Question about T206 history

[cubsfan-budman]

So, I've been reading Net54 for roughly 6 months. After checking out that thread about usage statistics on this site, I think that I probably have a similar usage profile to many of you on here...Very few threads go unread by me each day. So anyway, please forgive me if this question has been addressed before.

I read the recent resuscitated post regarding Joe Jackson's exclusion in the T206 set, Ted's recent post about possible sheet layout and another recent post about what should and should not be considered T206. Not only is the research and breadth of knowledge about these things impressive, the subjects themselves are really cool to consider in the first place.

Its obvious to me that a good portion of the interest in the T206 set is due to some of these mysteries behind the set itself.

The question that I have is:

Why are there so many mysteries in relation to this set in the first place?

I looked up Jefferson Burdick. He was born in 1900 and began collecting sometime around the age of 10. He only lived to 63 years old, but he was obviously viewed as an expert in his middle age. While Jefferson Burdick was the collector who has retained the most esteem today, there were other collectors of his caliber that were active in his day and even before.

Did they not have access to employees of American Lithographic during their collecting days? The way I imagine it, the printers, artists, designers, etc. would all have been in their 40s - 80s in the mid 20th century.

So, given their presumed access to the sources of the "truth" about these facets of the T206 set, why are there still so many unknowns?

Thanks for any insight!

Christian