S74 Silk Listed on EBAY SGC graded

[BobC]

Originally Posted by Jobu

I only have one S74 and considered getting it graded but decided not to bother (I think). Can someone explain the general things to look for that make an S74 in good condition? Between the presence/absence of the back, the condition of the back if it is there, staining, fraying, missing threads, etc it seems like there is a lot going on with these.

You kind of hit all the major buttons in your description. There are the two types of silks, the S74-1 white version that came with advertising backs attached, like your Marquard, and the S74-2 colored silks that didn't have any paper backing and instead showed the cigarette brand and factory number at the top and bottom on the front of the silks. Sort of like Leon's except those are miscut and show the brand and factory both on the bottom.

For the S74-1 silks you would prefer to have the backing attached, and that it be free of stains, dings and creases, other than the normal crease across the middle as they were all originally folded when put into cigarette packs back in the day. You would also look for the back advertising to be properly centered. Since the silks were printed in a single strip, and not on a sheet like most cards at that time, you don't normally have to worry about the paper backings being off-center from side-to-side, just top to bottom. Then you want the material on the front to be complete as well with as little fraying, if any, as possible.

Your Marquard silk easily shows there is some missing material at both the top and the bottom of the silk. On the colored version silks like the ones Leon posted, you want to be able to see the factory and cigarette brand information at both the top and the bottom of the silk with as little fraying as possible also. The ideal of course would be that there is no fraying at all. Leon's posted silks obviously show considerable fraying along with being severely miscut to where the facory and cigarette brand end up together on the silk. This type of miscut silk is akin to a miscut T206 card where you see the player name at the top of the card.

Also, just for the colored silks, there was some type of heat element or such that was supposedly applied when they were being cut. You can see when you have a really nice S74-2 silk that at the very top and bottom of the silk there is a strip of the material that is a little glossier from the reaction to the heat or whatever it was that was used to act as a type of seal to stop the material from fraying.

And on the front of both the white and colored version silks, you 'd like to see the image is clearly printed and centered well. Even though the silks were printed in single strips, apparently there was some sideways "play" during the actual printing process on the front of the silks, for both versions. And of course you'd like for there to not be any stains or marks on the front of either version of the silks.

Unlike the ad-backed white version silks that were folded when put into the cigarette packs, and therefore creased across the middle, the colored version silks are all just satin material and can easily have any creases ironed out. I never could understand why someone would send a colored version silk in to be graded and not at least iron out the creases. Not even sure how the grading company views and treats the creases but, would guess they deduct something for them.

In the following examples, the white version Old Mill backed silk of Hemphill shows a really nice back that is pretty well centered and, with the exception of the normal crease running across the middle, shows really nice corners and no other marks, dings or additional creases. The front of the Hemphill silk shows a perfectly centered image with some minor fraying/material loss at the top, and some nominal wear on the bottom. The spots on the image are from the scanner and not on the silk. You can also see the slight discoloration of the material across the middle on the front of the silk, which indicates where it was folded. You can't really tell on the back scan where it was folded since it did not do any excessive damage or wear to the paper backing.

The next example is of two different colored version silks. You'll notice on both the Daubert and Kling silks you can see the complete factory and cigarette brand descriptions at the top and bottom. The Daubert silk though still has a little fraying at the top and the bottom and though the threads running vertically in the silk are all there, probably 2 or 3 threads running horizontally across the bottom of the silk have been lost, while maybe 1 or 2 horizontally across the top are also missing. On the Kling silk there looks to be maybe a couple threads running horizontally across the top that are missing but, the bottom looks like it is all there with maybe a single horizontal thread starting to come apart though. What you also want to notice it that there appears to be a slightly different coloration to the material on both silks that runs across the very top and bottom of each. This is the heat treatment or whatever it was that occurred when these silks were being cut that was to stop the fraying. You want to see to see this on both the top and bottom edges of a colored version silks. The bottom edge of the Kling silk is how you want to see these, with virtually no fraying whatsoever. In this regard, the Kling silk is in a little better condition than the Daubert silk. Howvere, you'll also notice that the Daubert silk is a little more well centered then the Kling silk, so in that aspect the Daubert silk is slightly better.

I don't want to speak for all silk collectors but, these are the factors and things I look for and at to determine what condition a silk is in.

BobC