Numbers Question

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Posted By: Texas Ted

I have always been fascinated by numerical issues and wonder if anybody has ever seen any information about specific card set statistics. It would be very interesting to know how many of each card were printed, and then an estimate of how many have survived. My guess is that nothing survives from the very early years, but there could be some archival information around for the early to mid 1900s about how many cards were printed, distributed, and maybe even destroyed. I know there is some knowledge about short prints and double prints also, but is there anything about total numbers printed?

Then the really interesting second half is how many of those cards have survived. Besides fires, floods, tornadoes and other natural disasters you have mom cleaning up after kids leave for college, paper drives during the war years, and all kinds of other reasons for cards being destroyed. I just think it would be cool to know what percentage of the original printing still exists.

Probably only other numbers geeks are still reading now, but I also thought the ideal job would be the chief statistician for Major League Baseball.

Texas Ted
Starting my third attempt at a second childhood.

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Posted By: JimB

I agree it is a very interesting question. I would love to know, but doubt we ever will.
JimB

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Posted By: Bob Marquette

Ted- if the T207 set interests you, I suggest the 2 parter in VCBC written by Tim Newcomb in which he dutifully breaks down the stats and crunches numbers to give his opinion on rarity, existing card numbers, etc., based on the information he received. Granted there are many T207s out there whose owners didn't participate but it is as good a guess as any set review I have seen.
tbob

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Posted By: Br uce Bruce

I in no way subscribe to the accuracy of these numbers as proposed in Alan Hager's book. However, they could provide a place to start a discussion.

Examples of the R1A group, according to Hager, are Lone Jacks, N167, Four Base Hits, Darby Chocolate and SF Hess N338-1.

R1 examples = Kalamazoo Bats, Plow Boys, N526, Spotted Ties, N300 Mayo, WG1, G&B, SF HESS N321, E107 type 2, Texas Tommy and Yum Yums.

R2 examples = Buchner Gold Coin, E136 Gypsy Queen (small), Scrapps, T217 Mono, N173, E103, E105, T3, Delongs, Tattoo Orbit, George C. Miller and N162.

R3= N28, N29, E107, E91, E101, T209 color, E92, E94, C46 and T212

R4 = D304, M116, T207, T202, 1914 Cracker Jack,

R5= T205

R8 = T206, 1952 Topps

R4, at 25,000-100,000, seems far to big a grouping to be meaningful. Clearly there are a lot more T207s than there are D304s. In R1, clearly there are a lot more Mayos than Yum Yums. Etc.

As Tim Newcomb's recent survey of T207 shows, we don't know what we thought we knew, since there appear to be many cards tougher to find than Loudermilk, Ward Miller, and Irving Lewis. So if the information on the relative rarity of cards within a single issue can so different than what we all thought, who knows what additional information future research might reveal about the total number of existing examples of various issues?

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Posted By: warshawlaw

And it may surprise you, as was the case with the T207s.

Using the major price guides is a good barometer on pop. If a card is grossly underpriced in the guides it is often because there are no transactions from which to raise prices, because there are no cards out there. The 1928 Exhibit PCL set is a great example. SCD quintupled the prices in the 2005 book because some transactions confirmed what specialists in the set already knew; the cards are extremely low pop, so much so that they rarely come to market. Zeenuts are another great example. How many HOFers do you see--one or two of each, maybe. They barely exist so they rarely transact. No transactions, no data. No data, no price adjustments.

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Posted By: Richard Lloyd

Bruce...
Does Alan hager's book talk about the population of
Regional food cards such as Drakes cookies, Darigolds,
Dann dee potato chips as well as team issues and Pacific Coast League cards like Sunbeam and Seattle Rainier popcorn cards, just to name a few??
Best

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Posted By: Bruce Babcock

Richard, of the cards you mention , Hager does list the 1950 Drake's Cakes set at R-3 (10,000-25,000 cards) & the 1954 Dan Dee Potato Chip set at R-2 (2500-10,000 cards), but none of the others. NM-M price listed for the 36 card Darke's set was $8000 with a vg set listed at $1600. The 29 card Dan Dee set figures were $13,000 NM-M & $3600 in vg.

Almost half the book is taken up with post-WW II Topps, Bowman, Donruss, etc. He estimated that there were about 1500 different sets issued between 1886 & 1991, the date of publication. He included about 300 sets in the 500+ page book .