Which Robin Roberts card is rarer?

[philliesphan]

His 1949 Lummis Peanut Butter card
or
His 1951 Topps All-Stars card


Be interested to hear thoughts on examples extant of each. I'd speculate three on the latter, and perhaps five on the former. Any thoughts?

Marc

[bcbgcbrcb]

Lpb

Definitely the Lummis

[philliesphan]

surprised by the responses.

I thought there were only ~3 examples known each of Roberts, Stanky and Konstanty, so I imagined there might be a strong view that as one of the super short prints from that set [and the huge demand] that would be considered the rarer.

I know that Lummis cards are exceptionally scarce, with perhaps only a dozen or so examples having been sold publicly over the last decade.

Be interested, Phil and Adam, if you could provide any more context on your assessment.

Cheers

[whiteymet]

NO comparison. The Roberts Konstanty and Stanky were not even known to the collecting community until about 5 years after they were "issued".

The Current All Star is far and away the rarer of the two cards. Others may have just been thinking of "regular" Current All Stars in which case I would agree on the Lummis, but not in comparison the the Roberts Konstanty and Stanky!!

[toppcat]

MLAS for sizzle.

[bobsbbcards]

Agree that there's no comparison. 1951 Topps Current All Stars Roberts is so r are it's sick.

[Volod]

Just wondering - how were the Lummis cards issued? Were they attached to the product? Sold via mail-in request? The 1951 MLAS card was only obtained by special request made to Topps. That alone, in my view, would indicate that the Topps card is probably far rarer.
I have to wonder how a hobbyist in 1951 would even have become aware that the 11-card set of MLAS contained three non-issued rarities. Probably not by going into a mom&pop store and buying 100 wax packs and finding dozens of the eight commons and none of the other three. It was only later that highly knowledgable hobby vets received inside information about the Roberts, Konstanty and Stanky cards, and were able to request them from Topps. At least, that has been my understanding.

[toppcat]

Originally Posted by Volod

Just wondering - how were the Lummis cards issued? Were they attached to the product? Sold via mail-in request? The 1951 MLAS card was only obtained by special request made to Topps. That alone, in my view, would indicate that the Topps card is probably far rarer.
I have to wonder how a hobbyist in 1951 would even have become aware that the 11-card set of MLAS contained three non-issued rarities. Probably not by going into a mom&pop store and buying 100 wax packs and finding dozens of the eight commons and none of the other three. It was only later that highly knowledgable hobby vets received inside information about the Roberts, Konstanty and Stanky cards, and were able to request them from Topps. At least, that has been my understanding.

I think it was highlighted in Card Collectors Bulletin as Woody Gelman was very active in the hobby then and had just started working at Topps in 1951-52, although his art agency had worked on the account for a couple of years prior. Woody is the man who rescued the three MLAS short prints.

[sflayank]

not even close current all star roberts many many times rarer

[philliesphan]

Originally Posted by Volod

Just wondering - how were the Lummis cards issued? Were they attached to the product? Sold via mail-in request? The 1951 MLAS card was only obtained by special request made to Topps. That alone, in my view, would indicate that the Topps card is probably far rarer.
I have to wonder how a hobbyist in 1951 would even have become aware that the 11-card set of MLAS contained three non-issued rarities. Probably not by going into a mom&pop store and buying 100 wax packs and finding dozens of the eight commons and none of the other three. It was only later that highly knowledgable hobby vets received inside information about the Roberts, Konstanty and Stanky cards, and were able to request them from Topps. At least, that has been my understanding.

Steve - To me, this is the crux of the argument. No one knows much, at all, about the Lummis cards. Their stickered-counterparts in Sealtest are widely available...but the Lummis cards seem to be exceptionally rare. As I mentioned earlier, I've heard of less than a dozen examples from the entire set trading hands over the last decade. I'm sure some trade privately, but you can't find Lummis cards readily available anywhere -- add in a HOF rookie card to boot, for both Ashburn and Roberts, and it is a significant rarity.

I do think the MLAS is the rarer of the two, but I also tend to believe there's less than ten examples of Roberts / Ashburn in the hobby-

Marc

[Volod]

Originally Posted by toppcat

I think it was highlighted in Card Collectors Bulletin as Woody Gelman was very active in the hobby then and had just started working at Topps in 1951-52, although his art agency had worked on the account for a couple of years prior. Woody is the man who rescued the three MLAS short prints.

Thanks for the memory upgrade, Dave. Do you have access to any Gelman interviews or recollections in this specific vein? It seems that the Shorins just decided to trash the short prints, or some such. I had imagined that the three cards sat in a file drawer at Topps for a few years so that any requests coming in for them could be filled, but if, as you say, Gelman "rescued" them, what from, and to what extent?

[ALR-bishop]

Bob--It's not sick, just you...and me... because we don't have one.

[toppcat]

Originally Posted by Volod

Thanks for the memory upgrade, Dave. Do you have access to any Gelman interviews or recollections in this specific vein? It seems that the Shorins just decided to trash the short prints, or some such. I had imagined that the three cards sat in a file drawer at Topps for a few years so that any requests coming in for them could be filled, but if, as you say, Gelman "rescued" them, what from, and to what extent?

I have to dig out the reference-it may have been from Len Brown or Jay Lynch. Will post it when I track it down after de-stratifying my desk. I do believe there were legal reasons those three were pulled but there is some (thin) evidence they may have been printed separately from the other 8 cards in the set.

[Volod]

Dave - Thanks. I look forward to your information, if you can find it.

[toppcat]

OK, I found part of the reference on the 3 MLAS short-prints. It's from an SCD article on 10/13/2000 by Tom Mortenson and it references Woody saving a few specimens of the short prints. The rest of the article is an interview with Woody's son Richard so it's contextual only.

I have a later reference still that I have to find that is more specific. The hunt continues...

[Volod]

Originally Posted by toppcat

OK, I found part of the reference on the 3 MLAS short-prints. It's from an SCD article on 10/13/2000 by Tom Mortenson and it references Woody saving a few specimens of the short prints. The rest of the article is an interview with Woody's son Richard so it's contextual only.

I have a later reference still that I have to find that is more specific. The hunt continues...

Any chance you could post the stuff here, once you get it all together?

[ALR-bishop]

Steve-- do you read Dave's blog

[toppcat]

I will post the 2000 article soon, still looking for the other. It's an interesting read but in a large format so I have to scan it in pieces.

[Volod]

Darn, I forgot about the blog. That would be the place to go to see this stuff. Thanks for the reminder, Al.

[toppcat]

...that discusses Woody saving the three MLAS short prints:

[Volod]

Thanks very much, Dave. Very conscientious of you to remember to post that months afterward. A highly interesting read about the Gelmans and Topps. A little disappointing though that Mortensen did not ask about the 1951 issues specifically, and Gelman did not mention them either. Perhaps the information in the sidebar note is simply a claim that Gelman, Sr. had made at some point, but it suggests only that most of the three MLAS rarities were in fact destroyed by Topps, and Gelman maybe had to rescue a few examples from the trash bin. Do you have any other information that indicates the three shortprints were printed separately from the other eight in the set? Or, is it just that it would have been more work to cut those three out of a full sheet in order to throw them away? Thanks again for your diligence.

[toppcat]

Hang tight Volod, looking for the short print detail and should recoup it soon. Will post when I find it, no worries.

[toppcat]

Found part of the MLAS short print solution, as it were. The eight regular issue cards look to have been printed adjacent to each other. I thought I had a scan of the three short prints together as well but it's eluding me at the moment.

[Volod]

Thanks for that, Dave. I recall seeing those strips somewhere a few years ago. It's interesting that the poorly cut edges of the bottom and top do not match up. That is, whoever cut the strips apart - assuming that they were once part of a sheet - apparently cut them apart crudely and then trimmed the top edge of one strip...or might they have been cut from different sheets, with who knows how many cards on each one? If you find a strip of the big three, would really like to see that, as I have only seen them individually.