Al had some pics up of variation cards recently and one of them was the 1960 Topps Ernie Banks with the blue printer's notations showing in the white bottom border. This got me thinking and I decided to dive into Mr. Cub to see what else I could find. Well, that mine gave up its ore pretty quickly in the form of a whole bunch of 'new' Banks variations! As a variation psychopath, this pleases me greatly. Let me take you through them:
All of the variations appear in the lower left corners of these horizontal cards, so keep your focus there.
The first two scans are what we shall call the 'normal' versions. They aren't exactly the same, but they both form green nubs in that corner. I have yet to find one with a perfectly squared corner.
1. Normal
60banksnormal1.jpg
2. Normal
60banksnormal1c.jpg
3. A little tough to see, because it's quite light. A significant yellow printing cross appears, emanating from that same lower left corner.
60banksyellow1.jpg
4. A thick blue printing cross now appears where the yellow one was.
60banksblue1.jpg
5. A small blue printing cross now appears in that same spot. Very subtle.
60banksblue2.jpg
6. Only a small blue vertical line now appears.
60banksblue3.jpg
7. Lastly, a small blue horizontal line appears and signifies that the blue printer's notations running across the white bottom border are now present. I have yet to find a version having the small horizontal blue line with no printer's notations showing, so they seem to be inextricably linked.
60banksblue4.jpg
Pretty cool stuff. There are some subtly different ones out there, too. Some where a bit of yellow can be seen among the blue crosses, for instance. But to truly categorize them, they'd fit into one of the groups I outlined above. Maybe someone will run across yet another version. If so, LMK. The hunt goes on.
And to head the question off at the pass, I say yes, these are in fact variations. The people manning the printing presses had to make changes to the colors and what not to achieve these results.
On a side note, I saw plenty of off center t/b Banks cards that didn't have the printer's notations appearing on the bottom. They only appeared when that blue horizontal line graced us with its presence.