Charles Conlon Fakes, Baseball Magazine Stickers & A Brief Tutorial

[Forever Young]

Originally Posted by Runscott

Respecting Ben's wishes to continue the stamp discussion over here...



It is very refreshing to see someone else express this publicly. Thank you.



And you as well

Here are the pics of my Wheat removed from its mount (verso rotated as Conlon flipped the print). I'm not out to entrap anyone:

HEE HAW! NICE SCOTT! No wonder why you were happy getting that one back. Let me guess..... no longer for sale?? Awesome photo with ORIGINAL CHARLES CONLON handwriting.

This was published ONLY in effort to better the hobby. Both Rhys and I felt it was necessary to come together on this. I hope this helps clean things up a bit. People attempt to forge anything and everything in order to make a buck.. photography is no exception. It is important to work together to protect the hobby that we love .

[Runscott]

Originally Posted by Forever Young

HEE HAW! NICE SCOTT! No wonder why you were happy getting that one back. Let me guess..... no longer for sale?? Awesome photo with ORIGINAL CHARLES CONLON handwriting.

Nope. An original Conlon print is an original Conlon print, regardless of what some jacktard does to the back of it for his own nefarious reasons. But I am definitely grateful that you pointed out the blue stamp - once I knew what it was, it had to go

[Lordstan]

Taking Scott's lead on continuing the discussion over here, I cut and paste a question I have below.
Also thanks to Rhys and Ben for coming together to create a very nice summary.

Originally Posted by drcy

Dennis, a photo expert or seasoned collector doesn't look just at the stamp to determine the originality and age of a photo. Photos with no stamps or marks can be identified as Type Is due to their physical qualities. Many original photos have no stamps.

David,
I have a question about this statement. I agree that one can tell an original/vintage photo by the physical characteristics, but how can anyone say a photo is a type 1 when the rules of the type system have a set time duration? A photo produced in 1932 would certainly have most, if not all, the same physical qualities of one made in 1929, but if the photo was taken in 1927, the 1929 photo is a type 1 and the other is not.
Personally, it is with the multitude of unmarked photos that I feel the Type system has some limitations. Ben has often noted that he would much rather had a photo of 1915 Babe Ruth image produced in 1915 than the same image produced in 1919. He backs up these words by paying quite aggressively for those 1915 images. So if the physical qualities of the 2 prints are the same and there are no markings, how can one really tell?

Mark

[Forever Young]

Originally Posted by Lordstan

Taking Scott's lead on continuing the discussion over here, I cut and paste a question I have below.
Also thanks to Rhys and Ben for coming together to create a very nice summary.



David,
I have a question about this statement. I agree that one can tell an original/vintage photo by the physical characteristics, but how can anyone say a photo is a type 1 when the rules of the type system have a set time duration? A photo produced in 1932 would certainly have most, if not all, the same physical qualities of one made in 1929, but if the photo was taken in 1927, the 1929 photo is a type 1 and the other is not.
Personally, it is with the multitude of unmarked photos that I feel the Type system has some limitations. Ben has often noted that he would much rather had a photo of 1915 Babe Ruth image produced in 1915 than the same image produced in 1919. He backs up these words by paying quite aggressively for those 1915 images. So if the physical qualities of the 2 prints are the same and there are no markings, how can one really tell?

Mark

Well, first off.. the Type system says APPROX 2 years. This was done so a 1919 or 1920 restrike of a rookie babe Ruth or a 1954 mantle vs 1951 rookie or not equals. The two year window was created for this reason. HOWEVER... GEO. BURKE is a perfect example of approx two years is flexible. If A BURKE photo was made in the30s with a 30s stamp.. it will be deemed a type 1 as it was made off orig neg and at the approx time and hard to distinguish within 2 years(burke used same paper in house for example/why hard)..
Many things can be determined by the paper other than stamps through fluorescents in paper and exemplars( to name a couple).
The “apprx” 2 years things seems to be a hang up to some. It isn’t for me. Probably because I know that it is not used to willy nilly authenticate. PSA actually goes out of their way to be as exact as possible in photo authentication. They actually go a little too extreme sometimes if you ask me. i.e. not authenticating bains on mounts or real photos if it has a fake stamp. They will actually say they don’t know if they do not know. I understand why they do these things though. I believe the photo authentication division has learned from authenticating mistakes(other genres) of the past.

Originally Posted by Lordstan

So if the physical qualities of the 2 prints are the same and there are no markings, how can one really tell?

If they were the exact same.. they would have probably been printed at the same time

[Lordstan]

Originally Posted by Forever Young

Well, first off.. the Type system says APPROX 2 years. This was done so a 1919 or 1920 restrike of a rookie babe Ruth or a 1954 mantle vs 1951 rookie or not equals. The two year window was created for this reason. HOWEVER... GEO. BURKE is a perfect example of approx two years is flexible. If A BURKE photo was made in the30s with a 30s stamp.. it will be deemed a type 1 as it was made off orig neg and at the approx time and hard to distinguish within 2 years(burke used same paper in house for example/why hard)..
Many things can be determined by the paper other than stamps through fluorescents in paper and exemplars( to name a couple).
The “apprx” 2 years things seems to be a hang up to some. It isn’t for me. Probably because I know that it is not used to willy nilly authenticate. PSA actually goes out of their way to be as exact as possible in photo authentication. They actually go a little too extreme sometimes if you ask me. i.e. not authenticating bains on mounts or real photos if it has a fake stamp. They will actually say they don’t know if they do not know. I understand why they do these things though. I believe the photo authentication division has learned from authenticating mistakes(other genres) of the past.

Originally Posted by Forever Young

If they were the exact same.. they would have probably been printed at the same time

Ben,
I understand what you're saying here and I don't disagree with your logic. My concern is that by having this ambiguity of interpretation, it creates confusion and the possibility of the appearance of uneven application of the rules. By no means am I saying that they are playing favorites, but the more strict the rules are, the more even it appears.

Your explanation of the Burke photos is exactly the type of example that creates confusion. Nowhere in their book or on PSA's website do they say that all Burkes with a 30's stamp are type 1. Understand that I don't think this decision is unreasonable, but being that this sort of information is published nowhere, how are photo collectors or sellers supposed to know this?

By having this sort of unknown rule, what you're saying to people that it's not OK to call a 1919 original negative re-strike of 1915 Ruth a type 1, because it's over 2yrs, but it is OK to call an original negative restrike of a Burke image a type 1, even if if could've been produced 6 or 7yrs later. Can you see how this can create confusion?

If I understand it correctly, the paper's fluorescence and many other physical characteristics aren't likely to be significantly different from the 20s through the end of the 30's. This is why I asked the question.

[Runscott]

Originally Posted by Lordstan

By having this sort of unknown rule, what you're saying to people that it's not OK to call a 1919 original negative re-strike of 1915 Ruth a type 1, because it's over 2yrs, but it is OK to call an original negative restrike of a Burke image a type 1, even if if could've been produced 6 or 7yrs later. Can you see how this can create confusion?

If I understand it correctly, the paper's fluorescence and many other physical characteristics aren't likely to be significantly different from the 20s through the end of the 30's. This is why I asked the question.

Mark, Burkes are special only in the sense that there is a larger year range of prints where you can't tell what part of the range they were printed in. If there was no type system, as a photo collector you would treat all such prints the same. Same for the Ruth photos - how are you going to know that the 1919 print is actually a 1919 print, and not a 1915? In essence, both examples are treated the same - it's just that with Burkes it is more likely that you will call something 'Type I' when it was actually printed outside the 2-year range.

I don't think I have ever actually written 'in essence'.

[Runscott]

Also, I realize you weren't talking to me, but I figured Ben would appreciate a non-PSA guy saying something positive.

[GKreindler]

Bravo to both of you, Rhys and Ben. Wonderful thread that I'm sure is going to be SUPER helpful to a lot of people.

Graig

[prewarsports]

In my opinion the older the photo the more often it was trimmed. Pre WWI, you see A LOT of trimmed photos. In some archives as much as 80% of the pre WWI images are trimmed at some point by the newspaper editors or even the photographers by themselves. It has a lot to do with photographic processes at the time. Many collectors resort to the thinking that if it was trimmed before and has left a wavy inconsistent edge, cleaning it up a bit by trimming it nicer is not a sin, but touching a border that is original just to improve its condition is not acceptable. Similar to the philosophy of strip cards on the baseball side. If the card was already ripped or trimmed, most people don't care if you clean it up a bit. If you take an untouched sheet of strip cards and trim them all to make mint condition cards for grading, your going to have some detractors. After WWII you rarely see trimmed images with the exception of wire photos where newspapers often took off the captions and glued them to the back so they would not show up in publication.

[Forever Young]

Originally Posted by prewarsports

In my opinion the older the photo the more often it was trimmed. Pre WWI, you see A LOT of trimmed photos. In some archives as much as 80% of the pre WWI images are trimmed at some point by the newspaper editors or even the photographers by themselves. It has a lot to do with photographic processes at the time. Many collectors resort to the thinking that if it was trimmed before and has left a wavy inconsistent edge, cleaning it up a bit by trimming it nicer is not a sin, but touching a border that is original just to improve its condition is not acceptable. Similar to the philosophy of strip cards on the baseball side. If the card was already ripped or trimmed, most people don't care if you clean it up a bit. If you take an untouched sheet of strip cards and trim them all to make mint condition cards for grading, your going to have some detractors. After WWII you rarely see trimmed images with the exception of wire photos where newspapers often took off the captions and glued them to the back so they would not show up in publication.

Agree with all of this. There will be people who trim after the fact no doubt. It is unfortunate but nothing can really be done. If you like an image that is trimmed, buy it knowing many were trimmed but it is possible it was done later.
As far as value goes... a full image will always be better than one trimmed with everything else equal. HOWEVER... many images are 1-5 of a kinds particularly pre-ww1 so really, it doesn't detract it at all. Particularly if Rhys' 80% rule is close. Do the math... beggars can't be choosers if they want a particular image and A trimmed version is all that is available..

Originally Posted by Runscott

Mark, Burkes are special only in the sense that there is a larger year range of prints where you can't tell what part of the range they were printed in. If there was no type system, as a photo collector you would treat all such prints the same. Same for the Ruth photos - how are you going to know that the 1919 print is actually a 1919 print, and not a 1915? In essence, both examples are treated the same - it's just that with Burkes it is more likely that you will call something 'Type I' when it was actually printed outside the 2-year range.

I don't think I have ever actually written 'in essence'.

Thank you for your objectiveness Scotty. To set the record straight... IDK what PSA DNA does exactly here. It is just what I have gathered by different paper and stamps burke used coupled with the authenticated examples I have seen. These(burke) were open to the public(not news photos) and obtained directly from burke studios. Therefore, they are a different animal all together.

[Runscott]

Originally Posted by Forever Young

Thank you for your objectiveness Scotty. To set the record straight... IDK what PSA DNA does exactly here. It is just what I have gathered by different paper and stamps burke used coupled with the authenticated examples I have seen. These(burke) were open to the public(not news photos) and obtained directly from burke studios. Therefore, they are a different animal all together.

Hey, I have plenty of love to pass around. Yep, agreed about the Burkes. We have at least one Burke stamp expert on the forum, so I'm sure there are plenty of times where the range can be narrowed.

Unfortunately I can't agree about the trimming. If your vintage print has the photographer's or journalist's notes trimmed partially off on the edges, it was most likely a modern seller trying to increase his profits. The argument that it was done 'back in the day' is an old and oft-heard one, but why in the world would a photographer or journalist trim their own notes off the edges of their photograph?

[Exhibitman]

That's true, Mark.

Now, to expand the issue slightly, are there incidents of other stamps being forged, like the NEA/date stamps that are seen on so many vintage photos? I ask because I have seen some plainly original photos with seemingly inconsistent stamps on them.

Another question: Many archive liquidators are putting bar code or other modern pressure labels on photo backs. Personally, I remove them when I can because I hate how they look, but what is the consensus on that practice? Is it worse to have the modern sticker or to remove it?

Another question: I have heard that some collectors will 'clean up' messy photo edges on the thought that the newspapers often cropped photos in their archives. What is the consensus on that practice? Is it akin to trimming a card or is it acceptable?

[Runscott]

Originally Posted by Exhibitman

Another question: I have heard that some collectors will 'clean up' messy photo edges on the thought that the newspapers often cropped photos in their archives. What is the consensus on that practice? Is it akin to trimming a card or is it acceptable?

I don't think collectors trim edges - it's the sellers who are trying to make the photos look like they are in better condition, so they can get more money for them. Most collectors hate the trimming, as you need the edges for matting. Also, I don't think the newspapers actually cut that many photos - they marked the area that would not be included, but there wasn't any need to cut much. The extra area on the print gave them more room to make notes on the back.

What I used to do to improve a photo's sale potential, was to show what the print would look like with the edges matted out. No need to cut a vintage photo!