BOB LEMKE - Opinion...card classification...

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Posted By: Dan Mathewson

Bob-

Can you take a look at the thread below, which I started and is headed: NEED HELP IDENTIFYING A CARD.

For those vintage cards describe in that thread that are from the early teens, which may or may not be the actual photo T5 - Pinkertons, do you have an opinion as to:

1. How they may be classified?
2. Who may have (or did) print/distribute them?
3. Any value (as they are vintage, 1911 - 1913 prints)
4. Including blank back and scorecard back?
5. Regardless of mounting (though, the ones we are referring to are not mounted on the thick stock).

Thanks Bob (and anyone else...)

-dan

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Posted By: Bob Lemke

into these issues. We list three of the score card backs under 1911 Pinkerton Score Cards, and mention the blank-backs and postcard backs in that set's intro. I have no information about their origins, nor the scope of the issue. We'll add verified listings to the score card backs, but probably won't create checklists for blank-backs and PC backs. The new book lists common score card-backs at $250 in NM, the lone listed HoF, Wagner, at $800.

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Posted By: David

I respect much Bob and the work he does, and there's no doubt he gets pricing advice left and right from we in the peanut gallery ('What?!? My Mike Mussina Double Helix Autofocus-Refractor Game Used Tonenail Card only books for $500? Get my lawyer on the phone!")-- but the $250 for commons seems way high.

Second, to Dan, having something detailed in a price guide isn't always what it's cracked up to be. Personally, I love dealing with unique items no one has seen before. Music to my ears is when someone says, "Where the H*ll did you get that? And what the f*uck is it?". I can be deeply disapointed to find out that something is checklisted and priced in a price guide at my local book store ("Darn, I thought I had something special.") I bet you Frank Ward, king of the uncatagued cards, has felt the same way.

(Disclaimer: New collectors should not apply paragraph two with AAA cards.)

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Posted By: Dan Mathewson

...and it really wasn't all about price guide inclusion. More for me about trying to solve the mystery. Bob's guide sits closer to my desk than any of my commercial lender/broker binders do. (LOL...one of my closest versions of a bible...)

So, I figured since I knew Bob posted on the Board, I was hoping that maybe (during all his times in classifying the bizzillion cards he has done) he could point at something that would give an idea of a most likely manufacturer, distributor, time of manufacture, and so on. I'm impatient, it's my nature. I like a good mystery like anyone else, as long as it perplexes me for only a few minutes and THEN it gets solved. After that, it starts driving me crazy.

Relative to most of you (or all of you) on the board, I still consider myself a newbie in card collecting, though I'm trying to know more and more about Matty items with time.

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Posted By: David

It is a nice and scarce Mathewson item. I'd seen the Pinkerton cards around for years, but had never seen a Mathewson before. In fact, I don't think I've seen a Cobb or a Joe Jackson. I often wondered if the printers were stealing the images and thought they could best get away with it with the common players-- which is why the Cobbs and Jacksons seem to be especially tough. They must've figured Old Matty was a softy who wouldn't put up a big fuss, as he was busy writing all those musicals and books and perfecting those checker moves.

The cards generally were way undervalued in years past(in my opinion). This was no doubt due in part because they were not listed in SCD or Beckett. The average collector will stay away from, or at least pay much less for, trading cards that are not 'officialized' by being listed in a guide. Also, I bet a lot of people didn't know if they should be categorized as trading cards or other-- which significantly effects value. Many people don't consider postcards or scorecards to be 'real' trading cards. Now that they have Bob Lemke's official seal of approval (I hear that for each new listed issue there is an official hooded ceremony in a cow pasture local to Iola. This explains why there are fewer new listings in Winter, Packer Sundays and and during the bovine's natural mating season.), I bet their values and respect will go up.

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Posted By: runscott

(I think!) in some of the larger auctions. If I spot them in an old catalog, I'll update this thread with a reference. Seems like the Jackson pose was him hunched over with a bat extended.

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Posted By: Dan Mathewson

David-

Scott Forrest and I were chatting about this very notion over regualr e-mail today. Scott has a card up on eBay right now, it's an old Harvard College Post Card. It appears to have Matty's likeness pitching on the card, even though we know Matty didn't go to Harvard. (Item # 1580659986)

We were just saying he was probably the type of guy that didn't care if anyone used his image...rather, his personailty was probably more likely to enjoy the flattering use of his popular image...

...today, there would be screaming and lawsuits and damages...blah blah blah...

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Posted By: runscott

...so I updated the description. My thought is that whoever got contracted to print this college series of post cards probably did not go out and hire players from each college to pose for drawings! (Yes, it's absurd). Rather, they probably used file photos, and no doubt Matty would have been in many of them back in 1908.

Maybe I'm wrong about the Harvard card, but these ebay "description police" are driving me nuts!

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Posted By: David

I'll bet you Christy Mathewson was a shrewd businessman who knew how to get his 'residuals.'

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Posted By: runscott

I keep thinking it will show up in an old magazine and then I can claim this Harvard post card to be a "Matty rookie". hahaha

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Posted By: Dan Mathewson

AAA will slab it for you right now, and call it whatever you want.

I think they're running a special now, too, it's only $10 per card and it's called:

Pick Your Own Grade! You tell us what grade it is, we automatically agree, and that's that!

Whatta deal! LOL...