1948-1955 Bowman series divisions and sheet layouts

[G1911]

The conventional story is that there are a number of short print cards interspersed in the later part of the set that were included in most/all catalogs for many years, and the standard catalog until the end. The method by which these SP's were assigned seems to be lost to time and not particularly academic.

The more modern rendition of the story is that there are indeed no SP's, and the set was issued in 3 series of 32 cards each. This is derived at as 32 is the divisible number for most of Bowman's large size sets. There are panels of 1953 Bowman Baseball Color known showing 32 cards together. 1954 Bowman football is said to be released in 32 card series as well, with the cards laid out in numbered sequential order, relying on the 128 cards being divisible by 32 and that #'s 65-96 seem to be genuinely more difficult than the others. By 1955 Bowman was using much larger sheets for the baseball set, though the football conventional wisdom that year is that they again are just 32 card sequential sheets.

I do not have in my archive any images of 1953 Bowman Football uncut material, and could not find any searching the web. If the cards were issued in 3 series of 32, with the small sheets laid out in number order, then card #96 of Little Billy Cross would be the bottom right corner, which should make this attached miscut impossible.

It seems to neither of the available explanations mesh with the evidence, of which there is not much. I'd love to see any uncut material folks may have images of, or other miscuts showing an adjacent card. With only 96 it should be pragmatically possible to piece together the series, if not a full layout.

[toppcat]

I think the press sheets were far larger than 32 cards. While a different size in terms of the individual cards, this 51 Bowman Baseball uncut sheet shows 288 cards in a 16x18 array, with 72 different cards repeated four times. The 32 or 36 card panels seem to be how Bowman cut them down for final cutting and packaging. It's too big to upload here but this link works:

https://sports.ha.com/itm/baseball-c...umbnail-071515

[G1911]

Originally Posted by toppcat

I think the press sheets were far larger than 32 cards. While a different size in terms of the individual cards, this 51 Bowman Baseball uncut sheet shows 288 cards in a 16x18 array, with 72 different cards repeated four times. The 32 or 36 card panels seem to be how Bowman cut them down for final cutting and packaging. It's too big to upload here but this link works:

https://sports.ha.com/itm/baseball-c...umbnail-071515

I am reluctant to make conclusions on the large size cards from the small size cards sheets, but I think this is right for the large size cards too. The story in football has never made much sense, and none of the sheets surviving show complete borders for the 32/36 segment panels that would suggest that panel was it's own sheet.

This 51 Bowman sheet is one of the reasons I went poking around here - although my expectation was to hopefully find that the panels are segments of a much larger sheet and that it was a 32 card series. I am not so confident that his the case now. The card below Cross does not appear to me to match any of the 65-96 cards.

[G1911]

And to illustrate, since I have never seen a football panel, here's two examples I saved photos of for the baseball cards that preceded this set.

[toppcat]

Some old speculation on the large 52's here:

[G1911]

Here's part of a sheet (in Ted's version, a whole sheet or half-sheet, with other sheets replacing the right column with the missing 4 cards on the left, 1, 10, etc.) of the 1952 Bowman Larges. He claimed that the ratio of the right column SP'd columns was 5:1 and the left most SP column was 2.5:1. A look at much larger sampler sizes than 1,200 or 3,000 cards of Bowman Larges will reveal some interesting populations that do not come even close to these claims and call the SP'ing into question. I note that none of these 'complete uncut football sheets' show any of the indica of a sheet edge that is normally seen.

There is quite a large gap between what has been stated and what can actually be shown. Ted was the parent source for pretty much all of the current claims about the Bowman football sheets/series of each year, which are difficult to reconcile with a miscut such as the one shown and uncut sheets of non-football Bowman's. He cited private conversations with Howard Moll as the source for the press sizes and the sheets. His claims and stated memories have not infrequently been found to contradict later discovered direct evidence.

We know non-football sets like the 1954 Navy and the 1955 Baseball issue used sheets that were quite large. It's rather difficult to believe that miscuts are wrong and that a special small sheet was consistently used for football and only for football.

I am hopeful there is more direct evidence out there to flesh out what was, instead of just identify previous falsehoods though. One day we will get there

[toppcat]

Ted talked with Moll late in the ad man's life, who knows what his recall was at that point. Ted had many theories, not all were fact-based.

Zabel was printing the Bowman cards from at least 1950 I believe, not sure/can't recall if they were used earlier. I blogged about them a few times, most pertinently here (make sure to read the comments):

https://www.thetoppsarchives.com/201...-contents.html

Two comments of note thereon:

From Doug Hall, who worked there in 1962 and was grandson of William Zabel. He commented regarding about Zabel's presses:

"The Bowman cards were printed on a German-made multi-color press (I think it was a Heidelberg)from zinc plates, one for each of 4 ink colors. Before printing actually began. the press ran a sheet through each color, one at a time. I once had a full set of sheets of the 1953 Bowman cards of 1 color each (yellow, blue, magenta and black I think)."

An anonymous commenter stated: "I think the two 58” 2-color Harris presses at Zabel came from the Topps plant in CT. For a time, Topps May have printed the backs and LBP the fronts. Zabel bought their 60” 5-color Miehle to print Topps fronts."

That Connecticut Topps plant closed around 1971.

[G1911]

And here are some examples of the Navy Victories (credited to 1954, but I'm not sure if that's researched or just a conventional date. Lots of the claimed dates for 50's non-sport are not quite correct) and a 1955 baseball. Both are not full sheets, just panels.

I could have sworn a full 55 Bowman Baseball sheet appeared a couple years ago and we had a thread about it but I cannot find it now....



1953 Bowman football is almost certainly a 1 series release. I suspect there may be DP sequences, not random SP's. This Cross miscut has the third group of 65-96 printed above the first group of 1-32, if these conventional print sequences are correct. PSA populations clearly trend higher for 1-32.

[G1911]

And here's a debunking for 1955. 1955 is allegedly the same 8x4 32 card sheets, with 5 series and the first two being more common than the last 3.

#62 Blanda is allegedly a second sheet (33-64) card, in the bottom row of the alleged 8x4 layout. He's actually above a yellow card, which is probably #70 Jim Ringo, who is allegedly in the top row of the 3rd series 8x4 sheet.

Other examples proving the same can be found

[G1911]

And here is one showing #35 Veryl Switzer, allegedly the top row of sheet 2, is actually below Jack Simmons, allegedly in the bottom row of sheet 1.

So "sheet 1" actually has at least alleged series 1/2/3 all on it.

[G1911]

Now this is where it starts to get interesting. 34 HAner is the card to the left of Switzer, in the top row of "sheet 2". 39 Dick Flanagan is the second to last card in the same low.

With sheet 2 actually a panel printed below sheet 1, these cards would not have yellow cards above them at the top. Both these miscuts line up with the bottom rows of sheet 3, Tom Bettis and Breezy Reid.

It looks like we have, on one sheet on top of each other, panels representing:
1-32
33-64
65-96
33-64

[G1911]

I'm looking for 'series 1' now repeating below 'series 2', as those cards are quite common relatively. Looks like #59 Charlie Ane here shows him above the corresponding slot on the top of 'series 1', #3 John Olsewzki.

That puts us at this pattern of the blocks:
1-32 above
33-64 above
65-96 above
33-64 above
1-32

[G1911]

And this #32 Van Brocklin shows 1-32 above a blue card, which would b3 #72 Tittle (i.e., 1-32 above 65-96) or Nomellini (i.e., 1-32 is above 97-128). I strongly suspect it is Tittle.

1-32 above
33-64 above
65-96 above
33-64 above
1-32 above
65-96 (possibly 97-128)

[G1911]

These repeating patterns don't yet seem to fully align into two sheet layouts. This would be awfully big as a sheet to be one sheet, and particularly weird to only have 8 columns but this many rows. Presumably there would be more cards in either case, if this is one gigantic sheet or 2 sheet layouts. I suspect from miscuts after a gap, which could have a thin line in the gap.

This Nomellini (which is allegedly in Ted's rendition of Bowman cards the top right card of sheet 3) shows one of the sheet lines that would be this divider. Such a divider between panel sections on the sheet would make it very difficult to find a miscut so bad that it shows a card to the right of column 8.

[toppcat]

I wonder if Bowman slowly seeded in the higher numbers in successive press runs, while dropping earlier cards. Just a thought but it seems possible to me.

[G1911]

Originally Posted by toppcat

I wonder if Bowman slowly seeded in the higher numbers in successive press runs, while dropping earlier cards. Just a thought but it seems possible to me.

We know they did this in 1955 Baseball so that would make a lot of sense. One more reason there are probably sheet shenanigans and this sequence is not the whole story yet.

I believe that by 1955 Bowman was already wrapping up its card projects. I don't believe any of their non-sport issues are credited to 1955, and that year only saw the baseball and football sets (which I would presume, based on relative scarcities today, were their top sellers), neither of which were lazy releases. 1955 Baseball is notoriously bad for miscutting, the subsequent football set is a lot better cut and centered, especially 97-160. Thankfully only a tiny sliver of the next card is enough, with the design, to place which card is adjacent.

I'm trying to find further miscuts, in the high number cards that are top or bottom of "sheets" 4 and 5. I've found an Alex Langford showing "sheet" #4 had cards beneath it, but it's such a small sliver of the next card I can't make out which card it is. I am trying to do the 1954's as well as I am also confident the current theory there is wrong, but there are not many miscuts to play with.

Apologies if this is in your book and I don't recall it, but do you know the date or month the buyout of Bowman was finalized by Topps? It appears Bowman did a full print run of the football set in all its series (probably 2...) before ceasing operations, with some early designs of the next baseball set in progress. Topps seems to me to have been kind of a mess in 1956 with the buyout, releasing a lazy football set (I love it and it's one of my favorites, but it appears to be a quick meshing of the 55 Topps and 55 Bowman football designs using Bowman's contracted players), a lazy Presidents set copied and pasted from Bowman's work in 1952, and a small size Jets set that was pretty low effort alongside the effort sets of the Round Ups, Flags, Davy Crockett and Elvis issues that were mostly TV cash-ins, and the baseball series. I don't believe Topps copied a Bowman design again until 1966 for the Hockey and Football sets that basically copied the 1955 Bowman Baseball set.

[toppcat]

Originally Posted by G1911

We know they did this in 1955 Baseball so that would make a lot of sense. One more reason there are probably sheet shenanigans and this sequence is not the whole story yet.

I believe that by 1955 Bowman was already wrapping up its card projects. I don't believe any of their non-sport issues are credited to 1955, and that year only saw the baseball and football sets (which I would presume, based on relative scarcities today, were their top sellers), neither of which were lazy releases. 1955 Baseball is notoriously bad for miscutting, the subsequent football set is a lot better cut and centered, especially 97-160. Thankfully only a tiny sliver of the next card is enough, with the design, to place which card is adjacent.

I'm trying to find further miscuts, in the high number cards that are top or bottom of "sheets" 4 and 5. I've found an Alex Langford showing "sheet" #4 had cards beneath it, but it's such a small sliver of the next card I can't make out which card it is. I am trying to do the 1954's as well as I am also confident the current theory there is wrong, but there are not many miscuts to play with.

Apologies if this is in your book and I don't recall it, but do you know the date or month the buyout of Bowman was finalized by Topps? It appears Bowman did a full print run of the football set in all its series (probably 2...) before ceasing operations, with some early designs of the next baseball set in progress. Topps seems to me to have been kind of a mess in 1956 with the buyout, releasing a lazy football set (I love it and it's one of my favorites, but it appears to be a quick meshing of the 55 Topps and 55 Bowman football designs using Bowman's contracted players), a lazy Presidents set copied and pasted from Bowman's work in 1952, and a small size Jets set that was pretty low effort alongside the effort sets of the Round Ups, Flags, Davy Crockett and Elvis issues that were mostly TV cash-ins, and the baseball series. I don't believe Topps copied a Bowman design again until 1966 for the Hockey and Football sets that basically copied the 1955 Bowman Baseball set.

Topps finalized the deal to buy Bowman on January 20, 1956 and announced it on February 18th. The effective date of the sale was April 1st and it included contracts in force, production machinery and all trademarks. They paid $200,000 and I believe it strapped them for most of the rest of the year.

I think a couple of Bowman designs went into sets Topps produced for other parties but my notes are scattered on those right now.

Do you know Mike Thomas? He's pieced together virtual sheets which just recreate the 32 player blocks but also collects miscuts he uses to ID sheet positions. He's not as active as he used to be but does seem to update his website still; he was pretty focused on grabbing miscuts back in the day. You may want to give him a shout:

https://www.footballcardgallery.com/set/55b/1955-bowman-football-cards/?cat=bowman

[toppcat]

Originally Posted by G1911

We know they did this in 1955 Baseball so that would make a lot of sense. One more reason there are probably sheet shenanigans and this sequence is not the whole story yet.

I believe that by 1955 Bowman was already wrapping up its card projects. I don't believe any of their non-sport issues are credited to 1955, and that year only saw the baseball and football sets (which I would presume, based on relative scarcities today, were their top sellers), neither of which were lazy releases. 1955 Baseball is notoriously bad for miscutting, the subsequent football set is a lot better cut and centered, especially 97-160. Thankfully only a tiny sliver of the next card is enough, with the design, to place which card is adjacent.

I'm trying to find further miscuts, in the high number cards that are top or bottom of "sheets" 4 and 5. I've found an Alex Langford showing "sheet" #4 had cards beneath it, but it's such a small sliver of the next card I can't make out which card it is. I am trying to do the 1954's as well as I am also confident the current theory there is wrong, but there are not many miscuts to play with.

Apologies if this is in your book and I don't recall it, but do you know the date or month the buyout of Bowman was finalized by Topps? It appears Bowman did a full print run of the football set in all its series (probably 2...) before ceasing operations, with some early designs of the next baseball set in progress. Topps seems to me to have been kind of a mess in 1956 with the buyout, releasing a lazy football set (I love it and it's one of my favorites, but it appears to be a quick meshing of the 55 Topps and 55 Bowman football designs using Bowman's contracted players), a lazy Presidents set copied and pasted from Bowman's work in 1952, and a small size Jets set that was pretty low effort alongside the effort sets of the Round Ups, Flags, Davy Crockett and Elvis issues that were mostly TV cash-ins, and the baseball series. I don't believe Topps copied a Bowman design again until 1966 for the Hockey and Football sets that basically copied the 1955 Bowman Baseball set.

Topps finalized the deal to buy Bowman on January 20, 1956 and announced it on February 18th. The effective date of the sale was April 1st and it included contracts in force, production machinery and all trademarks. They paid $200,000 and I believe it strapped them for most of the rest of the year.

I think a couple of Bowman designs went into sets Topps produced for other parties but my notes are scattered on those right now.

Do you know Mike Thomas? He's pieced together virtual sheets which just recreate the 32 player blocks but also collects miscuts he uses to ID sheet positions. He's not as active as he used to be but does seem to update his website still; he was pretty focused on grabbing miscuts back in the day. You may want to give him a shout:

https://www.footballcardgallery.com/set/55b/1955-bowman-football-cards/?cat=bowman

[G1911]

Originally Posted by toppcat

Topps finalized the deal to buy Bowman on January 20, 1956 and announced it on February 18th. The effective date of the sale was April 1st and it included contracts in force, production machinery and all trademarks. They paid $200,000 and I believe it strapped them for most of the rest of the year.

I think a couple of Bowman designs went into sets Topps produced for other parties but my notes are scattered on those right now.

Do you know Mike Thomas? He's pieced together virtual sheets which just recreate the 32 player blocks but also collects miscuts he uses to ID sheet positions. He's not as active as he used to be but does seem to update his website still; he was pretty focused on grabbing miscuts back in the day. You may want to give him a shout:

https://www.footballcardgallery.com/set/55b/1955-bowman-football-cards/?cat=bowman

Thank you, that makes a lot of sense. The 1956 footballs are very close in design to the last bowman set and use a ton of the same pictures even, feels very hastily thrown together from Bowman's material, as do a lot of the 1956 Topps issues. I figured you would know the details sir. A couple Bowman designs were used for other parties; off the top of my head the 1958 Hires Root Beer cards Topps produced use one of the three 1956 Bowman Baseball prototype designs that I believe Mr. Olbermann has. I'm sure there are others I do not realize.


I posted the same OP on a football board too, where Mr. Thomas was upset that I did not privately contact him instead of sharing information publicly, and believed my counter evidence disproving Ted's theory, the 'more modern rendition of the story', was a cheap shot insult to himself because his site reposts Ted's theory for each Bowman set. I like when research is only about showing facts and not who found what.

[king11]

For the 1953 Bowman set, it looks like the card underneath the miscut of #96 Cross is #8 Averno. This could suggest that the group of cards 1-32 could be beneath the group 65-96.

[G1911]

Originally Posted by king11

For the 1953 Bowman set, it looks like the card underneath the miscut of #96 Cross is #8 Averno. This could suggest that the group of cards 1-32 could be beneath the group 65-96.

It is 100% Averno, the back lines up too with the text on Averno’s card, so 8 was printed below 96 on at least one slot on the sheet. Almost certainly 1-32 appeared below this 65-96 section at least once. Definitely a 1 series set now, not 3.

[toppcat]

Originally Posted by G1911

I posted the same OP on a football board too, where Mr. Thomas was upset that I did not privately contact him instead of sharing information publicly, and believed my counter evidence disproving Ted's theory, the 'more modern rendition of the story', was a cheap shot insult to himself because his site reposts Ted's theory for each Bowman set. I like when research is only about showing facts and not who found what.

That is unfortunate, yikes!

[JustinD]

Seems like a well thought discussion. For instance if Lansford was in the lower right hand position would we have this -

[G1911]

Originally Posted by JustinD

Seems like a well thought discussion. For instance if Lansford was in the lower right hand position would we have this -

That is a very nice find. 52 Large's narrative, which is the one most often cited alongside 1948, is definitely also wrong. I think we will also find in 1952 that the 'short printed' columns are also not as has been claimed. The POP report strongly suggests the short prints are a fantasy.

On the large size Bowman's, the 'internal rows' miscuts all suggest that they are in 32 card sequential sequences, as far as I have seen (with Bowman's 1955 baseball stratagem, possibly used in 1954 too, of replacing blocks of cards with new cards to have a 'living sheet' instead of a Topps style full replacement sheet, we may well find a counter-example, but I have not succeeded in locating such a card). I would love to see a card that does not follow that pattern.

Lansford would likely be above either #117 O'Donohue (representing "series 4"), 81 Kastan (representing "series 3"), #45 Steve Van Buren (representing "series 2"), or #9 Spencer. It is not Kastan, that card has a purple backdrop that does not match the sliver. So this Lansford looks to me like it is probably over another block of "series 1", "series 2" or "series 4".

[G1911]

And here is the #126 Lansford (supposed to be bottom row, column 5). Can see just a tiny sliver of the card below, which is not a sheet mark or line as it begins exactly where the edge of a next card would instead of intruding into the margin. I can't deduce the color, but maybe a dark red?

The options to be beneath him, if what we have seen holds consistent are
Hugh Taylor (light purple)
Tank Younger (dark red)
Jim Ringo (Yellow)
Al Carmichael (same block, so less likely - darker yellow)
Ernie Stautner (blue)


97-160 do seem to be better centered so far, I am having an issue finding miscuts in the border cards going the right direction.

[G1911]

And here is an interesting Bednarik. Bednarik is at the bottom of the 5th 32 card grouping, in the same position relatively as Lansford. The only Red card at the top of a grouping in the corresponding slot is Tank Younger, #38. This matches the red and the white glow of the Younger card.

This one seems to confirm that the 1955 Bowman's had all the series on sheets together; though I suspect that it is probably a situation like the baseball series that preceded it, some cards replacing others as time went on, with multiple layouts. That will be very difficult to prove or disprove with only miscuts.

I am going to try and find 1952/1954 examples too, but those are a more difficult design to match like this.

[G1911]

And matching Bednarik, 159 Colo above 39 Flanagan

[G1911]

Because of the layout patterns, these are the card #'s and direction of miscuts I am looking for in all of the large size, 1953-1955, years (the higher numbers of course do not exist in all 3 years)

These card #'s, miscut to show the card ABOVE: 1-8, 33-40, 65-72, 97-104, 129-136.

These card #'s miscut to show the card BELOW: 25-32, 57-64, 89-96, 121-128, 153-160

These card #'s miscut to show the card to the RIGHT of the subject: 8, 16, 24, 32, 40, 48, 56, 64, 72, 80, 88, 96, 104, 112, 120, 128, 136, 144, 152, 160

These card #'s to miscut to show the card to the LEFT of the subject: 1, 9, 17, 25, 33, 41, 49, 57, 65, 73, 81, 89, 97, 105, 113, 121, 129, 137, 145, 153



The 1952 Bowman Large's are a bit different in the sequencing.

[G1911]

Further supporting evidence.

#64 Ostrowski ("Series 2") above #72 Tittle ("Series 3").

#60 MacAfee above 100 Sandusky ("Series 4")



This expands the sequences to:
1-32 above
33-64 above
65-96 above
33-64 above
1-32 above
65-96 (possibly 97-128)

AND

33-64
97-128


Personally, I am sold that the only sensible explanation of the evidence is a scheme like the 1955 Bowman baseballs - cards removed from sheets to make way for new ones, making the series a rotating mix and a lot more complicated than rather straightforward Topps series. It will be hard to prove on an absolute basis without full sheets, miscuts can only get to a preponderance of the evidence standard for this kind of sheet sequencing.

1953 Bowman is probably a straightforward sheet with 96 different subjects, but not all appearing the same number of times (I suspect a true full sheet, not a partial panel, will reveal 'extras' of 1-32).

1954 - not enough evidence at present for any conclusions.

[toppcat]

Timing the retail market in a way with the subbed sections.

[G1911]

Trying to do 1954. 1954 Bowman is a pain in the rear for this, as there are not many miscut cards. All of the ones on internal rows I have ever seen show what we expect, the 32 card 'sections' of 4 rows.

To start, here is Wietecha, bottom of "series 1" above another card, which cannot be discerned. It is, of course, impossible for any card to be below Wietecha if they were produced on 32 cards sheets by the alleged series. So this is enough to debunk the narrative, but doesn't tell us much beyond that.

[G1911]

This one, I got a break on. Trippi is in the bottom of "series/sheet 2". If he was printed on top of "sheet/series 4", the card beneath him would be Jack Christiansen.

Christiansen has a constant defect with a blue mark in the top border, effectively meaning we can identify the top of Christiansen's card even on an off center card above him, not a full miscut. This distinctive mark occurs recurrently on Charley Trippi cards off-centered, placing Trippi above Christiansen and as a result, block 2 above block 4.

So we have segments of:
1-32
???

33-64
97-128

So, we can prove the 32 card sheets are false with the Wietecha, and we can show series/sheet 2 and 4 were actually on the same sheet and series for at least part of the print run. Very strongly indicative that 1954 uses the 1955 replacement pattern OR it is a one series production (with 65-96 almost certainly produced less).

[G1911]

For 1954, another way to get datapoints is to use the packs. Obviously, cards in a series can only appear in a pack with other cards from that series. 1954 Bowman Football are a pretty common pack unlike other years, and so some have been opened in a documented venue.

The penny packs are useless, of course, but some of the 7 card nickel packs also exist and have been opened. Here's a video of one being opened several years ago (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zqcbn6_bro0), which alone should have debunked this 32 card series myth if the pack is authentic.

In order the cards are:

32 Elroy Hirsch
17 Bill Bowman
57 Chuck Bednarik
18 Leo Rucka
58 Art Hunter
19 John Cannady
59 William McColl

Hirsch + a 3 card sequence from "series 1" and a 3 card sequence from "series 2".




And another one from the same guys: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tv8S3DLJNqk

118 Stautner
111 Lavelli
119 Ray Smith
112 Leon Hart
120 Neil Worden
9 Pete Pihos
33 Harold Giancanelli

Series 4 and series 1 in the same pack (with several non-commons besides the ruined gum card).




And a third, this time going from the back of the pack to the front: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssu2jyT2Cys
119 Ray Smith
118 Stuatner
117 Olszewski
116 George Connor
115 Al Carmichael
114 Richard Lem Mon
113 Charlie Conerly

1 sequence of most of a row in order (collation must have sucked).



There are more, but the short of it is further evidence that this was either 1 series or 2 series following the 1955 baseball pattern of cards removed and replaced in a rotating sheet, making series a very different concept than the Topps concept.

[G1911]

And for the small size Bowmans, here is a 1950 Bowman 37 Bobby Layne showing a card above. This card 'should be' the top left corner of the second series 'sheet' if the assertions are true. This card suggests that there were not, as has been the story for the small size Bowmans as well, only cards 37-72 appearing once each on this sheet in numerical order.

[G1911]

And 1951 is debunked as well. Here's #6 Tom Fears with a card above him. The accepted story is that this sheet held 1-36 in numerical order in 4 rows, only once each. Thus, there cannot be a card above Fears on these alleged tiny sheets.

The card above looks like it might be #33 Lillywhite, but the sliver is too thin for me to be 100% sure that's right, only 90%. If correct, that would place a repeating section of 1-36 above 1-36 again on at least one of the layouts, possibly rotating layouts again rather than static sheets.

[G1911]

The 1948 story is also untrue.

This is allegedly a 3 sheet 108 card production, arranged so that cards 1, 4, 7, 10, and so on are sheet 1, cards 2, 5, 8, and so forth are sheet 2 and 3, 6, 9 and so on are sheet 3.

The evidence for this that Ted et al. used, and all the other false claims about Bowman sheets and series, is surviving panels. All these surviving panels lack any indica that they are a complete sheet, none of the enlarged edges that the border of a full sheet would have, or even a believable size that would make much production sense.

While printing blocks on a sheet, of course, follow the surviving panels, these blocks and panels are not sheets and they are not series as has been long claimed.

This card is allegedly the top right corner of sheet 1. Clearly, that is not the case and there was a block above. Above #25 Pat McHugh appears to be card #108 Buford Ray, placing sheet 3 above sheet 1.

1948 Bowman is clearly a 1 series and sheet release, and was not done on 36 card sheets. That sheet probably rotated subjects in the way typical of Bowman but Topps didn't do or copied block patterns an unequal number of times onto a static sheet. the 3rd sequence block cards do actually appear to be relative short prints, unlike the 1952 Bowman Large's for which there is no real evidence that the SP story is actually true and considerable evidence that it is false.