Durham, NC T206 find

[CardTarget]

I have been out of the hobby for several years now, with my T206 set about halfway complete sitting in a closet. But I still use my cardtarget.com email address for various things. A golf buddy of mine noticed my email address and mentioned a few years ago that he had some T206s that he bought many years ago and someday he'd show me. This week he decided he was ready to sell and actually showed me. Wow!

In 1991 a guy he worked with told him his grandfather was trying to sell his old baseball cards. He met him literally in his grandfather's barn where he purchased an old tin full of T206 cards. He put them in a binder and they've been on his shelf ever since. So I'm excited to bring them into the light of day for the first time. The images below are the crème of the crop, but there are about 100 additional commons and low level HOFers too. A few have pencil writing on the back and one has what appears to be an "S. S." stamp?

They are about 85% Piedmont 150 backs, 10% Piedmont 350 backs, and 5% Old Mill backs. All of them "Factory 25, 24 Dist Va".

Also included were one T210 (Frank Taxis, Charlotte) and one T212 Recruit (Bert Daniels).

So I've been tasked with selling these... I will post pictures of all of the commons in the BST board soon. But if anyone is interested in keeping the collection together for any reason before I sell it all piecemeal, LMK. I know it's pretty rare to come across a collection like this that hasn't ever seen the hobby and likely hasn't changed at all in 70+ years. Thanks all!

[Bamacollection]

[sycks22]

I love hearing about the big finds every year

[Leon]

I will increase your PM limit. Good luck. That's very cool....

.

[GasHouseGang]

Is it April 1st already?!

Just kidding. Amazing find of some great survivors.

[brianp-beme]

Nice re-discovery of some great looking T206 cards. With the stains on the back bottom of the ones shown it appears they may have been mounted in a scrapbook (with photo corners perhaps?). It would certainly account for their fresh appearance. Do the others also have similar stains? And any additional background about the cards that you can provide?

Brian

[CardTarget]

Only about 8 of the other cards (of the total of 148) have similar corner stains. I would guess all of the stains were acquired at the same time when the cards were stacked at some point. I don't think they were ever mounted. Though maybe... the interesting thing is that every single card is a Factory 25 card. Which leads me to think they were all acquired a long time ago by a single person down here and the collection hasn't been added to in quite a few years. Though some of the cards are total beaters, and a couple do appear to have been removed from some mounting at some point.

[CardTarget]

All cards have been scanned and are available for viewing here:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/RB19ZkVauqFFNhyw9

I would appreciate any feedback on special cards I might have missed or things to look into (for example, potential longshot Josh Clark auto on page 4).

[CardTarget]

Oh, and the total number of cards is 139. Final tally. =)

[ullmandds]

nice! any brown old mills?????

[swarmee]

Originally Posted by ullmandds

nice! any brown old mills?????

Looks like one in the last photo, and two early on from the Southern Leagues.

Edit: Cards look to have brown backs, but that doesn't mean they're what you're talking about.

[Kevin]

Oh my. I think my goal for 2021 is:

Napoleon Lajoie - T206

Increase from 169 to 200+

What a wonderful find, my friend.

[swarmee]

The autograph looks like "John W.", so either Honus Wagner or the original owner... ;-)

Oddities:
Devlin has a miscut back and centered front.
Birmingham has a double-printed blue back, or had extra ink applied during printing. Same as a Ferris and Ganley (unless the Ganley is writing).
Cross 350 back either has two blue ink spots or print defects.
Dooin has a nice plate scratch on back.
Magee on bottom right of picture has a name at top.
Both Lindaman cards have a recurring print defect in the '0' of 150.
A couple were owned by S.S. and B.W.K.

Are you going to grade the better conditioned ones and Hall of Famers? Maybe bobby will run another one for the board if you ask him nicely... or you could submit at a $499 max value with a submitter like PC Sportscards (jewcer2k5 on Blowout) to get access to the $25 service level that PSA is only allowing for registered corporate bulk submitters. You can go through PSA's pop reports that are broken down by back and see if any of yours are "rarities" or "low pops" that would sell much better with less than 5 annotated so far in PSA holders with that specific back advertiser and factory number.

[swarmee]

I'll work on a PSA Pop Report for you:
T210 Taxis: Pop 1, Highest is PSA 2 --- this would be one to grade and would take the TOP POP, even though most collectors don't collect this set graded. New blood in the market is addicted to TOP POP.
T207 Daniels: Pop 53, Highest is PSA 6

Piedmont 150: No rarities on PSA pop report
Piedmont 350: King, La Porte, Maloney, McBride, Milan, Pickering, Quillen = no rarities
Old Mill: King, Kiernan, Manion, Mullaney (ALT), Paige, Revelle, Westlake = no rarities

[Pat R]

There are several Piedmont 150 plate scratches (9) but no new examples.

Abbaticchio
Ball (two different)
Dooin
Doyle
Konetchy
Oldring (this is the Oldring scratch that also has a corner crop on the back)
Shipke (two different)

also there are no brown Old Mills they're all regular SL Old Mills.

Here are a couple of examples of the Oldring scratch with the corner crop mark

img059.jpg

img060.jpg

[Rhotchkiss]

Mike, I sent you a message re some of your Southern League Old Mills

I have been staring at the Westlake and King because from the scans, the backs look like they could brown. However, scans can be deceiving and lightened old mills can often look brown via scan; they are best seen in person and, at least, need to be placed side by side with a regular SL OM back. Nevertheless, I think neither the Westlake nor King are brown old mills and here is why: First, they are both unconfirmed combos. I am not saying the combo can’t exist - I acquired a previously unconfirmed Violat Brown old mill - but it does make it less likely. Second, brown old mills are scrap; they are hand cut and were not placed in cigarette packs. Staring at the front and backs of both cards, neither appears hand cut. But more importantly, how would this owner, who we think assembled these many years ago and put them away, would have gotten his/her hands on a scrap card? Third, and most determinative (as Sonny points out below), neither come with a brown hindu back.

Regardless of whether any of these cards are brown old mills, it is an amazing find and really cool that things like this still exist. Congrats!

[stutor]

Westlake and King would not be possible in brown OM as they are part of the 14 card SL group that was not printed with Hindu. It is my understanding that only the 34 SLers printed with Hindu backs are possible with brown OM. Maybe I am mistaken

[Piratedogcardshows]

Great job helping them find there way to the hobby! Hopefully their will be many more finds in 2021. Nice Taxis!

[Rhotchkiss]

Originally Posted by stutor

Westlake and King would not be possible in brown OM as they are part of the 14 card SL group that was not printed with Hindu. It is my understanding that only the 34 SLers printed with Hindu backs are possible with brown OM. Maybe I am mistaken

Great point Sonny!! (assuming the brown is from Hindu, which is clearly the prevailing theory). Thus another reason they cannot be brown old mills.

[Pat R]

There are definitely no brown Old Mills in the group.

[rjackson44]

Pretty