Joe Drennan
Staff Writer

Some people believe in destiny ó their destiny to do something with their life ó their destiny to help ó or the destiny to pull a one of a kind card out of a pack of baseball cards.

Tony Kowalewski, a Forest Lake High School special education teacher, feels he met his destiny four weeks ago when his wife sent him out to run some errands on Sat., May 14. Kowalewski says he took some time to run an errand for himself since he was out and stopped by Shinders at Northtown to buy a box of baseball cards.

ìI asked the person working if it was better to go with the jumbo packs that have 45 cards in them or the regular packs that have 12 cards,î Kowalewski said. ìHe said the chances of pulling insert cards were better with the regular packs so thatís what I went with.î

Kowalewski, a sports card collector, started to reach for the box of 2005 Topps Series 2 baseball cards that was first on the shelf, but hesitated for a moment and was drawn to the box in the back of the shelf.

Anxious to start opening the packs of cards, Kowalewski rushed to his car and started opening them. When he picked up the fourth pack of the 24 packs in the box he noticed it was thicker than the others.

ìI knew I had something there,î Kowalewski said.

As he slowly separated the cards so he didnít damage the insert, Kowalewski saw he had something special. Kowalewski was holding in his hands a one of one signed Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Power Brokers card.

ìI just stared at it and started to cry,î Kowalewski said. ìIt meat so much to me because of what he fought for and my belief that everybody should be treated equally.î

The Power Brokers card series is a special insert series in the Topps Series 2 set that features the authentic signatures of some of the most famous people. The cards have a piece of paper that was signed by the person during their life time set into a baseball card. Some of the other people featured in the 51 card set include Colin Powell, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Ed Sullivan, Helen Keller, J.C. Penny, Jacqueline Kennedy, P.T. Barnum and Thomas Edison.

Each card is a one of a kind card with no other card like it in existence.

Kowalewski pulled his cell phone out and called his 14 year old son Josh to tell him about his card. When he got home Kowalewski said his wife wasnít too happy he spent $50 on a box of baseball cards, but Josh quickly intervened and explained the significance of the card.

ìI truly believe I was destined to have the card,î Kowalewski said.

History lesson

Kowalewski grew up in poverty in Milwaukee during the Civil Rights movement. He said that heíd walk past empty gun shell casings from race fights from the night before on his walk to school, but his step dad told him one important thing that he himself believed in early on in life.

ìYou take a person for whatís within them,î Kowalewskiís step dad told him.

In his resource history class, Kowalewski was talking about the Civil War and slavery when he pulled the card. This week before school gets out for the summer theyíll be talking about the Civil Rights Movement and Kowalewski says heíll certainly use the card as a key to the past.

The timing of Kowalewski pulling the card seemed to coincide with what heís been talking about of late. He said a week before pulling the card he was picking his son up from his friend Drewís house when he started talking to Drewís dad, and African-American.

Kowalewski said that Drewís dad told him how his grandfather had just gotten out of prison in Mississippi for the murder of a Ku Klux Klan member who burned his house down.

ìWe were talking about how it is a shame that we have people after all these years that have to go through racial tensions,î Kowalewski said.

Signature rarity

After pulling the card out of the pack Kowalewski did some research on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. signatures. What he found was that he rarely signed his middle name Luther like he did on the piece of paper in the card.

Another thing Kowalewski discovered was that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. often times used a fountain pen to sign his name, resulting in a run each time he pressed down. The signature on the card was made with a ballpoint pen so all the lines are crisp.

What to do with the card

Pulling a one of a kind card out of a pack of baseball cards is next to impossible. Kowalewski pointed out that the odds are one in 100,000 packs. With 24 packs in a box, 10 boxes to a case, a person could feasibly go through over 200 cases and not come up with a Power Brokers card.

Rich Klein of Beckett, the industryís leader in pricing sports cards, said they havenít given the card a price because with a one of one card like this they really donít know itís value.

ìThis is the first Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. autographed trading card created and itís truly the buyer and the seller who will determine the value,î Klein said. ìItís a once in a lifetime pull for him (Kowalewski) and depending on the financial situation he may want to hold on to the card. There is a certain joy of knowing youíve got something unique, thatís why people collect trading cards ‚ó theyíre something fun to own.î

With such a rare piece of history in his possession, Kowalewski wasnít sure what to do with it.

Kowalewski placed the card on ebay for auction with a $5500 reserve. The card got 22 bids, but the highest bid was for $2561.11. The posting also got over 1700 hits.

ìI was reluctant to put it on ebay at first, but I thought I could make some money and donate it to the diversity program at the high school,î Kowalewski said.

One person saw the listing and contacted Kowalewski. The person told him that they grew up in the Memphis area during the Civil Rights movement and told Kowalewski that they wanted to purchase it so they could place it in the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. museum.

ìIím going to contact the bidder because thatís where Iíd want the card to go,î Kowalewski said. ìI donít want the card to keep changing hands.

Kowalewski mentioned heís also going to contact the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. museum himself and look into the possibility of him keeping the card and loaning it to the museum for display.

ìI just think for some reason itís telling me itís not valuable in terms of money because it is such a keepsake that should remind people of what occurred in the past and that his life is not forgotten,î Kowalewski said. ìHe did so much not just for African-Americans, but for all citizens of the United States.î

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