The 1987 Smokey the Bear baseball card set was issued by the U.S. Forest Service as part of their long-running public service campaign featuring Smokey Bear to promote wildfire prevention. The 36-card set featured artwork of Smokey interacting with Major League Baseball players and stands as one of the more unique sports card releases ever produced due to its educational purpose rather than commercial aims.
While Smokey had been featured on some baseball cards in the past printed by the Forest Service, the 1987 set was the most extensive portrayal of Smokey meeting baseball stars. Each card depicted Smokey engaged in some fire prevention activity with a MLB all-star such as dousing a campfire with Nolan Ryan or teaching fire escape routes in the woods to Mike Schmidt. Along with the cartoon illustrations were brief biographies of the players and messages about being fire wise in the great outdoors.
The idea for a larger Smokey Bear baseball card set came from the Forest Service’s head of public affairs Bob Whiteley in 1986. Having been in charge of the Smokey campaign for many years, Whiteley thought featuring America’s favorite sport alongside its favorite conservation mascot could be an effective way to reach a wide audience, especially young families. Previous PSA efforts primarily used posters, bumper stickers, and public service announcements on TV and radio.
Whiteley reached out to the MLB Players Association to get permission to put active players on the cards. Though they did not technically endorse product, the union understood this was for an important cause and allowed images and names to be used. From there, Whiteley worked with freelance illustrator Jeff Jones to come up with concepts pairing Smokey with a diverse selection of 36 stars from across MLB.
The cardsstock was standard size similar to a modern baseball card but printed on thinner paper since they were meant to be distributed freely rather than collected. On the front was Jones’ full-color illustration while the back featured a fire prevention message and the player stats. No rarity, serial numbers or monetary values were included since they had no commercial purpose.
An initial run of 5 million cards was printed in early 1987 by the Government Printing Office with plans to send them to schools, rec centers, parks and anywhere else kids and families congregated across America. Volunteers from the Forest Service, scout groups and wildfire agencies helped distribute the cards that summer free of charge. Additional print runs were done in subsequent years to replenish supply.
Some of the more notable pairings on the 1987 Smokey Bear baseball cards included Lou Brock giving Smokey base-running tips in the woods, Fernando Valenzuela putting out a campfire with his signature screwball, Rich Gossage demonstrating how to use a fire extinguisher in a meadow, and Rickey Henderson showing Smokey the importance of an escape route behind home plate. A few female sports stars also made the cut such as track star Marion Jones assisting Smokey with a fire drill in the Olympics.
While not truly collectible in the hobby sense, the 1987 Smokey Bear baseball cards achieved immense popularity as an educational novelty item finding their way into an estimated 20 million American homes. They served as an accessible primer for kids on basic fire safety in woods and helped raise further awareness of Smokey’s message. Surveys by the Forest Service in subsequent years directly attributed a double-digit percentage decrease in playground fires to campaigns like the baseball card set.
Among card collecting communities, the 1987 Smokey Bear set also garnered cult status as one of the rare officially licensed sports issues not meant for resale. Though lacking traditional desirability markers, surviving high-grade examples with crisp illustrations fetch premium prices today when offered to museums or theme collectors. The unique hybrid of baseball icons and forest conservation messaging ensures the 1987 Smokey Bear baseball cards will remain a noteworthy and endearing relic from the golden age of card collecting mania in America.
In the years since, the Forest Service has issued additional specialty Smokey Bear cards tied to the Olympics, NASCAR, and other sporting properties but none on the massive scale of the seminal 1987 baseball edition. Its charming marriage of America’s pastimes with a meaningful PSA for responsible recreation in the wilderness continues to be remembered fondly by those who received the cards as children. Though their commercial value remains negligible, the 1987 Smokey Bear baseball cards live on as a small yet significant artifact of promoting wildfire awareness to a captivated audience.
