2011 Topps American Pie

This is at least the third edition of Topps American Pie. The other two were in 2001 and 2002. For all I know this product comes out every year but I don't think so. The past years cards were mostly baseball players while this set is mostly not. The set is not listed at Beckett.com and I really don't feel like expending too much effort. The cards seem to be separated by decade, probably starting in the 1940s. I only bought two 6-card packs so I'll post them all. Early next week I post 2 packs of Panini Americana for comparison and contrast.

Of the 12 cards I got, this is the only one related to baseball. You can hardly go wrong with a Jackie Robinson card.

OK, this one is ridiculous. These shocked women appear to be reading a tabloid newspaper. Is that how the Kinsey report was published? According to the back of the card Sexual Behavior in the Human Male was a bestseller. I kind of doubt that women gathered together to read it aloud to each other.

What this set is all about is American cultural icons and there are few more iconic than the Muppets of Sesame Street. This is, of course, before they all became Communists.

The Saturday Evening Post was still being published in the 1960s? Who knew? You would think they could have used a cover from the 1960s instead of this cover from 1903.

Star Trek, of course, got it's start in the 1960s but this picture is from, as you should well know, the making of Star Trek, The Motion Picture which came out in 1979. Gene Roddenberry is the guy behind the camera, the pointing guy is the movie director, Robert Wise. I'm not sure who the pointy-eared guy is.

The television mini-series Roots was one of the biggest television events of the 1970s.

The dumbest card in the two packs. According to the back of the card, this is the actual bar code from an actual 10-pack of Wrigley's (hey, another baseball connection) Juicy Fruit sold in Ohio in 1974. The pack is now in the Smithsonian. I'd like to see the chain of custody on that exhibit.

Giant icon of course. An American icon?  He did live here for quite awhile and was killed here. I still remember when I heard the news.

More Muppets!

An unfortunate sad note to end with.

In addition to the 10 base cards I got two insert cards. The wrapper lists a bunch of inserts including numbered foil board parallels, cards with autographs and relics and cards with coins embedded in them. I guess they had a lot of change left over when they finished the Topps Heritage set. I got two cards from the insert set called Topps American Pie Hirsute History. My question is, who's stupid idea was this?

Sideburns! This looks like Robert Redford to me. General Burnsides is mentioned on the back along with more modern wearers of sideburns like Elvis Presley and Luke Perry. I still think this is Redford even though he is not mentioned on the back of the card.

I wouldn't have thought you could fill up the entire back of a card writing about the soul patch. Who is this guy?  The back mentions Rush front man Geddy Lee and Olympic speed skating champion Apolo Ohno. It is surely not Geddy Lee. It sort of looks like Ohno but it sort of looks like a young Jeff Bridges as well.