Oldest commercially produced baseball card?

[I Only Smoke 4 the Cards]

Jay - How does the address serve as a reference to the age?

[Exhibitman]

I think they moved, Alex. A new address would give you an "issued no earlier than" data point--they would not know the new address before they had it, so a card with the new address had to have been made after the move.

This is a great topic that is always going to be subject to debate based on definitions and parameters. I personally treat any card made for a commercial purpose, either to promote a product/service or for sale itself, as a 'card'. That would exclude all privately-produced photos and postcards because they weren't commercial products. Doesn't mean they aren't desirable, just outside the realm of what we are discussing. I'd not necessarily treat the ticket/CDVs as cards simply because their primary purpose appears to be to serve as tickets for a game. The Peck and Snyder team cards are definitely 'cards' to me--meant to promote a business and given to the public.

Copyright dating can be tricky. The copyright date itself is only going to tell you when the image was created--the date the guy sat for the picture. The item itself could be a later creation. However the style of copyright statement used can help pin down an issue date range. For example, in 1870 Congress radically changed the manner in which copyrights were registered, from a district court-based registry to a central registry in DC. To give an example, the card show below was a commercially produced CDV that a photographer in NYC used to sell to the public from his gallery as part of a series of pictures of famous people. The copyright notice is the pre-1870 style. The image dates to 1862. The card could have been made any time from 1862 onward but very likely was made pre-1870 based on the copyright notice used [and in this case based on the location of the gallery as shown on the card back; the photographer later had multiple locations as shown on the card mounts for later printings].

[oldjudge]

Alex--if you read the thread from the beginning you will have your answer, and then some. I would not suggest this if I didn't think this was a particularly interesting thread.

[I Only Smoke 4 the Cards]

Originally Posted by oldjudge

Alex--if you read the thread from the beginning you will have your answer, and then some. I would not suggest this if I didn't think this was a particularly interesting thread.

I will give it a reread. A lot of information has been posted in response to my original question.