How rare are ROSE Postcards
 

I saved up my savings and sold my truck, I built up a little bankroll and than went hunting for some Rose's.
I can't find any , in any conditions?
How rare are these post cards............





https://www.flickr.com/photos/151843924@N04/albums

I had 7 in my last pre war auction most had less than 10 known examples

PC760 Rose Co. postcards are much rarer than most collectors realize. Finding a type card is easy due to the large number of subjects in the set, but the search for a specific player could take a lifetime.

The Rose Co. produced postcards of 192 different players in the summer of 1908 - exactly 12 subjects for each of the 16 Major League teams. Generally, each team was represented with a player at each position along with four starting pitchers. There are a few variations and several players were added, but the "main" set consists of these 192 cards. All of the major stars from 1908 are included - Cobb, Wagner, Johnson, Mathewson, Young, Lajoie, Plank, etc.

Not to confuse the issue, but they also produced a 14 card set of the Minor League Scranton team, which included Moonlight Graham.

I follow the populations pretty closely (both graded and raw) and my last tally accounted for about 500 total examples of these 192 cards. The individual populations vary quite a bit. Many of the postcards have only a single surviving example. Most of the cards are in the 1-4 range.

Wagner is the most plentiful card. The combined SGC and PSA pop reports show 14 total examples, but I think that there are several duplicates in that number. There are about 10 Mathewsons known. The next easiest cards are Cobb, Lajoie and Chance, all with about 7 known examples. Huggins and Wallace are the scarcest HOFers. I only know of 1 example of each.

Since the collector could pick which player he wanted to purchase. it would make sense that the stars of the days were generally chosen more often than the lesser known players. There are obviously outliers, like Cy Young who is very rare, but, for the most part, it is the obscure players of the time who are extremely rare.

Here is one of my favorite cards, the Major League rookie of Walter Johnson. I believe that there ar 3 or 4 known examples.

That is great info Kevin thanks for sharing.

Love the RPC's, some of the most beautiful cards ever produced, and every card needs a thread...
_

Kevin is the authority on Rose Co and I have little to add other than finding a Rose Co PC (any PC) is not hard - they are certainly around and Rose Co PCs come up for sale often. However, finding a specific Rose Co PC can be near impossible. As mentioned, Wagner is the most populous and there are only 14 examples on a the combined pop report and some are cross-overs (although I a sure there are some ungraded out there as well).

I love the Rose Co PCs. First, they are gorgeous. Second, they have many of the same Horner pics as the more classic T206, E90-1 and/or CJ cards. Third, the set has so many HOFers - I am not sure any set has more. Fourth, it has a Moonlight Graham, which is perhaps my favorite card. Here are my Rose Co's

They'll become more scarce when other collectors get the bug to collect'em. Mo scarce = mo $$$

There is one Lou Criger on the SGC pop report but I have never seen an image of the card. It must be quite rare if not even an image of the card can be found online! Joe


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Here is Criger. It is the only known example as far as I know.

It is postmarked from Oregon of all places.

Here is my 1 and only Contribution to these PC's

Ask and ye shall receive! What an awesome card and thanks for sharing. Joe

One of the small group I have...

On a semi-related note, and perhaps Kevin will have a better idea, What is the ratio of postally used versus never posted?? 1 in 10, 1 in 20?

Great postcard Scott. Keeler is definitely one of the toughies in the set. For some reason, NY AL players are generally very difficult subjects.

My guess is that around 10% of Rose postcards have been postally used. Maybe a little more.

Eye-popping!

Tough to follow these guys...but since no one has mentioned ad backs yet, here is mine.

The add backs are awesome. Hi Mac, how goes?

+1 agreed really nice ad back

Gratifying to see three cards that have passed through my hands pop up in the thread

looking forward to tomorrow, when you will mention for the third time you sold some rose postcards. maybe just sit this one out and let the knowledgeable people continue to share relevant information.

My 3 NY Highlanders...Stahl is unused. Glade is used. Hemphill is just scribbled on by a kid!

Two more examples
 

Here are my two examples. Eddie Grant and a blank Rose PC.

Kevin, do you have any info on blank Rose PCs such as this one?

If you build it... Nice cards Ryan. I had no idea Moonlight Graham had any cards. That is really cool.

Chad

Yes, those were made for customers to make their own do-it-yourself postcard. They consist of two parts - the front part with a round cutout area with a white border that would frame a photo that you put in from the behind along with a back flap that would be glued down to secure the photo. Here is an example that the Springfield Ponies of the Connecticut State League did for their team. Others exist where customers would insert a generic image of themselves, friends, family members, etc.

Fantastic cards. One of my white whales is the Chase Rose, only have seen one example and its owned by a board member.

Thanks Kevin,

Makes sense. I thought I had heard/read a similar explanation for the blank Rose postcards in the past but have never seen an example of a DIY card filled in like that.

Thanks for sharing it!

Scott

A generic one..

https://luckeycards.com/ppc760rosegenericbaseball.jpg

Pretty leon

52 Rose Co. Postcards!
 

Back in1979, I walked into a coin store here in Traverse City. They had just picked up a big batch of old baseball postcards and pins. They wanted $400 for everything. We really didn’t have the money, but my supportive wife urged me to go for it. Among the postcards were 52 Rose Co. postcards, with only 2 doubles. I sold them to Frank Keetz of New York, who is a postcard expert from New York. We were both pleased with the deal.

cotton
 

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wow, statistically that would almost have to be the biggest single find.

Luckily, I made a checklist of all 52 Rose Co. postcards. When I saw on this thread how few of the Rose postcards had benn accounted for, I figured my “find” - 43 years ago, had to be one of the biggest.

Here is Chase. This is one of two examples that I am aware of.

Thanks Kevin, that one is def different than the other one I have seen.

NOT MY CARD :(

https://i.imgur.com/tyJNTay.png

Yes, that is the other one that I am aware of. Very nice example.

My only one…George Stone.

That's freakin' stunning Paul

NYA ROSE PC"s
 

I wish someone would sell one of their NYA's to me !!!

Taylor
 

Do anyone have Dummy Taylor in rose pc?

Here you go.

I am aware of 2 known Dummy Taylors.

These have to be some of the coolest postcards ever. Can’t believe that there are over 200 different players. Seems like all of the stars from 1908 are present as well.

Ditto. Still hunting that one, myself. And we know who has one...... lol [emoji6]

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Love these. Great thread.

Agreed Great Thread and these are Great Looking Postcard

Speaking of Rose Co, the same Mathewson that “sold” in the January Heritage auction is previewed to be in their May auction (again). I am always puzzled when you see that, makes you wonder what happened there- did dude not pay or did he decide just to immediately consign? The May write up makes no mention of it being in the January auction.

possible that Heritage won it with their artificial bid preceding the reserve. (basically didn't meet reserve)

As others have mentioned, finding one is not hard, but finding a specific one is quite difficult. I was only looking for one player (Sullivan) and ended up probably overpaying by a fair amount to get it at auction. Another board member actually contacted me afterwards and basically asked why I bid as high as I did, but when there are only three or four of them out there, you can't always wait around for a fair deal. And, of course, somebody was bidding against me, so apparently someone else was also willing to pay more than what was, at the time, the generally understood market value for it.

Chesbro Rose
 

I had to trade another Rose and some money for this one.........

Awesome pick up Gary, congrats!

Great PC Gary! Congrats

Congratulations on the pickup Gary. I am not sure if I have ever seen a Chesbro before.