O/T Vintage Non-Sports Cards

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Posted By: Eric B

I'll give you what I know. If anyone can correct me or add anything, then please do.

Set produced by a small tobacco company around 1902-1905. Very scarce set of 48 known cards of war Generals from the usual Revolutionary War and Civil War heroes to uncommon war generals from the Spanish-American and Boer wars.

I believe exactly 15 of them have been sold on Ebay in the last 3 years. 9 went to 1 collector, 5 to me, and 1 to a relative of the General depicted who bid way more than expected. Maybe 2-3 others sold as well. Not a lot for a 48 card set. And 10 of them would be graded in poor condition with serious defects. If I was to guess, I would say they are rarer than Kalamazoo Bats BB cards, but not as rare as Yum-Yums. But that is hard to judge since BB cards get the attention - even non collectors who find them know they can be sold but those who find Generals may not realize there is a market for them too.

Anyway, the 48 card set was unusual in that the most famous US General of all, Robert E Lee was not in the set. Being a rare set, it was believed that it may exist and also another to make it a 50 card set which was the norm. Well now you know the rest of the story as the Robert E Lee card has surfaced. Possibly it was short printed. Now this is the only known example, but I suppose that now someone on this board will have one as well.

This card was actually part of an Ebay auction that did not reach the reserve. It was mislabelled so I missed it. I just happened to review completed auctions based on price and saw it after the fact. I've been working for the last 6 months to get it on the side. He had others too, but a dealer swooped in on those, but didn't put up enough for the Lee card. Probably didn't know what he was missing.