Buy & Sell with Fun While It Lasted

As of early 2023, Fun While It Lasted features over 15,000 images of rare memorabilia, along with more than 2,500 .pdf files of paper artifacts from defunct teams, leagues and sports brands of the past.

Most, but not all, of those items have passed through my hands at some point over the last 15 years. But I personally keep only a very modest permanent collection on one tall bookshelf.  Everything else I make available for sale to collectors, dealers, researchers and genealogists through our First Look Service and our e-Bay store. I ship about 2,000 orders a year around the world. The proceeds sustain this website.

My personal philosophy on collecting is perfectly articulated by the French stamp dealer, Monsieur Felix, during his cameo in the 1963 Cary Grant-Audrey Hepburn thriller Charade.

“For a few minutes they were mine. That is enough.”

So let’s talk about what we will buy and how you can sell to us first.  Or you can scroll down for information on our First Look Service and other info on how to buy from the Fun While It Lasted archives.

Sell Your Stuff

We are always buying. Our priority is to acquire material that advances Fun While It Lasted‘s mission to preserve and present the history of professional sports teams and leagues of the past in the digital age.

We are always interested in:

• Programs, media guides and other publications from defunct & minor leagues in all sports
• Original photographs, slides & negatives
• Official game balls
• Game uniforms
• Game films and reels
• Paper artifacts & correspondence of historical interest, such as contracts, press releases, logo slicks, operations manuals, business plans, telegrams, sales brochures and proposals

With only rare exceptions, we will not buy the following items:

• Trading cards
• Autographed memorabilia
• Collegiate sports memorabilia
• NFL, MLB, NBA or NHL memorabilia, other than from defunct member teams of those leagues
• Mass-market sports magazine back issues (Sports Illustrated, Sporting News, etc.)
• Souvenir merchandise from teams (Pennants, Bobble Heads, Pucks, Mini-Bats, etc.)

To start a conversation about selling your memorabilia to Fun While It Lasted, please use our Contact Form.  We will respond to you by email within 48 hours and will always ask to see sample photos or scans of items we may consider buying.

Buy From Fun While It Lasted

Most of what we have for sale at any given moment is listed for sale in our e-Bay store. You can find our entire sale inventory listed there.

You can also search on our inventory on a targeted basis without leaving Fun While It Lasted.  We use the Auction Nudge plug-in for WordPress to display our real-time inventory of available memorabilia on most of our team and league posts and pages. Scroll towards the bottom of each post or page and you will find our Shop link for that particular team or league.

Our Shop section and links look like this. Any time you see this shop interface on our site, understand that you are buying directly from us!

Introducing: Fun While It Lasted First Look

In December 2022, we introduced our First Look Service. This is an opportunity for the most dedicated collectors & seekers to gain a first right of refusal to view, ask questions about and purchase new arrivals to our collection before anyone else gets to see them, while simultaneously supporting Fun While It Lasted. Here’s how it works:

In return for a small one-time gift to Fun While It Lasted, you can reserve a lifetime first-look option* at all memorabilia we acquire that is relevant to a particular team or an individual person that you are interested in.

• Any one individual may be reserved for a one-time $5 gift.
• Any one team may be reserved for a one-time $10 gift.

Because we can offer no guarantees that we will ever acquire items you are interested in, we felt it was important to make this offer both modestly priced and non-expiring so that it offers a compelling advantage for folks who are competing to find the rare & unusual materials that we trade in.

How It Works

As an example, let’s say that you reserved a First Look option on soccer player David Beckham. If Fun While It Lasted acquires a match day program from the English National Team, Manchester United, Real Madrid or the Los Angeles Galaxy where Beckham appears on the cover, is listed on the match roster, or is featured in an article, you will receive an email notification with a photo, a description, a suggested price and an option to buy.  We will be happy to answer any additional questions that you may have at this time.

Important caveat: team options are superior to individual options. If someone else has a First Look option on the Los Angeles Galaxy as a club, they will get the first crack at any L.A. Galaxy item featuring David Beckham. A person with an individual option on David Beckham would then see that item next if it remained available.

A few ancillary benefits:

• As a First Look supporter, the suggested price we send to you on your items will always be lower than what we would list the item for in our e-Bay store. This is because we don’t need to pay e-Bay fees & commissions on direct sales and also to thank you for your support.
• While First Look is not intended to function as a personal shopper service, we may on occasion choose to alert you to the availability of items you are seeking that Fun While It Lasted has not chosen to acquire, to give you the opportunity to purchase them directly from the seller.

Make Your Reservation

Use our contact form below to reserve as many teams ($10 each) or individuals ($5 each) as you like. Payment via PayPal can be made using to Donate link at the top of any page on the website and must follow within seven days in order to finalize your First Look Options.

First Look Options – Teams

These teams have been reserved and are no longer available.

First Look Options – Individuals

These players, coaches & executives have been reserved and are no longer available.

First Look Reservations - Individuals

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