1939 PB variation question

[DaveW]

I just did a quick survey of 1939 Play Ball cards that are currently available on Ebay to see if there are any clues about availability and maybe scarcity. I picked 10 or 12 random cards in each of the 3 groups and looked at how many were available.
Here’s what I found:
Cards 1 - 115 with Upper Case only 208 cards/10 = 20.8
Cards 1 - 115 with Upper or Mixed case. 262 cards/10 = 26.2
Cards 115 - 162 with Mixed Case only. 66 cards/12 = 5.5

So it seems that the first group of 115 cards that were printed with only Upper Case names were printed in a quantity that is about 4x more than the second group that was printed with names in Mixed Case (the high number cards and the 73 cards from the lower numbers that were printed again).
So while none of the cards are “rare”, the ones with mixed case backs are definitely scarcer (about an 80/20 distribution or maybe 75/25).

Of course all the usual disclaimers about a non-scientific, one day snapshot apply.
- Dave