Hobby History of 1916 M101?

[nolemmings]

Wow, this info is telling in what it doesn't tell us about the 1916 Mendelsohn cards. Almost no info prior to 1960 on any of the sets.

It seems that prior to 1960, there was a single reference to Standard Biscuit back in 1939. That’s it for bakery-issued Mendelsohn cards. There was only one reference to a single “M” set for these cards, in the 1953 edition, called M5 with no issue date info but a reference to 200 cards. Finally, there were no “H” type sets for Mendelsohn cards and no others either prior to the 1960 ACC.

The Carter article I referenced earlier from 1958 made mention of Weil and Morehouse Baking, as well as the Globe Clothing set, so it appears those were known to Carter and Orem by that time, but still, 13 advertisers seem to have been completely unknown even after the 1960 ACC.

Maybe the 1946 edition has something but I am not very hopeful.

[trdcrdkid]

I finally dug out my copy of the 1946 American Card Catalog. Following are the pages showing the D cards, the M cards, and the miscellaneous H cards. The handwritten notes are by Walter Corson, whose copy this was. I took closer pictures of Corson's notes at the end of the M card and miscellaneous H card sections. These were not officially part of the 1946 ACC, and they mostly involve sets issued after 1946 but before the next edition of the ACC in 1953.

[nolemmings]

Thanks again David. The handwritten additions to your copy seem to mirror many of those found in the 1953 eidtion of the ACC. I wonder who copied whom?--Did Corson supply info that Burdick then included in the updated ACC or did Corson just borrow a 1953 editio and hand-copy the changes into his older book? Anyway, you were kind enough to reference a 1940 supplement to the USCC, and I am wondering if there are other known annual supplements of any kind that we could track down and consult. It seems there was a flurry of discoveries of the Mendelsohn sets between the 1953 and 1960 versions of the ACC, and it would be nice to know how those collectors or the hobby overall shared its information during that time.

The ACC entries as to Mendelsohn's sets remain ambiguous if not mysterious to me. The 1946 and 1953 editions first identified "M5" as a Sporting News set, singular. We now know that The Sporting News was not affiliated with m101-5, as it was not advertised for sale in that paper nor did the card backs bear its advertising. So Burdick would have no reason to associate TSN with m101-5, right? Thus I would assume Burdick was referencing m101-4, yet Carter and Orem seemed beside themselves to have uncovered the m101-4 set in 1958, implying that they understood the previously cataloged Sporting News set to be m101-5. This is confusing, unless I'm just missing something.

[trdcrdkid]

Originally Posted by nolemmings

Thanks again David. The handwritten additions to your copy seem to mirror many of those found in the 1953 eidtion of the ACC. I wonder who copied whom?--Did Corson supply info that Burdick then included in the updated ACC or did Corson just borrow a 1953 editio and hand-copy the changes into his older book?

Good questions. I know that Corson knew Burdick pretty well, and I'm sure he contributed research to the 1953 ACC, though he wasn't one of its official editors (who were Burdick, Charles Bray, Gene Di Nardo, and Woody Gelman). I suspect that some of Corson's annotations were made between 1946 and 1953, but those that exactly correspond to additions in the 1953 edition are copied from that edition.

Originally Posted by nolemmings

Anyway, you were kind enough to reference a 1940 supplement to the USCC, and I am wondering if there are other known annual supplements of any kind that we could track down and consult.

My copy of the 1939 USCC (which was John Wagner's) includes the 1940, 1941, and (I believe) 1942 supplements, only the first of which includes anything relevant to your question. After 1942, Burdick realized that it would make more sense to do a whole new edition of the catalog, so he stopped doing the annual supplements.

Originally Posted by nolemmings

It seems there was a flurry of discoveries of the Mendelsohn sets between the 1953 and 1960 versions of the ACC, and it would be nice to know how those collectors or the hobby overall shared its information during that time.

A lot of information was shared through hobby publications, mainly Card Collectors Bulletin (which I have mostly complete from 1955 on but am missing from 1951-54), Sport Fan (from 1955), and Sport Hobbyist (from 1956). I've posted a lot of relevant articles printed in those publications in 1953-60, including the 1958 Lionel Carter article in Sport Fan on M cards that you've cited. A fair amount of research was also shared through letters between individual collectors, many of which Leon has (and a much smaller number of which I have). One thing I don't have, but have been trying to get, is E. C. Wharton-Tigar's Cartophilic Typed Listings from the early 1960s with checklists of US tobacco cards. I'm pretty sure Leon has these.

Originally Posted by nolemmings

The ACC entries as to Mendelsohn's sets remain ambiguous if not mysterious to me. The 1946 and 1953 editions first identified "M5" as a Sporting News set, singular. We now know that The Sporting News was not affiliated with m101-5, as it was not advertised for sale in that paper nor did the card backs bear its advertising. So Burdick would have no reason to associate TSN with m101-5, right? Thus I would assume Burdick was referencing m101-4, yet Carter and Orem seemed beside themselves to have uncovered the m101-4 set in 1958, implying that they understood the previously cataloged Sporting News set to be m101-5. This is confusing, unless I'm just missing something.

You're right that it's confusing, and I don't think you're missing much. These sets are confusing to sort out, especially when you're coming at them without any prior knowledge, as the guys in the 50s were doing.