T215 (Red Cross) issue mystery....can anyone explain ?

[FrankWakefield]

I think Mr. Lipset got it right.

The few T215s that were around were primarily in the hands of Louisiana collectors. The cards were found there. When I bought a bunch of Old Mill red border cards, about a third of them were series 6. I think the guy I got them from got them from a collector who bought them from the family of the original collector from years ago, and he was a Kentuckian. That's why most of the cards were series 6 Blue Grass League cards, so I then thought, and continue to think.

I don't have a Mono tobacco card. Wish I did, missed my best chance on getting one at a modest cost 25 years ago, or so. My understanding is that they have no factory designation on the back. Also, a generation ago, most T217 Mono's were in California. I don't necessarily think that remains true today. There may well be more there than any other state, but many have wandered out into the hands of other collectors.

I think Louisiana is where the T215s were distributed, I think that's where second generation collectors found them... and now they're spread over creation.

[jimonym]

I wonder if at some point there wasn't a conflation of Red Cross and Red Sun.

There's some documentary evidence that the brands produced by the W.R. Irby Branch of the American Tobacco Company in New Orleans (of which Red Sun was one) were chiefly distributed in Louisiana, Texas, and surrounding areas. Prior to selling out to the ATC in 1899, Irby was primarily a producer of cigars, cigarettes and snuff and that product line stayed pretty much the same afterward.

P. Lorillard had a huge factory in Jersey City, and had no factory in Louisiana. But products were shipped by rail all over the place of course. Here's an ad for a Salt Lake City grocer from 1888, and he's offering Lorilliard's Red Cross tobacco for sale.

[FrankWakefield]

I can see a distinction between Red Cross tobacco packages and Red Cross tobacco cards. There may well have been ball cards in all Red Cross packages. Ball cards might have been put in the packages to compete on a regional basis.

Anecdotal history that I've heard is consistent with what Mr. Burdick and Mr. Lipset have. I think the T215 cards were distributed in Red Cross cigarette packages in Louisiana about 99 years ago. And for years most of the cards turned up in Louisiana.

I have one, it is in Kentucky. I bought it from Mr. Lipset about 20 years ago, when he was in New York. I think that card was printed in New York, delivered to a factory in New Jersey, packaged with cigarettes in a Red Cross tobacco package, shipped to Louisiana, and then the package was sold to a consumer.