[G1911]

Any of you gentlemen into T219? Pretty tough, pretty good looking, pretty cheap. My trinity. It hasn’t been talked about much here, mainly a few posts explaining that it is indeed a different set than T218. PSA doesn’t seem to know the difference between these two sets, they tag T218 as T219 and vice versa fairly frequently. I'd title this "The T219 thread", but that's a little presumptuous.

It’s the later of 2 clones of the common T218’s, with only boxers (12 poses excised to cut the set down to 50. ATC/ALC seem to have liked printing in multiples of 25). Unlike T223 and the later T206 clones, the T219’s are the same image quality as their source. The physical size is smaller side-to-side and usually just a little bit taller, not sure why as the T218 cards would fit fine in the HLC and Miners boxes, and are cropped differently.

The missing boxers and their corresponding t218 series are Sailor Burke (1), Charles Eyton (3), Joe Gans (2), George Gardiner (2), Jimmy Gardner (1), Charley Griffin (2), Dick Hyland (1), James J. Jeffries (Drapes) (2), Jack Johnson (Green) (Late 1 and 2), Johnny Summers (Boxing) (3), Johnny Summers (rowing) (3), Eddie Walsh (1). Johnson and Jeffries were presumably to avoid duplication, and Gans was dead. Gardiner was a former champion, but retired. Some of them were pretty good, like the other Gardner brother, but it seems to me the excisions had some thought put into them, some of the weaker fighters, duplicates, and the two who were no longer active.

As they include a selection from all three series, it must come after T218-3 that was issued in early 1911. The Jeffries and Johnson cards were edited on the backs for the July 4, 1910 bout (The Johnson back update mirrors his T227 back text). Possibly a precedent/follow-up to the T227 HLC/Miners partnership? It deductively must be a 1911 or 1912 issue.

They are significantly tougher than T218, but supply seems to far outstrip demand anyways. Honest Long Cut Black is the common back. Honest Long Cut Green is maybe 3x-5x tougher than the blacks, though they usually aren’t even noted as existing when the set comes up. I’m not sure if anyone else cares about them whatsoever. Miners Extra is fairly tough, seems easier than it actually is the last couple of years due to a couple large lot sales and a series of them put up for rather optimistic BIN’s on eBay that just sit. They are easier than T218 Tolstoi’s. The Red Cross are almost impossible, there’s a couple big batches of them and outside of those, good luck.

I still don’t have a type card of the Red Crosses, but am building a set of each of the other 3 backs, for a 150 card run (I have 124 different). I haven’t really made notes to confirm each card exists with each back until recently. I’ve confirmed everything with Honest Long Cut Black, Miners Extra, and Red Cross (that one complete set made the tough one easy for once). I still need to confirm Honest Long Cut Green backs for Coulon, Jeanette, Kaufman, Harry Lewis, Loughrey, Neil, Nitchie, O’Toole, Jack Sullivan, West and Wolgast. I’d be pretty surprised if these didn’t exist, but I’ve learned to never assume with ATC/ALC sets.

Anyone else collect these? Hate them? Thoughts on the backs? Have any of the HLC Green’s I haven’t seen a pic of you’d be willing to share? Rub it in and share a Red Cross?

Here's the 3 backs I do have, plus the Johnson size/crop comparison since he's the only card that seems to get any attention.