This is a 1960 Mickey Mantle APBA Game Card. APBA, which stands for American Professional Baseball Association. APBA dates back to the 1930s and a bunch of high-school buddies in Lancaster, PA. The boys played a baseball simulation game invented by one of them, Dick Seitz. His game was loosely based on an old tabletop baseball game called National Pastime. But unlike any previous board game, it combined the randomness of dice with the on-field performances of individual players. The game involving baseball statistics, and strategy was first created, and sold in 1951 by Dick Seitz. The original game offered 20 player cards for each of the 16 major league teams and two play charts. The whole shebang set you back $10. The 150 games sold encouraged Seitz that there was a market for his game so he produced new versions annually from 1952-56. That steady increase in sales encouraged Seitz to quit his job in 1957 to make APBA a career. APBA Games and Collector Software are still based in Lancaster, to this day. the APBA baseball game played today is not much different than the 1957 version.

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