Exactly the sort of thing I'd be looking for.
The process wasn't precise, and both Ames have a similar enough dot pattern on black that they probably came from the same master.
But the blue is slightly different, and less or more noticable, the plate scratch ones have a gray layer in the hat, while on the caption varieties it's closer to peach.
To me that along with the Schulte differences (as well as the right side of the bat having an extra line if it's not a different color shifted) would confirm two different press runs.
The next steps would be comparing different brands, and comparing ones that we know are sheetmates from the plate scratch sheets that did carry over into the 350 series to see if there are differences there.
It's entirely possible there are transitional ones too, where front sheets for Piedmont and SC 150 were used to print Piedmont and SC 350.
|