t205s with green borders

[shammus]

Saw one of these listed in BST....had never seen one before or heard of this sort of variation existing. Does anyone know more about them? Are they similar to t210s with orange borders in that a few sheets missed a color pass during the original print run and some cards came out with different colored borders? Are these easily found or are they pretty tough to come by?

Thanks guys,
Brian

[barrysloate]

Hi Brian- hope you are well. I've had a bunch of the green bordered T205 over the years. My guess is they are missing the gold layer. You don't see them too often but they are out there.

[asoriano]

I was always under the impression that the green borders were caused by some type of exposure to a moist environment.

For what it's worth, a majority of the green borders I've seen are in poor condition.


A missing layer that was not applied seems plausible as well.


Happy Holidays!

[drc]

Don't know the specific card you are talking about, but copper, such as used on the T205s, can tarnish green. Just look at the Statue of Liberty.

[Rob D.]

Whatever you do, if you have T205s whose borders have turned green, don't send them to Kruger Industrial Smoothing. They'll screw them up, just like they did the Statue of Liberty.

(Just for you, Joe.)

[Wite3]

They are the result of exposure to moisture and have tarnished. The gold borders are indeed a metal that was applied last to the card. Underneath the gold borders is usually yellow, pink, or white print. I have held two different cards without the gold borders and it is very obvious. I have owned and still own many green bordered cards and they are almost always in poor condition. Hope this helps.

Joshua

[brianp-beme]

Good golly I own a bunch of green borders...I guess this would be as good an indicator as any that my collection could be considered archival (the arch-rival of Bruces everywhere).

Brian

[drc]

The T205 borders would have originally been as bright as a brand new penny. Even the darker, brownish borders have tarnished with age.

[Exhibitman]

Here is a T205 where the gold ran out during printing. It is not green underneath:

[barrysloate]

So then the green borders are merely gold borders that have become discolored. But the green also have a different texture than the gold, so some of the upper layer has disappeared.

[drc]

This is merely speculation, but the T205s had a big and lengthy print run. It's plausible they used different metal alloys at different points, and the type of tarnish might relate to the particular alloy.

[sb1]

McGraw has never had gold applied and it's yellow underneath

[quinnsryche]

Could we get some board members to post some scans of their most obvious green borders and even some missing the gold altogether? I am sure we would all appreciate some visual referrences. Thanks!

[tbob]

They are certainly harder to find but nowhere near "scarce" or "rare." I had several in vg/ex shape years ago but got rid of them to obtain ones with nice gold borders.