Football card numbers
While Post was assigning football card numbers to box panels, it appears they were trying to follow three rules:
1) Don't put more than one player from a team on the same panel
2) Don't put the same player on the same cereal brand
3) Offer each player on at least two separate cereal products
They were successful in following the first rule, but broke the others more than once.
The baseball promotion featured 20 different teams; football only needed to cover 14. Baseball cards were numbered using 17 cereal products in the numbers to panel assignment scheme. The plan for numbering football cards was based on 19 cereal products. Both sets were 200 cards. As covered on the Posting Numbers page, the baseball promotion assigned cards to panels via a next player on each team matched with a cereal product methodology. The football promotion used the same sort of cereal product correlation, but rather than assign all of the cards from one product before moving to the next, Post simply moved to the next cereal product and card number. There were things to deal with along the way as it wasn't a perfect system, especially in light of the three rules above and the fact that they reduced the number of cards on Oat Flakes and Rice Krinkles 10 oz. boxes by one and also reduced the number of cards on the backs of 14 oz. Raisin Bran from six to five, while increasing the number of those RB14 back panels from three to four. This last move had the effect of increasing the number of RB14 cards from 18 to 20. The kicker was that Post evidently either didn't realize that they planned to make these changes or forgot they had already made them for the baseball card promotion. It is possible the card numbers for both the baseball and football sets were determined at close to the same time.
For the 200 card football promotion, Post assigned card numbers to each player based (somewhat loosely at times) on the teams' 1961 order of finish (record) and alphabetically by the player's last name. Since Green Bay won the 1961 NFL championship, they were the lowest numbered team in the 1962 Post football card set. Alphabetically, Dan Currie was first of the 15 Packers' players chosen for inclusion in the set. Since there were 14 teams and 200 cards, Post decided to use 15 players for the first eight teams and either 13 or 14 for the remaining six. The following table shows the 1962 Post football promotion team order and number of cards for each.
| Team | 1961 Record | Number of Cards | Card Number Range |
|---|---|---|---|
| Green Bay Packers | 11-3 | 15 | 1-15 |
| New York Giants | 10-3-1 | 15 | 16-30 |
| Philadelphia Eagles | 10-4 | 15 | 31-45 |
| Detroit Lions | 8-5-1 | 15 | 46-60 |
| Cleveland Browns | 8-5-1 | 15 | 61-75 |
| Baltimore Colts | 8-6 | 15 | 76-90 |
| San Francisco 49ers | 7-6-1 | 15 | 91-105 |
| Chicago Bears | 8-6 | 15 | 106-120 |
| Pittsburgh Steelers | 6-8 | 13 | 121-133 |
| Dallas Cowboys | 4-9-1 | 13 | 134-146 |
| St. Louis Cardinals | 7-7 | 13 | 147-159 |
| Los Angeles Rams | 4-10 | 14 | 160-173 |
| Minnesota Vikings | 3-11 | 14 | 174-187 |
| Washington Redskins | 1-12-1 | 13 | 188-200 |
The order for the cereal products used for the football promotion was the same as for the baseball promotion except that instead of starting with the smallest box, the largest size of each
brand was used first. This changed with the last cereal brand, Grape Nuts, when the 11 oz. box was used before the 16 oz. box. The order was:
| Order | Product | Number of Panels | Cards per Panel | Total Cards |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Post Toasties 18 oz. | 2 | 7 | 14 |
| 2 | Post Toasties 12 oz. | 4 | 7 | 28 |
| 3 | Post Toasties 8 oz. | 3 | 5 | 15 |
| 4 | Bran Flakes 16 oz. | 4 | 7 | 28 |
| 5 | Bran Flakes 11 oz. | 4 | 6 | 24 |
| 6 | Grape Nuts Flakes 16 oz. | 4 | 7 | 28 |
| 7 | Grape Nuts Flakes 12 oz. | 6 | 6 | 36 |
| 8 | Raisin Bran 14 oz. | 4 | 5 | 20 |
| 9 | Raisin Bran 10 oz. | 4 | 4 | 16 |
| 10 | Post Tens | 7 | 3 | 21 |
| 11 | Alpha-Bits 13 oz. | 4 | 7 | 28 |
| 12 | Alpha-Bits 8 oz. | 4 | 6 | 24 |
| 13 | Sugar Crisp 14 oz. | 3 | 7 | 21 |
| 14 | Sugar Crisp 9 oz. | 3 | 6 | 18 |
| 15 | Sugar Coated Corn Flakes 10 oz. | 4 | 7 | 28 |
| 16 | Rice Krinkles 10 oz. | 6 | 4 | 24 |
| 17 | Oat Flakes 10 oz. | 4 | 5 | 20 |
| 18 | Grape Nuts 11 oz. | 2 | 2 | 4 |
| 19 | Grape Nuts 16 oz. | 3 | 3 | 9 |
Following Post's scheme, #1 was assigned to Dan Currie on Post Toasties 18 oz., #2 to Boyd Dowler on Post Toasties 12 oz., #3 Bill Forester on Post Toasties 8 oz. and so on through #19 Roosevelt Grier
on Grape Nuts 16 oz. Sam Huff at #20, started over on the product list on a Post Toasties 18 oz. back panel.
This was the basic process Post used to assign numbers to the cards. Because there were 19 products and a maximum of 15 players on any one team, this guaranteed that two players from the same team would not be on the same panel. Well, that was true until the backs of boxes began to fill up and some of the products were no longer used in the ordering scheme. At a certain point in the ordering process there was realization that Raisin Bran 14 oz. panels were going to hold five cards instead of six. Oat Flakes 10 oz. boxes got reduced to five also, but apparently not until after the ordering was complete. Rice Krinkles got an expanded header design sometime after the close of the process, dropping their backs from five cards down to four. And there were plenty of other things to fix on the fly, too. But it all got done. You can find out how on the next page.
One more note before showing the chart and explaining the whole order process—Post produced duplicate panels of both sizes of Alpha-Bits on Crispy Critters boxes of the same sizes, duplicates of Grape Nuts Flakes 12 oz. panels on Top 3 10 oz. boxes and tested a new "Flip-Out Spout" box duplicating all four of the 12 oz. Post Toasties regular top flap box panels. These box panels used the same numbers as their corresponding duplicates. So when you see Alpha-Bits listed on the assignment chart, Crispy Critters have the same numbers. The same goes for Top 3 and the "Flip-Out Spout" Post Toasties.
