T210 Old Mill Cigarettes Red Border Oddities

steve B · #1 05-12-2019, 01:19 PM

That's entirely too complex a process for a print shop to make money on the job, or for that matter even get the job if they quote it based on that.

It's 5 passes through the press, which means 5 plates, 5x the handling, drying time etc.
Instead of 3, red pass, black pass, gloss. (I'm not certain all 210s got gloss. )

doing a job at a roughly 40% higher cost just isn't a path to profit.

The name looks like a bar, because the black is printed high in relation to the red frame. If it was done as a separate pass, there would be differences in the location of the name.

It is possible that they might have used a semi-transparent red, and occasionally printed black first. That's not standard practice, but I have seen it on at least one modern card. (81 Fleer Star Stickers that are light blue instead of dark blue have the black under other colors. ) I'd have to have a bigger sample than the few T210s I have, but I see enough that have names that appear less clear and strongly black than usual, which is what a black first printing would look like. (I actually have to check mine, but I don't recall any like that. )

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vintagecatcher

That last card is a great example which shows the black printing phase was done after the "border framing" as it clearly shows the black on the sox is over the bottom red border.

So it seems the production sequence would progress as follows:

The black and white photo images were printed on a sheet. A bar with the player's name and team was added below each image. That bar can be clearly seen in Jason's Hick freak T210. The individual player images were then framed by the border, which was normally red with the exception of the Series 3 cards that were printed in orange. The bottom of the border frame normally covered the player's name and team name.

Black "highlights" were then printed to give some cards further contrast.

Then lastly a gloss coat was added.

Here is a scan of my George Cowan T210 which is a good example of a T210 that had a black highlight step in the printing process. Not all T210s had this step.

Patrick

Vintagecatcher · #2 05-13-2019, 09:47 AM

Thanks again for you input Steve..

Looking at Jason's Hicks T210, where the border is misaligned, one can see a clear line where the name and team bar is laid over the bottom of the player image.

Patrick

steve B · #3 05-13-2019, 01:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vintagecatcher

Thanks again for you input Steve..

Looking at Jason's Hicks T210, where the border is misaligned, one can see a clear line where the name and team bar is laid over the bottom of the player image.

Patrick

We may just be saying the same thing in different ways.

On the original art used to produce the halftone the plates (Or in 1910, more likely a stone) yes, that was done. The picture was usually pasted to a board, then the name/team caption was pasted under it, not usually overlapping, as that would show up on the halftone and need to be fixed (Or not on some cards from other series) but close enough for our purposes.

The black plate would then have the pictures with the name and team captions under them, all on one plate.

Other things intended to print in black would have been hand painted onto the original photo, but it would still all be on the same plate that printed all the black.

shammus · #4 05-13-2019, 07:41 PM

Here's a few favorites from my collection. The OHalloran is one of my absolute favorite cards. Notice the irregular and oversized borders with white on the outside...it was cut off of something...would love to know what

The Bergen is a salmon colored Series 8 card. I think the Series 8s were prone to this slight border variation.

t210berg.jpg

43-192a_lg.jpg

t210OHalloran.jpg

Tim Kindler · #5 05-14-2019, 06:52 AM

Wow! I love this thread, so neat to see the process of how T210s were made!!! Great examples, and very educational......Thanks guys!!!

Vintagecatcher · #6 05-16-2019, 07:13 PM

Thanks again for all the responses!

T210s are just such a cool set.

I only wish more of them would come up for auction more frequently!

P.S. Jason...your Hick's freak T210 isn't really a "caption jump," but a "border bounce."

The alignment of the border framing is what is off, the caption is in it's regular or normal location.

Patrick

seablaster · #7 05-19-2019, 07:14 AM

I'm kinda late to the party, but what else is new?

Horizontal reverse misprint:

Proof that cards were oriented vertically and horizontally on at least one sheet:

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