Old Judge vs T206 from a small collector's eyes
 

I'm a small collector unlike most of the good folks on this board but I do have a healthy love of Pre-War baseball cards. My main collection (41 cards) is T206 because I love the history and they are affordable enough in low grade which to a single dad with a mortgage and tons of bills means a lot. I love to read the history of T206 and watch rare cards sell online and like everyone else I dream of finding a Wagner in a shoe box at an estate sale :)

N172 Old Judge and T205 are the other sets which catch my attention and cause me to do a lot of reading. I tried '33 Goudey and even bought six of them but for some reason that set really does nothing for me at all, I don't like the shape of the cards and the images themselves leave a lot to be desired in my opinion. T205 appears to be a set which sells for a bit more than T206 but it is smaller and still fairly priced so I can see in the future if I see some of the cards up for sale picking up some of them also and slowly working a bit on that set but OJ are another matter from what I have seen with even the common cards in very poor condition (skinned, faded etc) selling for upwards of a hundred bucks which I suppose makes sense based on their age and likelihood that most of them did not survive but it is still more than I can justify paying for a well worn example of a card. T206 was either produced in much larger numbers than OJ or the people of their era were better at preserving things. If an OJ in raw condition and poor shape sold for $20-$30 bucks I would likely have a dozen of them now but no matter how much I watch ebay hope for a bargain it never comes to pass. I bid on one this week at $40 and it eventually ended for 79 and I assume that will most likely always be the case so what I need to do is just concentrate on the White Borders and be happy with that and keep the OJ pipe dreams out of my OCD or just tell myself I can buy ONE OJ card as an example of the set and be done.

Sorry to have bored the board with my ranting/venting, I just had to blurt all that out to a group of people who could possibly understand my obsession and were I am coming from. My real life friends would think the whole notion is nuts :)

OJ's are like potato chips. You You can't just have 1:)

I think you are doing well. Stay focused on what you like maybe T206 and an occasional T205. If you get bored with that, you can always sell or trade and switch to something else like a subset of OJ cards. You are collecting what you like right now which is awesome. Just remember it is a marathon not a sprint, so don't get discouraged.

Good Luck

Well THANKS to a forum member I have bought my first OJ :)
Pasted to an old scrapbook page and no idea who the player is (looks like the bottom is trimmed) but an Old Judge none the less. I'm satisfied now. ...or at least when the mail runs.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-f-a.akamaihd.n...8e1976a0f2a7ca

George Myers, catcher for Indianapolis

Cool; congrats!
 

Glad I could help, and glad someone could identify him for you.

That is the beauty of this forum. A fellow can complain and tell his woes and someone will usually help him out :) Thank you for pointing it out to me and thank you to z28d for the ID I'm 100% less frustrated now lol

How does one tell which particular year Old Judge cards were produced? Is there a difference in markings between a card made in 1887 and one from 1889? The one I bought has Old Judge in the top left corner but I have seen other cards without it and some where it is curved and in the middle. Does this just vary by card or is it an indicator of when it was made?

Your card, and any others with the "Old Judge Cigarettes" banner within the photo area (be it hot dog style or within a box) date to 1887 with exception of some of the Script cards which began production in 1886. There is a way to date each and every year and it has to do with the card design, not the copyright date that is often found on them. Your card is what is referred to as an 1887, Type B, zero Numbered card. If your card wasn't trimmed at bottom you would see the number "0358". This pose would be used on both Type A & B cards in 1887. It can also be found as a Gypsy Queen and lastly re-issued in 1888 as a type Fb.

If you take interest in the set, the Old Judge book (The Photographic Baseball Cards of Goodwin & Co.) can be very helpful. Congrats on your first OJ.

Thanks Much :) I have been eyeballing that book but Im so wrapped up in the T206 set right now I can't afford to actually collect OJ but I am fascinated by them anyway and thrilled to have finally found one as an example for my collection. The pricing seems to suggest that a common OJ is many times more rare than a common T206. Would this be correct? Has anyone made any Educated Guesses as to how many cards of each common pose still exist?

Let's put it this way. Good luck finding an OJ that's more common than the T206 Honus Wagner.