It's not often that we report on baseball in these pages, and still less frequent that we talk about collectable baseball cards.
But an amazing find in a dusty attic in Ohio has changed all that, because a collection has been unearthed that is worth an astonishing £2 million.
Some of the cards from the amazing £2m collection
The cards were found by 51-year-old Karl Kissner, who was going through his long-dead grandfather's attic when he found a small, soot-covered box underneath a crumbling doll's house. Inside, Kissner found a collection of baseball cards that seemed old, but he didn't think much of it and returned to rooting around seeing what else was there.
Two weeks later he sent them to an auction house for appraisal - and the expert was astounded at what he found. The cards turned out to be from an incredibly rare series issued in 1910, including such famous players as Ty Cobb, Cy Young, Honus Wagner, Christy Mathewson and Connie Mack.
"It's like finding the Mona Lisa in the attic," Kissner said. "We guess he stuck them in the attic and forgot about them. They remained there frozen in time."
Kissner's grandfather, Carl Hench, ran a meat market in the small town of Defiance before he died in the 1940s, and it is believed that he was probably given the 'E98 series' cards as part of a promotional push by a company who sold caramels.
The Honus Wagner card in perfect '10 out ot 10 conditionWhile most cards from the 'E98 series' that still survive are faded and tatty, Kissner's are pristine with bright colours and clean white borders. Expert memorabilia firm Professional Sports Authenticator rates cards on a scale of 1-10, with the previous highest rating for any E98 card being a seven. All of Hench's cards have been rated as eight or more, with one of them - an Honus Wagner - being rated a 10. That card is pictured to the right; other Honus Wagner cards of a similar vintage have been sold for as much as £1.9m each.
The quality of the surviving cards is all down to the fact that the collection lay forgotten for decades: after Hench's death his daughter Jean lived in the house until she died last October, leaving it to Kissner and his 19 other cousins who all spent months on and off sorting through what was bequeathed to them.
Kissner sent a selection of the cards to Peter Calderon, a baseball memorabilia expert at an auction house in Dallas, to check if they were valuable.
"My first words were, 'Oh my god'," said Calderon, who recently sold a baseball from the 1986 World Series for £300,000. "I was in complete awe. You just don't see them this nice."
Baseball memorabilia experts have been taken aback by the discovery, New York-based Barry Sloate saying, "this is probably the most interesting find I've heard of," and Joe Orlando, president of Professional Sports Authenticator, saying, "Every future find will ultimately be compared to this."
Almost all of the cousins have decided to sell their share of the cards, which will be dripped into the market over the next couple of years and are expected to fetch up to £2m.
"These cards need to be with those people who appreciate and enjoy them," Kissner said.