with matching serial-number)
Duplicates: 0

Notables on base cards – The Supremes, Dolly Parton, Jimi Hendrix, Aretha Franklin, Elvis Presley, Marvin Gaye, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Johnny Cash, John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Chuck Berry, Judy Garland, Sammy Davis Jr., Frank Sinatra, Jesse Owens, Josephine Baker, Norman Rockwell, Robert Oppenheimer, Walter Cronkite, The Three Stooges, Paul Newman, Loretta Lynn, Joan Baez, Robin Williams, Amelia Earhart, Ernest Hemingway, Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, James Stewart, Rosa Parks, Billie Holiday, Dean Martin, Nat King Cole, John Glenn, Jerry Lewis, Fred Rogers, Fats Domino, Martin Luther King Jr., Sandra Day O'Connor, Sally Ride, Michael Jackson, B.B. King ...

... Albert Einstein, Cy Young, James Naismith, Ty Cobb, Christy Mathewson, Charlie Chaplin, George S. Patton, John Sullivan, Annie Oakley, Lizzie Borden, Amos Alonzo Stagg, George Washington Carver, Butch Cassidy, The Sundance Kid, Molly Brown, W. E. B. DuBois, Helen Keller, Old Hoss Radbourn, Cap Anson, "Buffalo Bill" Cody, Walt Whitman, Benjamin Franklin, Betsy Ross, Sojourner Truth, Edgar Allen Poe, Abraham Lincoln, P.T. Barnum, Susan B. Anthony, Harriet Tubman, Booker T. Washington ... and many more from history, sports, pop culture, politics and more. (Note: Images for the non-1/1 cards here are from last time to not waste server space.)

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Insert cards: 12
Employee Alloy (foilboard) parallels (8) – Rocky Marciano, Charles Lindbergh, Mary McCarty, Annie Oakley, Harry Houdini, Lewis & Clark, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, George Dewey (all 1/1s)
Employee Aurora (sparkly ribbon on foilboard) parallels (4) – Clara Barton, Charles Horace Mayo, June Duprez, Hobart Bosworth (all 1/1s)

Autographs/Memorabilia: None in this format.

The Dropped Box Special™ reared its ugly head this time on two-thirds of my set and all of the 1/1 cards. Two others -- see gallery -- took a far bigger jolt.

What's Buzz-worthy: I pressed my luck on this rare set once again with an eye on maybe grading some cards here -- depending on whether this one was cleaner or not compared to my first --- and then to see which 1/1s I might find. The Cardboard Gods decided otherwise as I landed what I call the Dropped Box Special™ where two-thirds of the set got a smaller jolt, killing one corner on most cards on the grading front as well as all of my 1/1 cards. Two other cards at the end of the set probably absorbed the main part of that jolt from a drop somewhere in its lifetime with major corner damage on an opposite side. It's about an $85 reminder that there are risks of factory sets from any company when the packaging is a standard box but I'll survive ... it's not my first cardboard rodeo. The bummer is that all cards here are /25 save for the 1/1s. I still might be able to slab some cards from the front of the set (not the best crop in that part of the set) and maybe some within the final third (the best part) if the subject strikes me, but this one isn't the most grading-friendly release to start. We'll see.

As I noted with my break last week, this release is jam-packed with history via cards of notables in pop culture, politics, science and so much more. It's one that I have actually opened a few items here but not for this format, which is a rarer set made for employees of the company where every standard card is limited to just 25 copies and then all bonus cards here are 1/1 creations of two types, a foilboard set and a sparkle-foil board enhanced set.

Unlike the standard factory sets that had really, really rough cuts on the fronts, these are far more clean with that and might allow me to grade a few of the notable or unusual inclusions here from a meaty set that is loaded with names who aren't on boatloads of cardboard. (Back edges can still be rough.) Sure, there are TV and movie stars and athletes who have cards -- but there are others who don't have much and that's part of the appeal to me here, especially with the overall volume made for this set being pretty low. (Even better, this set had a modest price -- and that matters more than ever in my book these days, too.) The 500 regular factory sets made for this one have two version of basic cards -- an INSPIRE version (a clean watermarking gloss on the fronts says INSPIRE), while 250 other sets are HISTORIC and the volumes made on all cards here are noted on the card backs. This one reads EMPLOYEE across the fronts as you can see on some images.

The checklist for this one is as huge as the variety of who's found inside and you can see a touch of that below and a thick breakdown of the entire product's inclusions is in a gallery after the card images. The company said it intends to make this more like a "living set" that adds more people to it over time -- and I like that -- though this one's sequel hasn't yet happened. (I had seen something somewhere about this year, though.) I liked this one so much, I have another on the way and I'll post that one here, too, at some point.

Product Grade: A- (huge set with a ton of names from all around us ... without breaking the bank)
Box Grade: A (this format is solid ... as long as found at a modest price and not a dropped box)
Fun Grade: D (the dreaded Dropped Box Special™ really hurt this time ... still a nice set)

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