Need help with T205 authentication

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Posted By: Phil

Hello everyone,

I've lurked quite a few times, reading some of the interesting posts and learning something everytime I was here. But now I have a question and I hope I can get some advice.

At work (large company) I have someone who is liquidating his collection piece by piece over our public announcement boards. He has a 1911 T-205 Mathewson that he is bringing in for me to examine on Thursday. It has a Piedmont back and is not graded obviously. The starting price he listed seemed well below fair value. Apparently the card has a/some creases (the worst kind of defect), but the scan I saw looked much better than the various 1's and 2's I researched (the border was in much better shape with less gold chips and he said the color is very good).

I know there have been reprints of this card over the years. I was hoping someone could give me some advice as to what I should be looking for when I examine this card. This person works at my company and does not seem so far to be the unscrupulous type. However, I am sure it is possible that he came about the card and does not know its authenticity. His other collectibles are not PreWWII cards, so this probably is not his collecting forte.

Obviously, the scan might not be showing all the flaws. If anyone could give me some advice as to how to examine this card, I would truly appreciate your advice and help. I do not have the scan on me now at home, but I can post it tomorrow after I get in at work.

Nice to finally post here and I look forward to talking to you in the future.
Thanks
Phil

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Posted By: Steve f

Ask if you can post a scan here before purchasing.

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Posted By: Phil

I was able to get to the public announcements through my web email. All I did is click "save as" from the posting and uploaded it here.

Please let me know if this helps or doesn't work. I do not know if the picture quality is enough for you to tell anything.

Thanks again for the help.

Phil

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Posted By: Russ Bright

if you have access to an ACTUAL T205 - look at the gold on the borders - it's real gold dust, none of the reprints I have ever seen do a good job of replicating that - even the lesser condition cards I have still show a difference in shine/shimmer - moreso than the newer reprints that look green/dull - even if it's a beauty with sharp corners, if it's creased you won'tn'e get more than an SGC30 for it and probably less - i have a couple cards that were screamers with hairlines or barely noticable creases (could have passed as EX to naked eye) that ended up grading good or Poor because of the creases - they're a condition killer - take care to look for paperloss as well -

anything under 200 dollars for this card in described condition (creasing, no paperloss) is a good deal

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Posted By: Russ Bright

and from that scan i would run screaming... lol... looks like it was done on an ancient scanner and viewed with a VGA monitor - i hope it looks better in person - but if the print dots are that big in real life...

R

p.s.

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Posted By: Paul S

I'm looking at my own T205's right now. In person the marks on the gold border should be more like chipping, rather than just "worn". And I have to agree with Russ about the scan quality.

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Posted By: Phil

I have emailed the seller asking to see if he can email me attachment pics of the front and back. I can say that the scan is nothing like the picture on the email. I clicked save as from the original and that saved as a BMP. But to upload it, I had to open it and resave it as a GIF file.

Is there a better way for me to do this? The scan you see (and I do on the forum) is bad compared to what I saw. I am just trying to get the most accurate pic possible.

Again, thanks everyone!

Phil