E94 Overprint Research
 

Having recently started collecting E94 in earnest, and with a few new fresh to hobby examples sold into the market, I became very interested in the overprint backstamps. I read through the old Net54 threads and tried to educate myself. Conventional wisdom seemed to suggest that of the 10 overprints, Blome’s was the toughest and the other 9 were roughly similar in difficulty (very difficult!). I also came across an old thread that attempted to list out all the overprints that were known. I decided to refresh that list, data mine the Internet and auction sites for whatever was out there, and I also asked a few hobby friends what they had. Below is my current list of 63 confirmed overprints. The 63 cover 25 total cards, so it's really close a complete set of 30. If there are others, I would love to add to the list.

So far, the data is showing something rather interesting. Below is the overprint breakdown by back. Not surprisingly, Blome’s is the most common with 18/63 (28.5%). I was, however, surprised to see 15 Your Out stamps (24%)—making it seem like Your Out is more like Blome’s, than the other 8. The other 8 seem to have many many fewer examples and appear more clumped together in relative scarcity. The addition of one or two cards could change the “other 8” power rankings dramatically, so it's hard to put a lot of stock into a pop 2 being that much tougher than a pop 4.

Blome's - 18
Your Out - 15

A Base Hit - 6
Home Run - 4
Oh You Fan - 3
Oppie Dildock - 3
Pennant Winners - 4
Three Strikes - 4
Your Safe Close - 2
Your Safe Cuckoo - 4

Total - 63

Finally, a word on grading. Inconsistent. As you can see, there are numerous examples of both PSA and SGC high grades, where they presume the overprint is part of the card and not an added stamp (especially on the older holders). And, more recently, SGC is giving 1.5/2s (all the new to hobby examples I referenced above were 1.5 or 2 but with very sharp 3-5 appearance otherwise) perhaps considering the overprint as a stamp. My own contributions are Chance and Lord, because every thread needs pictures.

-Jay

Hi Jay
Nice research. They are super fun to collect though I don't have any right now. I might tell a funny story about the overprints I had, that might or might not be in one of those old threads (probably is), later on...Good luck in the search!
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George...mpany_Building

The Boston area is very rich in card related buildings.

Thanks for the post Jay, nice research and nice pick ups.

Great work Jay!

Andy

Checklist
 

That's a great checklist Jay...went through my old checklist and you have the four I had...Jerry

Cool post. I can confirm another one on your list.

My two are on the list.

Not a Your Safe Cuckoo or Opie Dildock collector, but enjoyed the research anyways. Thought I would provide a breakdown of the background colors of the 61 on your list that include this information:

Olive - 13
Blue - 13
Purple - 11
Green - 11
Gold - 9
Red - 4

As can be seen, red is the runt of the litter, with only 4 examples. Any ideas out there on how this list lines up with the color distribution of regular (non-overprint) E94 cards?

Brian

Great observation, Brian - I saw the same thing, but wondered if it's just a matter of not having a big enough sample size.
But I definitely did wonder about it, since Tris Speaker is my focal area, and there is one overprint of Speaker in each color, except for red.

Wow, this was an unknowingly lucky buy.

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...ae745442_z.jpg

Show off. :D

Nice card Jeff.



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Jay,
Your research is much appreciated. I can add a couple of cards to your list: Jennings (A Base Hit, purple, raw) and Evers (Try Butter Scotch Caramels, green, raw). Also have Magee (Your Out, purple, raw).

Do you have scans of these? I’d love to see them.

Cobb
 

Great Cobb Jeff!!...Spec, if you have scans those would be awesome...Jerry

Jeffrey, Jerry,
Sorry. I tried for about an hour to upload scans of the Evers since it has an unusual back overprint. However, Net54 would not accept them, I believe because of size (MBs vs. KBs).

Tech
 

Maybe one of the more tech savvy guys can explain how to upload them easier...Jerry

Hey Spec
If you can send them to me I will post them for you. My email is leon@net54baseball.com.

I would love to see an unusual print back.
.

Thanks, everyone! Excited to see spec's cards.

Great idea to filter differently by color. Very cool

Thanks, Leon!
 

Thanks to Leon's technical assistance, here at last are the scans I promised.

an 11th back!!!!
 

My pleasure, Bob. That Butterscotch one is a new one to add to the list, after about a hundred years. That is exciting for some of us...

Here are mine from my last collection, I don't own them any longer. They came from Lew Lipset a long time ago. The opening bid was $1000. I called Lew and said I wanted to do a straight bid of $8000. It was the only bid and I won them, with juice, for a bit under $10000...

https://luckeycards.com/pe94overprintset3.jpg

Amazing images.

Awesome
 

Those are awesome Spec!!...thanks Leon for helping...Jerry

I think I have 3 or 4 of those overprints in my type collection.

Here is cool advertising for Blome's

Wow, Spec! That butter scotch is so cool. Leon, is this overprint new to you? I know you've been studying these for a lot of years.

Cool
 

That's cool Dan...still can't get over the borders on that Magee either...Jerry

That is a great card on several levels!