Welcome to the third annual Brain Power Awards where we present honors every April to those who have done the most impressive Wacky Packages research in the previous year. Feel free to visit the open bar.
 
In sharp contrast to 2001, 2002 was a glorious year for Wacky Pack research, and for Wacky Packages in general. No small part of the drama was due to the Topps Vault auctions, which started in April 2002. There were many discoveries which will never earn a Brain Power Award because they were immediately apparent from the Topps auctions, for example the existence of a 4th sheet without Bum, Choke, Mess Clairoil, or Windhex, which had been long speculated about. But even without Topps Vault, it was an active year, in fact none of the winning discoveries were related to a Vault item.
 
There are always two Brain Power categories, the first is the discovery that took the most raw brain power, but not necessarily the discovery which was most important or relevant, we are just looking for sheer impressiveness in terms of how difficult it was to discover, with attention to the circumstances by which the discovery was made. There were 15 viable entries in this category, with top nominations being: Other notables were:
  • Patrick Zimmerman/Dave Schmidt/Char Boy: The continuity of copyright typos in sheet position across series.
  • Phil Carpenter: Ray Hammond written on the side of Hungry Jerk series 3 (it is so faint it is barely discernable).
  • Francis Khoury: Little black duck missing on the 1977 Koduck sticker (would have been more impressive if it had been the first 77 modification noticed).
  • Francis Khoury: Copyright typo on the two asterisk version of the 1977 Hostage ("1NC" instead of "INC" - this is so subtle!)
  • Patrick Zimmerman: Boozo line art not used on 7th checklist. (that's some seriously close attention to checklist line art!)
  • Patrick Zimmerman: the cram maggie die-cut was used on the double wacky (had he figured out why he might have been a top contender)
  • Dave Schmidt: all wonder bread wackys have one asterisk (how did this avoid detection until 2002? somebody must have noticed this before)
  • Grisham: box top of Sneer on original has "SNEER" painted on it, sticker does not. (had he figured out why he might have been a top contender) As expected in such an important year there was a certain amount of strife and division among the judges. But in the end Jeff's Ultra Blight 1977 variation discovery won out, the argument being that Dave admitted to being bummed about receiving miscut wonder breads, before he realized what he could do with them. Had he preconceived his scheme and hunted down miscuts he would have definitely been first contender. But most of us could look at the 1977 Ultra Blight a thousand times and not notice the anomaly. Who pays that much attention to Ultra Blight anyway? So in terms of sheer Wacky Pack brain power, Jeff Weiss has earned the 2002 Brain Power for this category.
     
    The second category is the discovery which was most relevant to the greatest number of collectors, regardless of how difficult it may have been to discover. Again there were multiple nominations by various collectors, however the two stars of category one are undeniably front runners again for category two. The top nominations are: Once again the committee was divided among the same two discoveries as in the first category, each of which not only involved superior brain power, but both of which are highly relevant. In this case however the split was not so difficult to resolve, the argument in Dave Schmidt's favor being the much greater availability of Wonder Bread stickers, and the much greater number of people who collect them. So in the end Dave Schmidt has taken this category, his second Brain Power award in a row, which is almost as difficult as consecutive wins at Augusta. Congratulations to Jeff and Dave on his second, a bottle of expensive champagne is in order. 
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    The committee thanks you for your interest. See you next year, and keep those gears turning because 2003 looks like another very interesting year.
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