1949 Leaf Theory

[yanks87]

Pat- these are all great, can I ask where you are getting all of these great clips from?

[Pat R]

Originally Posted by yanks87

Pat- these are all great, can I ask where you are getting all of these great clips from?

Old newspapers, I find that they can be helpful in eliminating some of the card versions of the "Mandela effect".

I've seen several opinions why Graziano was short printed by Leaf but I think it would be a heck of a coincidence if it wasn't because he was banned by the NBA right around the time Leaf started printing his boxing cards. He was banned in the end of November 1948.



[IMG][/IMG]

[yanks87]

Originally Posted by Pat R

Old newspapers, I find that they can be helpful in eliminating some of the card versions of the "Mandela effect".

I've seen several opinions why Graziano was short printed by Leaf but I think it would be a heck of a coincidence if it wasn't because he was banned by the NBA right around the time Leaf started printing his boxing cards. He was banned in the end of November 1948.



[IMG][/IMG]

Mandela Effect indeed. That is why I’m going to the Chicago history museum this spring to look through donations from the Leaf family. I am certain there will not be a silver bullet moment in there, but I hope to fill in some info about the company, that in turn could help fill in the story of Leaf cards and there production.

[bleeckerstreetcards]

Brian - did you make it to chicago to review the Leaf family items? Any updates on your findings?

Such a fascinating thread

[yanks87]

Originally Posted by bleeckerstreetcards

Brian - did you make it to chicago to review the Leaf family items? Any updates on your findings?

Such a fascinating thread

I did, and further down the rabbit hole I went. I actually spoke with Beckett last week, and a lot of what I found we review on an episode of his podcast. I'll boil it down to the cliff notes version.

**First off, Ted Z is the ultimate resource for all things from this era, his anecdotal information is second to none, a true gentleman of the hobby. Kudos to Steve Birmingham as well, we have a great email thread going spitballing ideas on everything from printing to plate variations. One more, George Vrechek from Sports Collectors Digest, his wrote an article in 2009 which proved to be a "Rosetta Stone" for a couple of things about the set.

The Chicago History Museum had donations from the Marshall Leaf estate, (Marshall) was the son of Sol Leaf, the founder of the company. In the boxes and printed materials, one thing became obvious; Leaf was a candy company, cards were made to get kids to buy candy. Leaf owned several businesses, not just Overland, but also Dietz Gum who both produced cards in the 30's, but they also did non-sport cards with the likes of Disney and Playboy which continued on into the 70's. Within the boxes, there were examples of the Boxing and Football cards, no baseball, but what I learned from all the materials and meeting minutes was that in '47 to '49, Leaf was growing. They were building a new factory on N. Cicero in Chicago and erecting neon billboards on Michigan Ave. I think the cards were a cannonball attempt in the candy market to make a big statement.

When you start digging into the stories from Ted, and put that against the Leaf marketing materials that I saw, along with the injunctions that Bowman brought against Leaf in March and May of '49, the latter aimed at East Coast distributors of the cards, it becomes 99% viable to say that the cards hit the market in '49. The ONLY way that this could be disputed would be to find someone like Ted in the Chicago area that bought the cards in 1948, and to this date I have not been able to find that. When you sprinkle in the info on the backs and the fact that the first run of cards have '49 copyrights sprinkled in with '48's, sales in 1948 would have cards that carry a '49 copyright, which doesn't make sense. As Ted has said, the copyright means that the text was written in '48, and when work resumed on the set in '49, the copyright changed. I also have a theory that there are cards from the sets that could have been produced as "salesman samples". I think the Graziano, alternate Newhouser and perhaps football card that did not change, could have actually been the cards sent out with the salesmen to show off the cards that would be following in 1949. Both of those cards carry the '48 copyright, though the front image of the short print Newhouser is different than the one or two that surface from time to time. This could also explain the blue back Joe Louis.

My short summation is going long, but one thing that I think is an important point to make, and it follows up what I started the thread with, there was a plate change made to this set yielding versions of the cards that are different than the earlier printings. of the variations that are recognized by the industry, Kent Peterson is the exact variation that I am talking about. MOST, not all, but MOST of the changes that were made can be found in the details of the hats. By removing the detail of the black plate, done with a solvent, the hats become brighter. I am working off of the uncut sheet that Ted provided earlier in the thread to illustrate how the cards changed. Another element that myself and Steve have noticed is the addition of color bars to the backgrounds to "close off" the cards in spots, so that the "white" of uniforms don't bleed into the borders. I will attach two images that I worked up that illustrate this, but take a look at your Leafs. you may have a variation and not realize it. The last part which of course will be added to an already hard sell is the "pink" prints, which in my theory were the last of the 'Late Prints" as they carry the missing hat details from the "Late Printing."

The images below show Stan Musial's card that I took into photoshop and left only the Cyan and Black channels on to illustrate how the cap details were removed and what the card looks like. The second image is the top row of the uncut sheet, top line is the first printing, second line is the late printing, third is the pink print.

**PHEW** for those that stayed with me, thank you, this has been an amazing research project and there is so much more to go into, but this brings it up to date...for now. Thanks for the continued interest and collaboration in cracking the code on this set!!

[Leon]

Originally Posted by yanks87

I did, and further down the rabbit hole I went. I actually spoke with Beckett last week, and a lot of what I found we review on an episode of his podcast. I'll boil it down to the cliff notes version.

**First off, Ted Z is the ultimate resource for all things from this era, his anecdotal information is second to none, a true gentleman of the hobby. Kudos to Steve Birmingham as well, we have a great email thread going spitballing ideas on everything from printing to plate variations. One more, George Vrechek from Sports Collectors Digest, his wrote an article in 2009 which proved to be a "Rosetta Stone" for a couple of things about the set.

The Chicago History Museum had donations from the Marshall Leaf estate, (Marshall) was the son of Sol Leaf, the founder of the company. In the boxes and printed materials, one thing became obvious; Leaf was a candy company, cards were made to get kids to buy candy. Leaf owned several businesses, not just Overland, but also Dietz Gum who both produced cards in the 30's, but they also did non-sport cards with the likes of Disney and Playboy which continued on into the 70's. Within the boxes, there were examples of the Boxing and Football cards, no baseball, but what I learned from all the materials and meeting minutes was that in '47 to '49, Leaf was growing. They were building a new factory on N. Cicero in Chicago and erecting neon billboards on Michigan Ave. I think the cards were a cannonball attempt in the candy market to make a big statement.

When you start digging into the stories from Ted, and put that against the Leaf marketing materials that I saw, along with the injunctions that Bowman brought against Leaf in March and May of '49, the latter aimed at East Coast distributors of the cards, it becomes 99% viable to say that the cards hit the market in '49. The ONLY way that this could be disputed would be to find someone like Ted in the Chicago area that bought the cards in 1948, and to this date I have not been able to find that. When you sprinkle in the info on the backs and the fact that the first run of cards have '49 copyrights sprinkled in with '48's, sales in 1948 would have cards that carry a '49 copyright, which doesn't make sense. As Ted has said, the copyright means that the text was written in '48, and when work resumed on the set in '49, the copyright changed. I also have a theory that there are cards from the sets that could have been produced as "salesman samples". I think the Graziano, alternate Newhouser and perhaps football card that did not change, could have actually been the cards sent out with the salesmen to show off the cards that would be following in 1949. Both of those cards carry the '48 copyright, though the front image of the short print Newhouser is different than the one or two that surface from time to time. This could also explain the blue back Joe Louis.

My short summation is going long, but one thing that I think is an important point to make, and it follows up what I started the thread with, there was a plate change made to this set yielding versions of the cards that are different than the earlier printings. of the variations that are recognized by the industry, Kent Peterson is the exact variation that I am talking about. MOST, not all, but MOST of the changes that were made can be found in the details of the hats. By removing the detail of the black plate, done with a solvent, the hats become brighter. I am working off of the uncut sheet that Ted provided earlier in the thread to illustrate how the cards changed. Another element that myself and Steve have noticed is the addition of color bars to the backgrounds to "close off" the cards in spots, so that the "white" of uniforms don't bleed into the borders. I will attach two images that I worked up that illustrate this, but take a look at your Leafs. you may have a variation and not realize it. The last part which of course will be added to an already hard sell is the "pink" prints, which in my theory were the last of the 'Late Prints" as they carry the missing hat details from the "Late Printing."

The images below show Stan Musial's card that I took into photoshop and left only the Cyan and Black channels on to illustrate how the cap details were removed and what the card looks like. The second image is the top row of the uncut sheet, top line is the first printing, second line is the late printing, third is the pink print.

**PHEW** for those that stayed with me, thank you, this has been an amazing research project and there is so much more to go into, but this brings it up to date...for now. Thanks for the continued interest and collaboration in cracking the code on this set!!

Nicely done! Great research. Thanks for sharing.

Teddy (hey Ted) is always fun to chat with. A wealth of expertise too, as well as the other gentlemen mentioned .

I love uncut strips and sheets but this is all I have, per the subject matter.
It's in a CSG 1.5 holder now.
.

[yanks87]

Originally Posted by Leon

Nicely done! Great research. Thanks for sharing.

Teddy (hey Ted) is always fun to chat with. A wealth of expertise too, as well as the other gentlemen mentioned .

I love uncut strips and sheets but this is all I have, per the subject matter.
It's in a CSG 1.5 holder now.
.

Thanks Leon! It's been a lot of fun, and still more to do. That's a good looking Stan, love all the cards in the set! Tough to chose a favorite!!

That said, Stan is right up there.

[ngrow9]

Bumping this thread as I am in the process of reviewing the original court documents from the Bowman v. Leaf lawsuit filed in 1949 in Chicago. Leaf's filings in the case shed definitive light on some of the questions raised here.

For instance, the company conclusively states in court filings that its baseball product was first released to the public in March 1949. So the cards were not released in 1948 despite copyright dates to the contrary. Moreover, they were first released in Boston, and by May had reached roughly 80% of the 48 states. So this was a national, not regional, release.

Leaf released its first football set in fall of 1948. It used the same wrappers for its initial run of 1949 baseball cards. So the "All Star Pictures" wrapper Ted Z. posted earlier in the thread is the original baseball wrapper. The company specifically noted it used the same wrapper for both football and baseball cards in its March 1949 case filing. The wrapper with the "All Star Baseball" wording must have come later. While the wording of the wrappers do not appear to have been directly at issue in the litigation, Bowman did contest the similar manner in which Leaf generally marketed its product (both sold packs of 5 cards and 3 sticks of gum for 5 cents each).

Leaf released its Knock Out boxing set in early 1949.

Leaf originally publicized its intent to release a 300 card baseball set in 1949.

Bowman eventually filed a second case in Philadelphia after failing to secure an injunction stopping Leaf from distributing its product in the Chicago case. This is the court order some have referenced here. Leaf was actually not a party to that case, it was filed only against Philadelphia area distributors and sellers of the Leaf product. So reports that Leaf cards have been disproportionately found in the Midwest likely suggest that east coast distribution was curtailed by the second lawsuit. But cards were distributed on the east coast initially.

Leaf and Bowman continued to litigate in Chicago through 1949, eventually culminating in the aforementioned settlement agreement in March 1950, under which Leaf agreed to leave the field through at least 1951.

I'm reviewing these materials as research for a book on the legal history of the baseball card industry, one that will hopefully be of interest to many here.

[G1911]

Originally Posted by ngrow9

Bumping this thread as I am in the process of reviewing the original court documents from the Bowman v. Leaf lawsuit filed in 1949 in Chicago. Leaf's filings in the case shed definitive light on some of the questions raised here.

For instance, the company conclusively states in court filings that its baseball product was first released to the public in March 1949. So the cards were not released in 1948 despite copyright dates to the contrary. Moreover, they were first released in Boston, and by May had reached roughly 80% of the 48 states. So this was a national, not regional, release.

Leaf released its first football set in fall of 1948. It used the same wrappers for its initial run of 1949 baseball cards. So the "All Star Pictures" wrapper Ted Z. posted earlier in the thread is the original baseball wrapper. The company specifically noted it used the same wrapper for both football and baseball cards in its March 1949 case filing. The wrapper with the "All Star Baseball" wording must have come later. While the wording of the wrappers do not appear to have been directly at issue in the litigation, Bowman did contest the similar manner in which Leaf generally marketed its product (both sold packs of 5 cards and 3 sticks of gum for 5 cents each).

Leaf released its Knock Out boxing set in early 1949, followed shortly after by a basketball set.

Leaf originally publicized its intent to release a 300 card baseball set in 1949.

Bowman eventually filed a second case in Philadelphia after failing to secure an injunction stopping Leaf from distributing its product in the Chicago case. This is the court order some have referenced here. Leaf was actually not a party to that case, it was filed only against Philadelphia area distributors and sellers of the Leaf product. So reports that Leaf cards have been disproportionately found in the Midwest likely suggest that east coast distribution was curtailed by the second lawsuit. But cards were distributed on the east coast initially.

Leaf and Bowman continued to litigate in Chicago through 1949, eventually culminating in the aforementioned settlement agreement in March 1950, under which Leaf agreed to leave the field through at least 1951.

I'm reviewing these materials as research for a book on the legal history of the baseball card industry, one that will hopefully be of interest to many here.

Well, sign me up to order a copy of this book once its available

The boxing set has long been said to have been released twice, once in 1948 and once in 1949 (reflecting the two backs), but the source for this claim seems to be memories rather than evidentiary material.

[yanks87]

Originally Posted by ngrow9

Bumping this thread as I am in the process of reviewing the original court documents from the Bowman v. Leaf lawsuit filed in 1949 in Chicago. Leaf's filings in the case shed definitive light on some of the questions raised here.

For instance, the company conclusively states in court filings that its baseball product was first released to the public in March 1949. So the cards were not released in 1948 despite copyright dates to the contrary. Moreover, they were first released in Boston, and by May had reached roughly 80% of the 48 states. So this was a national, not regional, release.

Leaf released its first football set in fall of 1948. It used the same wrappers for its initial run of 1949 baseball cards. So the "All Star Pictures" wrapper Ted Z. posted earlier in the thread is the original baseball wrapper. The company specifically noted it used the same wrapper for both football and baseball cards in its March 1949 case filing. The wrapper with the "All Star Baseball" wording must have come later. While the wording of the wrappers do not appear to have been directly at issue in the litigation, Bowman did contest the similar manner in which Leaf generally marketed its product (both sold packs of 5 cards and 3 sticks of gum for 5 cents each).

Leaf released its Knock Out boxing set in early 1949, followed shortly after by a basketball set.

Leaf originally publicized its intent to release a 300 card baseball set in 1949.

Bowman eventually filed a second case in Philadelphia after failing to secure an injunction stopping Leaf from distributing its product in the Chicago case. This is the court order some have referenced here. Leaf was actually not a party to that case, it was filed only against Philadelphia area distributors and sellers of the Leaf product. So reports that Leaf cards have been disproportionately found in the Midwest likely suggest that east coast distribution was curtailed by the second lawsuit. But cards were distributed on the east coast initially.

Leaf and Bowman continued to litigate in Chicago through 1949, eventually culminating in the aforementioned settlement agreement in March 1950, under which Leaf agreed to leave the field through at least 1951.

I'm reviewing these materials as research for a book on the legal history of the baseball card industry, one that will hopefully be of interest to many here.

Where were you able to find the court filings/litigation records? I am wrapping up a book specifically on Leaf and I wasn't able to find documentation on the Bowman suit? Most of the things that I found alluded to the fact that it was settled out of court.

It's interesting that Marshall was involved at all, being that he had just come back from the war, and Sol and Harry were still very much in charge of the company. If you are comfortable sharing any of your findings around the suit, I definitely would love to update that chapter to be accurate.

What I found to be the release order of the cards put Pirates first, Unnumbered, then Numbered (TedZ corroborated this), then Boxing as cited in the article, followed by the 1948 Football Issue, a March release of the Baseball cards carrying '48 and '49 copyrights, and then the 1949 issue of football and the smaller short print issue which was limited in it's distribution after the May injunction shutting down east coast distribution.

Any info you have, I would love to check out! Thanks for chiming in!