1947 BOND BREAD and its "imposters"....show us your cards ?

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The 1947 Homogenized Bond Bread inserts and Cards and Photos from the era with like and similar pictures.

APPENDIX A – Part Three (Working)

1. The 48 card set (44 baseball players and 4 boxers) inserted in 1947-1948 into Homogenized Bond Bread packages
[continued]

Characteristics {continued]:

3 Corners
a. Some with very crudely cut/die cut rounded corners (not to be confused with cards altered to make them appear as Bond Bread cards)
b. Most with distinctive die cutting, but not of the quality of playing cards

4. Size

The next scan is an example of the significant variation in the width of the Homogenized Bond Bread package insert cards. The scan after that shows that while the height of these insert cards does vary, the height variation is not as significant as with the width. The pictures are merely examples and not inclusive of all dimensional variations.





5. Die Cutting

The die-cutting of the corners of the Bond Bread package insert cards was done by the same manufacturer that die-cut the card corners and boxes (packages) for the “Sport Star Subjects”, the “Screen Star Subjects”, and the boxes of the W673 “Navy Ships” sets. The “Navy Ships” set is mentioned in Posts #123 (box picture) and #126 (cards in set) above. The manufacturer was not the playing card company AARCO as some have suggested. Rather, it was a bigger company founded in the Nineteenth Century that used the same die-cutting for the packages of its myriad of products sold worldwide. The die-cutting process, that company's capabilities, and involvement will be explained in the main body of the text of this article. I do not understand what the difficulty has been in identifying the manufacturer. Some of its baseball products have been listed in a variety of catalogs including the 1960 ACC.

6. Printing

Each player card was printed from several lead mold die cuts, which were replaced as each wore out. All of the die cuts used for an individual player were made from the same original screened print. Cards printed from a newly molded die cut are virtually identical. As the image on the lead mold wore down during the printing process, each individual cut would begin to show its own distinctive wear that progressively increased with its particular defeats becoming more pronounced as the printing continued until the die cut was replaced. Then everything would look “new” again, until that new cut began to wear down.

With a potential of 1,000,000 cards inserted every day into a Bond Bread package, if all 48 cards were printed at the same time rather than in series of 12 so as to leave the customers with something new to find later on, that means 20,000 of each player card would be printed for just one day's bread supply. It would take up to 4 lead molded cuts per player to print just one day's supply. If they were printed in series of 12 cards in units of 4 per sheet, then four times the amount of die cuts, or up to 12 cuts would be used to print the cards needed for just a day's supply of bread. Not enough of these cards can now be found to determine which die cut printed which individual card. However, if a defect is visible on one card and it shows up progressively worse on another card, it is not unreasonable to conclude both were printed from the same cut. With these cards, the degree of visible wear is not a sign of a reprint. Rather, wear is only indicative of where in the life of the die cut a card was printed. Again, each die cut for an individual player started out virtually identical because they were made from the same halftone print or die cast (mold).

This analysis may go against the grain of many, but one cannot expect a single printing plate was used to produce the 30,000,000 cards needed each month? The cards are not of a high quality of printing and not dissimilar to the printing techniques of a newspaper. The die cuts were locked together to create a printing plate, with individual cuts replaced as they wore.

Other types of printing defects can include “white spots” and streaks caused by a fleck of paper from the paperstock (or some other foreign material) temporarily lodging on the die cut. The spot would remain until it was dislodged by incoming paperstock, the plate, or more often by a printer whose functions included routinely wiping the plates to remove such “spots.” Cards with such “spots” can vary vastly, with spots appearing anyplace. If the stray material had lodged on a focal point of a picture, it would appear more predominate. Spots can often be exaggerated when printed from a degenerated die cut as the image being transferred may already lack the “fresh” appearance and may transfer more ink than a newly molded one.

Condition:

a. Bond Bread package insert cards were individually handled – in the factory putting them into the packages, transporting them and shelving the loaves of bread in the store. The customer took a loaf from a shelf, moved it to the cash register along with other purchases, and it was probably bagged or boxed, then transported home. There were no card sleeves around when the package was opened. Rather a card taken out of the package, and probably passed around for all to see. If you were lucky enough to have an empty cigar box or some similar container, you might have keep your cards inside. Of course, these along with other things were handed to your friends and family to see. Unless you had access to someone who could use more than one loaf at a time, each single card was a specialty by itself and properly shared with all. If there was no interest in it, it was thrown away. I know of no Homogenized Bond Bread package insert card that is pristine. Rather they are used cards, mostly not in a high grade, but of high scarcity because of what most people do with old or worn out things.

b. Contrarily, the same cards from the “Sport Star Subjects” set are found in higher grades. They came packaged, and the container could be used to “protect the cards from the normal wear and tear that Bond Bread package inserts suffered. Most cards with white-backs and rounded corners attributed as “Bond Bread” cards in a grade of “Ex” or better apparently come from the “Sport Star Subjects” set, not Bond Bread packages.

c. Bond Bread is not fancy bread and contains little fat or other ingredients that would stain a card (such as a glaze, chocolate or grease might do).


2. 1947 Team Photo Packs [continued] :

Some of the boxers and some of the action shots of baseball players in the Bond Bread package insert set and other sets were discussed elsewhere in October 2014 in net54baseball.com's thread, “1947 Bond Bread Exhibits, started by member Is7plus. There member Exhibitman posted the following 8x10 inch glossy photo of the Marcel Cerdan picture of the type appearing in the Bond Bread package insert set and on other cards.



Exhibitman noted that he had “a couple dozen boxers . . . with the same font and sharing the images with some sets.” Cerdan's picture had written on it in ink, “DECEASED.” Cerdan was killed in an airplane crash on October 28, 1949 on his way to visit his friend, French singer Édith Piaf, before entering training camp for his rematch with Jake LaMotta for the middleweight championship.

Exhibitman also posted in that thread what he described as “Bob Feller from a multisport picture pack [printed, around 7 x 9]” followed by a picture of Feller which is a more complete version of the cropped Bond Bread Feller picture. Below in this appendix will be more details about such printed pictures, which are often mistakenly called “Bond Bread Premiums (6½x9 inches)” and sometimes sized at 6½x8½ inches.

Anyone who can post a scan of either the Photo Pack that contained 8x10 inch boxing cards or the multisport picture pack of the 6½-7 x 8½-9 inch printed sheets, please do so. It would help us all.

Regarding the other Bond Bread Set (the Special Jackie Robinson giveaway issue), below are scans of another ACME original photo used in that set.






3. A Numbered Card

About three weeks ago, I found on the internet the card shown in the scans below. Its offering merely provided a picture of the front of the card with the description: “1947 Homogenized Bond Bread Bobby Bobbie Doerr Card.” As you can see, the card is printed with the number “SH145” in the lower right front corner. It has the complete picture of Bobby Doerr that was cropped in the Bond Bread set. When it arrived, it measured 3x5 inches. Does anyone have any similarly numbered cards of any player or sport? Perhaps a list of cards in the set? Could you post scans or identify any other cards? Thanks, Mike







Watch for the next posting of this article.

Copyright 2020, by Michael Fried, P.O. Box 27521, Oakland, California 94602-0521