rarest backs

[rman444]

M131?

I am also pretty sure that there are more than 50 virginia extra examples out there.

[darwinbulldog]

M131 could go in the same category as D355; you can put it on your list if you reject Burdick's decision to catalog it as a set. Otherwise you have 100% of them with the rare back instead of less than 1%.

The difference is in the other issue that has been raised, stamping vs. printing. Let me explain my choice to include stamped backs, or rather, some of them, as I may not have been sufficiently thorough when I first addressed it. This part admittedly is a bit subjective, but I've arrived at what I think is a reasonable method of classification. Others surely will disagree. My thinking is influenced by some of the same criteria that folks in the hobby apply in deciding whether or not something should be considered a baseball card at all. Was it intended for public distribution? Was it used to advertise a particular product?

I don't think old Howe, or Gilliam, or F, or Jeff himself stamped a card as a means of growing his brand. They stamped their cards in the same way that people used to stamp their books, for identification of the owner's personal inventory. If, on the other hand, I were to stamp a card:

"Sal's Sno-Balls
Metairie Rd.
---------------------
One of 50 Pictures
Of Base Ball Players
Of the American
And National Leagues"

or something like that and give out those cards one summer to every customer who purchases a particular product, then I've created a new type of card. I submit that this is true whether I also own the printing press for the cards and the negatives for the photos that were used on them or, alternatively, if I'm just using pre-existing images for my cards or pre-existing cards for my ad.

That's just hypothetical, and I wouldn't place a premium on a card that was created in that way today using strip cards from the 1920s, but if they were created during a window of time in which the original unstamped card was still being actively distributed, then I would classify it as a different back for that set.

What if it was stamped a year later? A decade later? There's no clear right answer to me, but as a rule I would say it's period stamping as long as the players in the set were still active. And I think there are people who can tell if a card was stamped before or after it became heavily worn, so I would defer to their input if there are examples of stamps on prewar cards that might have been added in, say, 1986.

[darwinbulldog]

Originally Posted by rman444

I am also pretty sure that there are more than 50 virginia extra examples out there.

That does seem probable. I'll remove them for the next update.

[darwinbulldog]

E92 Croft’s (red)
E98 Old Put
E121 Kings, Gertenrich
E135 Merchant's (back from the dead)
M101-4 Haserot's, Mall Theater
R316 Douglas Park, Morton, Rialto
T205 Hindu, Drum
T206 Old Mill (brown), Lenox (brown)
T207 Red Cross
T213-3 Overprint
W461 Playland
W514 Hendler's, Barker
W515 Fleer, Jersey
W551 Wool's
W554 Lucky Yo-Yo, Lukcy Deal, 40 Winners, Bonemery
W573/E120 Cafe du Monde, Cream Nut, Kings, Leader Theatre
W575-1 Johnson, Haffner's, Clark's, Gassler's, Leader Theatre, Queen City, Shotwell, Service Candy

T206 Ty Cobb (but not D355) is included if you follow the letter of the Burdick law.
D355 (but not T206 Ty Cobb) is included if you follow the spirit of the Burdick law.
M131 is debatable, but I'm with Burdick on this one, so I'm leaving it off the list.

[nolemmings]

Just as a point of clarification, you can delete the m101-5 reference, bacause Mall Theatre is a strictly m101-4 set, as is Haserot's, if you're inclined to include it.

[edjs]

I was reading through this today, and it made me think about the D310s with the Aldon Candy and the ones with the Pacific Coast Biscuit stamps on the back. Would these meet the criteria, since the stamps are period?

Also, I wanted to bring this thread back, as it is quite informative for those that haven't read it yet.

[brianp-beme]

Thanks for dredging up this old thread edjs...missed it on the first go around. Very informative, and I was racking my brain to come up with any more additions, but none yet. I am more of a front/common back collector, so only have 3 rare card back examples that are listed: W515 Fleer, W575-1 Gassler's Bread, and W575-1 Haffner's.

The Aldon Candy D310 is a neat card, but not sure if it qualifies...

Brian

[brianp-beme]

Just noticed that W575-1 Henry Johnson is on the list, which might allow the D310 Aldon Candy to squeak in as a contemporaneously stamped card. I have 7 Henry Johnson W575-1 cards, a fact that by itself might just knock it off this list, as I assume there are probably at least another 44 HJ's out there, and I didn't go on a hunting expedition to locate these over the years.

Brian