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Posted By: hankron

Your best bet is to get a big pile of low grade 1950s Topps for study and comparison. There's no better education than owning and handling the real stuff. With enough hands on experience a reprint will stand out like a Xerox in the Louvre.

Minimally most of the official Topps reprints ('archives', etc) are on super smooth glossy stock, with the exact same gloss back and front. The backs of all the original 1950s-70s Topps regular cards are rough, fibery cardboard that has less gloss than the fronts.