T206 Back Collecting

[Archive]

Posted By: JimB

The shallack front on MOST (but not all Ty Cobb backs) is an important difference from other T206s, but that seems to me to be the only significant issue. Like all the "T206" brands, Ty Cobb brand was part of the American Tobacco Company. Since to my knowledge most, if not all, Ty Cobb back cards were found in Georgia, the fact that it is "factory 33" (a unique factory compared with other T206s) seems to make sense, and does not indicate some criteria that ought to immediately eliminate the back from the T206 set. And the fact that it only appears on Ty Cobb cards (red portrait) also makes sense given that it was probably a special promotional brand with distribution limited to Georgia (Cobb's home state).

I think if we try to imagine ourselves as smokers in 1909-1911 and we like to collect these cards that are inserted in packs of cigarettes issued by brands owned by the American Tobacco Company, then we would assume (correctly) that the Ty Cobb brand has those cards too. The bonus with those was that you were sure to get a Ty Cobb card.

As Bill Heitman mentioned in a thread about a month ago, the T-206 designation is somewhat arbitrary to begin with. It was the ACC designation, not the American Tobacco Company designation. The writers of the ACC could have just as easily designated 16 different sets (or more) out of what we call T206s today.

If the Cobb back cards were printed at a different factory in Georgia, with the identical front and somebody there decided to shallack the front to make it a little nicer does not, on its own, isolate it from the larger T206 set as we know it from the American Card Catalogue.

JimB