T51 Murad questions
 

I have a few T51 Murad questions.

1. Does anyone know when the first series was issued? I’ve seen 1909 and 1910 mentioned, but with no cites. This seems very important, because the Rochester hockey card appears to be the first hockey card depicting a specific team in that sport. That’s particularly true if the set came out in 1909, because the C56’s came out sometime in 1910.
   
2. Is there any evidence that the pictures are of actual people on the team? I assume the answer is no.
   
3. This post (https://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?p=1925693) says that “there seems to be a general consensus that the [number on front] variations pre-dated the non-numbered issues.” Is that right? As this post (https://prewarcards.com/2016/12/27/1...and-checklist/) notes, the original set has 225 cards--6 series of 25 each, 2 second editions of the first 2 series, and 25 cards from the first series with the number printed on the front. I would have thought that the first series pre-dated the non-numbered issues.

Thanks in advance. It seems as though, at least for Williams and Rochester, these cards should be selling at orders of magnitude more than they are now.