1921 Koesters Bread Cards
 

Greetings, I was wondering if we have any experts on the 1921 Koesters Bread cards? They appear on front exactly like the E121 set but these are blank baked. Are there any identifying marks to look for to id these cards?
Look forward to a reply.

Certain players appear exclusively in the Koester set but for the most part they are blank backed E121 cards. Also the card stock is slightly thicker for these cards.

contact Rhett

As I understand it, there are 52 cards in the Koester D383 set, including the Giants and Yankees 1921 teams only. How difficult are these to obtain and what is the price range?

Not overly common but can be found. Problem is authentication as they are basically the same as W575-1 cards. There also supposedly a sheet of 40 players that predates the individual cards. Cards were a poster put out by the E h Koester bread company. I have 2 cards that were from one of these posters that have a thicker card stock which SGC will not authenticate as Koester Bread or W575. Also cards that are confirmed Koester Bread by PSA will not be confirmed by SGC as such and are called W575-1 by SGC. There are some Koester bread cards currently on eBay which are way overpriced so I would be careful if buying. There are a few players that appear only in Koester bread that are not in W575.

A lot of the cards are the same poses as the E121, but there are players-and coaches-who are in the Koester Bread who are not in the E121 set. These include:

Jesse Barnes
Joe Berry
Eddie Brown
Jesse Burkett
Bill Cunningham
Alex Ferguson
Chicken Hawks
Fred Hoffman
Johnny Mitchell
Charles O'Leary (some argument whether or not O'Leary is in the E121 set).
Bill Piercy
Braggo Roth
Casey Stengel (forgot. Thank You, Leon.)

The cards are not easy to come by and prices vary, but the hardest cards are Burkett and O'Leary. A lot of examples from the set are trimmed.




Here is a link to the checklist:

http://www.oldbaseball.com/MegaCheck...ries&year=1921

Stengel is only in D383 too, I believe.

http://luckeycards.com/pd383stengel.jpg

Sorry, couldn't resist a "perfect storm" typo:D

I knew I forgot someone :o.

There's a guy named Chicken Hawks! He's from my neck of the woods -Santa Clara University. I need to get a card of his.

Dave,

Do you mean this card? This is one of the Koester Bread cards that came from the sheet of 40 cards. SGC would not grade it as a W575 or Koester Bread because the card stock was thicker. My understanding is that PSA would grade this as a "Hand Cut" Koester. Would have preferred it to be in SGC slab so I used the Flip from SGC and an old case as i want the card to be displayed in my case.

Here you go:

I had a group of Koester Bread cards a few years ago. I listed them on eBay and my web site. A guy contacted me and told me where he had consigned the group that I bought and what other players he had. He also told me that his father had opened boxes of pepperment candy and the cards were inside. I do not remember the brand. If I recall right, he was in Canada.

a few more...
 

In an Old Cardboard article regarding the E121 entourage Rhett Yeakley noted:

"There are also some players who were included in this (Koester’s) set that have position variations that can aide in determining that they are Koester’s cards."
These include:

Ross Youngs as R. F. (not O. F.)
John McGraw (side view) as Mgr. (not Manager)
John Rawlings as 2nd B. (not 2.B. or Utl.)

For the Ross Youngs R.F. vs. O.F. difference, do the 1922 W575-1's also show O.F., consistent with E121???

SGC graded, what I thought was a 1921 Koester Bread Ross Youngs as a W575-1 instead of Koester Bread even though it has "R.F." on it. Should I resubmit?? Will they change their opinion of the card with this info?

Outf. would be the answer.

When I get home from church today (later) I will write a long winded reply regarding the set as a whole. The Ross young with R.F. is the version that was included with the Koester's Bread grouping. He was never produced with an "Outf." designation.

Glad Rhett will chime in with additional info. I like information-laden long winded replies from authors!

On a side note I looked up John Rawlings on eBay to see if I could see if he was shown in any current sale offers as 2nd B. or 2.B. and came up with this unusual auction...

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1921-E121-Am...item22fb7f0dc6

BMW is claiming that this is "the only known blank-backed E121 to be assigned a numerical grade by a legitimate TPG". Seems to me that this would be a common W575-1 due to the fact that any blank backed E121 would be a W card or a Koesters. I am not sure what SGC was thinking calling it a blank backed E121. Derek, maybe that is partly to explain why SGC doesnt know what your Youngs card is either.

My fault. Emil Meusel is also listed as "L.F." in the set:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/EXTREMELY-Ra...item5651716ed0

Can't wait. The longer the wind, the better.

I am going to try to be as concise as I can be, but this is a very complicated set to deal with.

The Sheet and the advertising from Koester's Bread feature 40 cards, however, I do believe the actual distribution of cards to be 52, as some not found on the sheet have been found in unmistakably period Koseter's accumulations.

A study of the E121 family of sets needs to be done with a "timeline" of production being kept in mind. Obviously, before the 1921 World Series between the two New York teams there were already New York players in both the E121 set and being distributed by anonymous companies as what we would call W575-1's (they chose not to stamp or print ads on the back of their cards). Those cards from early print runs are the ones that are difficult to pin-point being from another W575-1 source or from the Koester's distribution.

About the thickness of cardstock, if they are on very thick stock they should be hand-cut from the poster/sheet (whatever you want to call it). The regular cards distributed in the bread are on stiff stock but are very similar to the e121 Series of 80, in contrast the E121 Series of 120 (and later sets like Lou Gertenrich) are on a distinctly thinner card stock and are actually harder to find in nice shape, even though the series itself is far less popular than it's earlier Series of 80 cousin. Hold one of each card in each hand and you can tell the difference pretty easily.

About the Koester's Bread set... we know that they distributed the series of New York players as we have seen the album and the period advertisiments. That being said, we know that Gassler's Bread also made some of these new New York cards in their set (sadly no Burkett :) ), so there may or may not have been other companies that also distributed the New York cards with blank backs but no advertising has been found to support any other companies doing so, but as there were many different distributors over the years of the cards of this format (E121/D383/D350?etc, etc.) I bet the manufacturers of the cards would have entertained any other outfits wanting to distibute a "World Series" set as well. We know that The American Caramel Co. also got into it and distrubuted their own version of the "World Series" cards for insertion in it's E121 set in the versions we call "Type 2" and "Type 3" which were made at the same time as the Koester's, they just weren't as exhausive as the Koester's set, and instead of only producing the New York players the American Caramel Co. continued to print some of the cards that were from earlier printings along with the new New York players they were including in their product, that is why some other teams (non-New York) and players are found with the Type 2 and 3 backs. Anyways, below find a breakdown of the 52 cards known to be in the "Koester's set"...


The following players were "Only Produced" in the print run witht he Koester's cards, thus if you find these cards they are Koester's cards 100%...

Jesse Barnes
Howard Berry
"Ed." Brown
Jesse Burkett
"Bill" Cunningham
Alex Ferguson
"Chicken" Hawks
Fred Hoffmann
John Mitchell
Chas. O'Leary
William Piercy
Chas. Stengel

The following cards are exclusive to the Koester's Bread set, due to small changes ONLY FOUND in the Koester's set, thus if you find these cards they are Koester's cards 100%...

Lou DE Vormer (Upper case "E" in "DE" as part of his last name "DE VORMER)
John McGraw (Standing pose, Position is "Mgr." on front not "Manager")
Ross Young (Position on front is "R.F." not "O.F.")


The following cards were first part of the E121 Series of 80 Type 2 and 3, Gassler's Bread, as well as the Koester's set--but likely if you are finding them with blank back they are almost certainly Koester's as they were only produced in this fashion during the small print run of the Koester's/Type 2-3 Series of 80/Gassler's Bread print run...

Frank Baker (made in this run and dropped before E121 Series of 120 & later sets)
"Rip" Collins (made in this run and dropped before E121 Series of 120 & later sets)
"Phil" Douglas (P., but they removed the quotes from name in later runs)
William Fewster (Position as "Outf." only made with this print run)
Frank Frisch (Position as "3rd B." only made with this print run)
"Mike" Gonzalez (made in this run and dropped before E121 Series of 120 & later sets)
M. J. McNally (Position as "3rd B." only made with this print run)
Emil Meusel (Position as "L.F." only made with this print run)
R. Meusel (Position as "R.F." only made with this print run)
Elmer Miller (Position as "C.F." only made with this print run)
Roger Peckinpaugh-Correct Last name (made in this run and dropped before E121 Series of 120 & later sets)
Jack Quinn (made in this run and dropped before E121 Series of 120 & later sets)
John Rawlings (Position as "2nd B." only made with this print run)
Robert Roth (made in this run and dropped before E121 Series of 120 & later sets)
George Ruth-Throwing (made in this run and dropped before E121 Series of 120 & later sets)
"Bill" Ryan (made in this run and dropped before E121 Series of 120 & later sets)
"Slim" Sallee (End of throw-made in this run and dropped before E121 Series of 120 & later sets)
"Pat" Shea (P., but they removed the quotes from name in later runs)
Aaron Ward (Position as "2nd B." only made with this print run)

The following cards were first part of the E121 Series of 80 Type 2 and 3, Gassler's, as well as the Koester's set--if you are finding them with blank back they are probably Koester's as they were not produced with any of the early print runs, HOWEVER since all are Pitchers or Catchers their position did not change from the "P." and "C." from this print run into the later print runs as the manufacturer didn't change those designations in later runs like they did with the infield and outfield positions bu shortening all Outfielders to "O.F." and the infield positions from 1st B." for example to "1.B." Also, in theory any later print runs would be on the much thinner card stock.

Cecil Causey (P.)
Alexander Gaston (C.)
Harry Harper (P.)
Waite Hoyt (P.)
Miller Huggins (Mgr.)
Arthur Nehf (P.)
Tom Rogers (P.)
Robert Shawkey (P.)
Earl Smith (C.)
Frank Snyder (C.)

That leaves us with the following cards. These are the cards that originated in the earlier print runs of the E121/W575-1 sets and were then continued to be made with the Koester's set, these are the ones that may or may not be Koester's if you found them. *An interesting aspect is that the W575-1 cards with "Henry A Johnson" stamped backs were only made at the ame time as the earlier e121 Type 1 backs, thus in theory most of these should be found with the Henry Johnson back, which is mutually exclusive to the later print run W575-1/D383 Koester's bread cards above (the ones listed above should never befound with legit Henry Johnson backs)*

Dave Bancroft (Leaping)
Geo. J. Burns
Hugh Jennings
George Kelly
Carl Mays
Walter Pipp
Walter Schang
Fred Toney (Trees in background)

Hopefully this clarifies things a bit, but it may just produce more questions. :)

-Rhett

So Rhett, are the cards cut from the Koester's poster (very thick card stock hand cut) considered Koester bread or W575-1? SGC won't commit to calling it either for slabbing. What is your opinion?

I can't speak for SGC's reasoning on anything as I am not them.

The sheet cut cards from the advertisng sheets sometimes found are presumed to have been made for the Koester's Bread company, the cards found in the bread for distribution should have factory cut edges--this means there are actually two different "Koester's sets" if you want to think about them that way.

Curious
 

How is "Koester's" pronounced?

Believe it is pronounced Kester according to anything I have found.

Thanks Ken

Hi Rhett,
So if I am reading what you say correctly, for these 4 cards all labeled 1922 W575-1, all with blank backs, 3 should be labeled 1921 Koester Bread and one should be labeled 1922 W575-1 (grainy picture with O.F. designation). At one time the SGC 10 Miller with Square corners was labeled Koester by PSA and I sent it in for crossover and this is what I got.

Thanks from this collector
 

Thanks Rhett for laying it all out for us...the whole collecting community is better for all your efforts AND willingness to share.

Brian

It would seem to me that the upper right "W-575-1" is actually a W501-Type 2, as it has the rough cut top and bottom edges and is more grainy than the W-575-1 series. The only way to be sure, as the Type 2's dont have the G-4-22 designation, is the thickness/thinness of the stock. W-575-1's were on card stock and W-501's were paper thin stock for both Type 1 and 2. card stock vs. paper stock should be easy to determine during grading, but not sure how east it is to determine once it is slabbed. Perhaps none of these four cards are W-575-1's as labeled.

Mark is correct in regards to the designation of the card with the uneven top/bottom border. I referred to those cards in my article as W501 Type 2's as they share the same checklist with the W501 Type 1 set (the Type 2's are just missing the G-4-22 and card number at top). In the past I had referred to that set as W575-1B, however, as I was writing the Old Cardboard article and after some thought I feel the W501 Type 2 designation to be more accurate (and potentially less confusing--if that is even possible with these sets).

The other three cards are all from the Koester's Bread distribution. Since someone gave them their own ACC designation (D383) I would venture to say that none of those cards were accurately described on the flip, but then again I invented the W501 Type 2 designation so I can't really give SGC a hard time for not identifying that one accurately. :)

That is kind of what I always thought on their labeling. Thanks for all the info.
I did forget to mention that one of the W575-1 cards does have a RM Hayes store stamp on the back which was a book store from Hagerstown Maryland. I assume the stamp was placed on the card after the fact.

Thanks to all who participated in this thread, especially Rhett. This thread has now been added to our permanent Archive Center (look at the row of icons and it's the far right one) under D383.

Leon, thanks for providing a great place for the sharing of information! We need to try to convert some of the T206-ies to come to the dark side and start collecting the really interesting stuff! :D

More kudos
 

And thanks to Rhett I discovered that six cards I had identified as W575-1 are most likely D383 Koester Bread cards. This information was just not available before in such a comprehensive fashion, and was obviously the result of years of research on these sets. It sure is appreciated. Definitely archive material...and thanks Leon for considering it as such.

Brian

Great thread and thanks to Rhett and Leon. I have always found the black and white stuff to be interesting. Now we need SGC to get on board with the Koester Bread and W575-1 cards. I really love the way these cards look in the SGC holders but it is a little frustrating when the flips are mislabeled and SGC refuses to revisit the issue.

It was mentioned earlier that someone thought the cards came in peppermint candy.

Back in the 1980's an old man gave me some Koester cards.... (we didnt know they were Koesters cards at the time)
He told me he got them from a butterscotch candy company...KERRS candy.

He may have been wrong with his memory. This was in Baltimore ...Koesters bread was sold in Baltimore. Research was done and I couldn't find a link between Kerrs and baseball cards, but I find it interesting candy has been mentioned twice .

Maybe they were thinking of the american caramel issue?

Koester
 

Below is an example of the DE Vormer trimmed, Roth and Harper all on what is likely poster stock

Piercy
 

Anybody have a Koester Piercy??