Originally Posted by bcbgcbrcb
I believe that the reason for such a spirited argument/opinion from "rickalaska" (whom I do not know so have nothing personal against) is quite obvious, and admittedly so by "rickalaska, maybe without even realizing it. Assuming that "rickalaska" owns a major stake in this set as indicated, which I'm sure is the case, there are two reasons why it would be much more beneficial for the perceived issue date to remain at 1907-09 as was catalogued in the Standard Catalogue of Vintage Baseball Cards (the bible to many of us vintage baseball card collectors) over the years and, thus, existed in both PSA's and SGC's database and was used on all of their flips up until this point, as far as I know. First, as has been mentioned here already, there are a few "rookie cards" included in the set, assuming that the 1907-09 dating is correct, which greatly enhances the value of those four cards: Walter Johnson, Tris Speaker, Eddie Collins & Ty Cobb. Secondly, with the earlier issue date of 1907 included, that would make this the earliest catalogued postcard set offering individual images of ballplayers from teams across both the American & National Leagues as opposed to a few earlier issues picturing players from just one city/team. A 1910 issue date for the NC set would completely invalidate both of these benefits and make a very big financial difference to anyone owning the previously mentioned 4 "rookie cards" and possibly impact the value of the set overall as it loses its' appeal as the "first", which may or may not make a huge impact in price but certainly might to some collectors.
The reason that I feel that it is important for me to jump in here, "rickalaska" was "me" ten years ago when I shared many of the same views and did much of the same research and came up with many of the same conclusions based on uniform styles, images used, etc. I had a similar spirited debate, maybe not quite as dramatic, with Kevin regarding the issue date of this set. For those of you that might recall, I was a pretty significant player in the Baseball Hall of Fame "Rookie Card" market at the time and my interest in this set centered solely around the inclusion of WaJo, Speaker and E. Collins as the 1907 catalogued date made these the earliest catalogued individual cards of these three players. Having paid nice premiums to own all three of them, it was very difficult to accept that they might not, in fact, be the earliest cards after all. Again Kevin presented logical findings and reasoning, with the earliest postmark dates being at the forefront, but, I didn't want to believe that the info was correct as it would present a major blow to my collection, even beyond the financial aspect, but even more so, the fact that I would now have to seek out other "rookie cards" for those three players.
A decade later and my entire collection having been already sold a number of years ago, I can look back on this set and am 100% behind Kevin's assertion that the 1910 issue date is correct. Again, much of my belief centers around the postmark dates found, and lack of dates not found. If you go back and look at any important postcard set of the era, you will find at least one example with a postmark matching the perceived date of issue, including all of the 1907 Detroit/Cobb's, Rose Company, etc. I believe that the same would apply here and am comfortable with the TPG's and card catalogues updating the info to 1910.
Again, with no vested interest in this topic any longer, I can step back and look at things objectively. I can sympathize with "rickalaska" but in the end, I think the same thought process will ultimately win out.
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