1948-1955 Bowman series divisions and sheet layouts

[toppcat]

Timing the retail market in a way with the subbed sections.

[G1911]

Trying to do 1954. 1954 Bowman is a pain in the rear for this, as there are not many miscut cards. All of the ones on internal rows I have ever seen show what we expect, the 32 card 'sections' of 4 rows.

To start, here is Wietecha, bottom of "series 1" above another card, which cannot be discerned. It is, of course, impossible for any card to be below Wietecha if they were produced on 32 cards sheets by the alleged series. So this is enough to debunk the narrative, but doesn't tell us much beyond that.

[G1911]

This one, I got a break on. Trippi is in the bottom of "series/sheet 2". If he was printed on top of "sheet/series 4", the card beneath him would be Jack Christiansen.

Christiansen has a constant defect with a blue mark in the top border, effectively meaning we can identify the top of Christiansen's card even on an off center card above him, not a full miscut. This distinctive mark occurs recurrently on Charley Trippi cards off-centered, placing Trippi above Christiansen and as a result, block 2 above block 4.

So we have segments of:
1-32
???

33-64
97-128

So, we can prove the 32 card sheets are false with the Wietecha, and we can show series/sheet 2 and 4 were actually on the same sheet and series for at least part of the print run. Very strongly indicative that 1954 uses the 1955 replacement pattern OR it is a one series production (with 65-96 almost certainly produced less).

[G1911]

For 1954, another way to get datapoints is to use the packs. Obviously, cards in a series can only appear in a pack with other cards from that series. 1954 Bowman Football are a pretty common pack unlike other years, and so some have been opened in a documented venue.

The penny packs are useless, of course, but some of the 7 card nickel packs also exist and have been opened. Here's a video of one being opened several years ago (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zqcbn6_bro0), which alone should have debunked this 32 card series myth if the pack is authentic.

In order the cards are:

32 Elroy Hirsch
17 Bill Bowman
57 Chuck Bednarik
18 Leo Rucka
58 Art Hunter
19 John Cannady
59 William McColl

Hirsch + a 3 card sequence from "series 1" and a 3 card sequence from "series 2".




And another one from the same guys: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tv8S3DLJNqk

118 Stautner
111 Lavelli
119 Ray Smith
112 Leon Hart
120 Neil Worden
9 Pete Pihos
33 Harold Giancanelli

Series 4 and series 1 in the same pack (with several non-commons besides the ruined gum card).




And a third, this time going from the back of the pack to the front: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssu2jyT2Cys
119 Ray Smith
118 Stuatner
117 Olszewski
116 George Connor
115 Al Carmichael
114 Richard Lem Mon
113 Charlie Conerly

1 sequence of most of a row in order (collation must have sucked).



There are more, but the short of it is further evidence that this was either 1 series or 2 series following the 1955 baseball pattern of cards removed and replaced in a rotating sheet, making series a very different concept than the Topps concept.

[G1911]

And for the small size Bowmans, here is a 1950 Bowman 37 Bobby Layne showing a card above. This card 'should be' the top left corner of the second series 'sheet' if the assertions are true. This card suggests that there were not, as has been the story for the small size Bowmans as well, only cards 37-72 appearing once each on this sheet in numerical order.

[G1911]

And 1951 is debunked as well. Here's #6 Tom Fears with a card above him. The accepted story is that this sheet held 1-36 in numerical order in 4 rows, only once each. Thus, there cannot be a card above Fears on these alleged tiny sheets.

The card above looks like it might be #33 Lillywhite, but the sliver is too thin for me to be 100% sure that's right, only 90%. If correct, that would place a repeating section of 1-36 above 1-36 again on at least one of the layouts, possibly rotating layouts again rather than static sheets.

[G1911]

The 1948 story is also untrue.

This is allegedly a 3 sheet 108 card production, arranged so that cards 1, 4, 7, 10, and so on are sheet 1, cards 2, 5, 8, and so forth are sheet 2 and 3, 6, 9 and so on are sheet 3.

The evidence for this that Ted et al. used, and all the other false claims about Bowman sheets and series, is surviving panels. All these surviving panels lack any indica that they are a complete sheet, none of the enlarged edges that the border of a full sheet would have, or even a believable size that would make much production sense.

While printing blocks on a sheet, of course, follow the surviving panels, these blocks and panels are not sheets and they are not series as has been long claimed.

This card is allegedly the top right corner of sheet 1. Clearly, that is not the case and there was a block above. Above #25 Pat McHugh appears to be card #108 Buford Ray, placing sheet 3 above sheet 1.

1948 Bowman is clearly a 1 series and sheet release, and was not done on 36 card sheets. That sheet probably rotated subjects in the way typical of Bowman but Topps didn't do or copied block patterns an unequal number of times onto a static sheet. the 3rd sequence block cards do actually appear to be relative short prints, unlike the 1952 Bowman Large's for which there is no real evidence that the SP story is actually true and considerable evidence that it is false.