1961 Topps #405 Lou Gehrig Benched "black tooth" variation?

[swarmee]

I saw a picture on the CU/PSA boards about a guy who just bought a PSA 8 Lou Gehrig and it had an unsightly black tooth (looked like it was drawn in) print defect. Is this a known error/correction or just recurring print defect? Is there any value difference in "pearly whites" versus "black tooth"? I know I would rather have the "pearly whites" card.

Black Tooth Gehrig example:

1961 Topps #405 - Baseball Thrills: Gehrig Bendched After 2,130 Games (Lou Gehrig) [EX*MT]
Courtesy of COMC.com

Pearly Whites Gehrig example:

1961 Topps #405 - Baseball Thrills: Gehrig Bendched After 2,130 Games (Lou Gehrig) [PSA*5]
Courtesy of COMC.com

[ALR-bishop]

I think in many cases it is impossible to distinguish between a recurring print defect and a variation created by an intentional change in the printing process by the manufacturer. The fact this defect occurred where it did and is noticeable makes is plausible that if the defect occurred in early runs it was noticed and corrected, like for example the 66 open fly button on Landrum that was airbrushed out. That one is easier to diagnose because it was more prominent and the correction occurred in 2 or maybe 3 phases.

On most recurring defects there is no way to really tell if they were inadvertent defects that occurred in some runs and were not intentionally addressed.

But as far as I know there is no hobby standard or accepted official definition of what constitutes a true variation. The 58 Herrer and 57 Bakep would seem to be just recurring print defects but because they have hobby recognition are greatly valued by master set collectors.

Unless a variant card gets recognition by SCD, Becketts, or The Registry, it tends to be collected only by ardent variant collectors like me and not attain much if any premium. But if a recurring defect like the smudge of green in the bottom of baseball on the back of the 61 Fairly card gets recognized by PSA, master collectors have to have it and the value takes off

I just collect them to go with my sets because I find them interesting and enjoy interaction with those who collect them. There are several such collectors and an ongoing thread on them on the Net54 post war board

[JollyElm]

Whatever you want to call it, it is without a doubt a recurring anomaly, so quite a few people would consider it a variation and collect it accordingly.

There seems to be more than just the 'pearly whites' and 'black tooth' varieties, too. After a quick search, I found the 2 different versions plus one that has Lou's teeth more delineated (far right in the scan)...

61gehrig.jpg

So, I guess collecting all of these depends on how much of a psycho variation collector you are.

[JollyElm]

And there's also this 'partial black tooth' variety…
61gehrig2.jpg

[swarmee]

I figured a highly visible recurring print defect of a Hall of Famer in a commonly collected set would have more known about it. But you're right, the fact that one of the cards has articulated teeth and the other has a straight line of white teeth, makes me think that this was a change during the printing process, not just a print defect.

[savedfrommyspokes]

Seems like the print variations of the HOFers are tougher to discover as most collectors typically do not have multiple copies of these higher dollar HOFer cards to compare one copy to another like they would be able to do with a lesser valued common which they are more likely to have multiples of.