I have been working on this project for a while. I’m writing a manuscript about the history of the 1949 Leaf sets. The print color variations are rampant through the set, in talking with my Great Uncle who worked as a printer during the late 40’s, his opinion was that the inks that were purchased were “whatever was available.” So the CMYK 4 color process used whatever they could get from their ink distributors, without a color standard applied to it, hence the difference in colors.
The Red hat variation represents a physical plate change, making it a true variation. It is in-line with the Peterson variation that is widely recognized. I am currently trying to get PSA and others to recognize this variation that affects most of the 49 cards in the 1st issue set.
I took the images of the 2 version of this card into photoshop and isolated the cyan and black channels, you can clearly see how the black printing plate had been changed to allow for the red to show through. Another indicator of the later printings is the pinkish magenta ink, which is only present on the cards whose plates had been altered to improve the color of the hats. I’ll have more info coming soon on this topic.
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