By CLAYTON PARK

Brown's Cooperstown recently opened for business in Upper Fremont. Owner Pete Brown touts his shop as both a sports card shop AND a museum of sports artifacts and a library for sports collectibles reference guides.

The new store, which is located at 4258 Fremont Ave. N., is Brown's second, although he says he hasn't decided yet if he will continue to operate his first store, located in Moscow, Idaho, now that he has made Seattle his home.

Brown, 57, is a former college admissions administrator who decided it was time to make a midlife career change. Opening a sports card shop seemed an ideal way to "combine my fascination with small business with something that's been a hobby of mine since childhood," he said.

Brown still has the original set of baseball cards he began collecting at the age of 10. "It was 1951 and for a half year I lived in Philadelpia," Brown recalls. "My grandfather took me to a Phillies (baseball) game. All the kids in my school collected baseball cards, so I decided to do so as well ... My childhood hero was Granville "Granny" Hamner, a shortstop for the Phillies."

Today, that card would be worth $25 in mint condition, which Brown admits his isn't. "I played with my cards (as a kid) so it's pretty dog-earred and probably worth only 10 percent of its mint condition value. But that's not important to me: I've kept it all these years for sentimental reasons," he said.

Over the years, Brown has managed to get his hands on a number of sports cards that have become quite monetarily valuable as well. As a kid he once found a Joe DiMaggio card from 1948 in a drawer. He ended up selling it in the '80s for $150, but said that card would be worth as much as $2,200 in mint condition.

Cards that Brown has on display at his Fremont shop include a rare collection of Seattle Rainiers baseball cards from the 1910s-1930s, a rookie card for basketball legend Julius ("Dr. J") Erving from the 1972-73 season (value: $225), a basketball card from the 1980-81 season that depicts Dr. J along with two rookies from that year: Magic Johnson and Larry Bird (value: $375). Brown also has a 1989 rookie card of Seattle Mariner superstar Ken Griffey Jr. (value: $90).

Brown said he chose to locate his shop in Fremont because "I like the original nature of the area. People are free to be themselves and not afraid to be different."