Unconfirmed POLAR BEAR cards vs 1910 COUPON cards

[Abravefan11]

Hi Barry – This situation is a complex one to say the least but I’ll try and give a brief and hopefully easy to understand answer.

There are 68 Coupon Type 1’s that breakdown as follows.
20 - Southern Leaguers (All Southern Association)
6 – Super Prints
42 - 350 Only

We know the 20 SL’ers were not printed with Polar Bear backs.

The six Super prints were printed with Polar Bear backs.

Of the remaining 42 I show the following:

A+B+C+D – 3 No Prints

Polar Bear – 39 Unconfirmed
Carolina Brights – 32 Unconfirmed
Old Mill – 31 Unconfirmed

If we select just a subset of the T213-1’s (350 Only) it would seem at first look like there is a correlation between the PB No Prints, or CB’s, or OM’s and the 350 Only players included in the Coupon 1 set and there might be (more on that later) but it’s not a printing connection like the 350 A+B+C+D or BL460/Red Hindu. There are enough anomalies when comparing the groups that show they’re not a match. The same goes for the Coupon Type 1 and A+B+C+D.

[tedzan]

Regarding your......"There are enough anomalies when comparing the groups that show they’re not a match.
The same goes for the Coupon Type 1 and A+B+C+D."

As of today, 23 of the 48 Major Leaguers in the COUPON set conform to the "Quintuplicate" back design.
And, another future large DRUM find might just add 12 more COUPON subjects to this list.

A-B-Co-Cy-D confirmed cards......

Becker
Chance (portrait-yellow)
Charles
Chase (blue portrait)
Cobb (red portrait)
Donovan (throw)
Engle
Evers (bat-yellow sky)
Huggins (portrait)
Hunter
Killian (portrait)
Knabe
LaPorte
Lennox
Mathewson (dark cap)
Marshall
McBride
Myers (fielding)
Starr
Street (portrait)
Summers
Sweeney (bat)
Willett


Yes, the COUPON-1 set is an "enigma'....but, at the same time I find this set quite fascinating. For instance,
there are 48 Major Leaguers from the 350-only series. Now, where have we seen that number (48) before ?

Southern League series and the 460-only series....perhaps, 48-card sheets were a standard sheet format at
American Litho. ? ?


TED Z

[Abravefan11]

Ted - Only about 10% of the 350 Only players are "No Prints" in the A+B+C+D. So if you select a group of 42 to be in the Coupon set is makes sense that almost all of them will exist in both. But No Print A+B+C+D do exist in the Coupon Type 1 and this is telling.

I think you're on the right track at looking at the number of cards in this set, but I don't think it's 48. 48 was the total number of Southern Leaguers but all weren't produced in the first run. Only 34 were printed in the 150 series. 34 x 2 = 68. How many cards in the Coupon Type 1 set? 68

[tedzan]

1st....As you know, the Piedmont and Old Mill press runs of the SL series are 48 cards. If the press run of the 34 SL Hindu cards
was also printed on a 48-card sheet, then I can imagine that they filled out that sheet with 14 Major Leaguers (ML). And, there
were many, many more Piedmont and Old Mill SLer's printed than Hindu SLer's.

Look, I'm using the example of 48 since it has occurred often in this set. It is one possible format (12 cards across x 4 rows down).
Of course, there are certainly other possible sheet configurations.

2nd....Regarding the Coupon set. You are mixing ML subjects with SL subjects. It doesn't work that way. We have concluded that
ALC pre-printed fronts of T206's (at least 4 or 5 sheets within the 350-only series) and added the tobacco brand back as needed.
The pre-printed sheets of SL cards were separate from the ML sheets.
Therefore, what I am saying is that a pre-printed sheet of 48 ML (from an early 350-only series run) was selected and printed with
the Coupon backs. And, I emphasize an EARLY RUN, since many of the subjects on that sheet designated for the Coupon backs were
retired ballplayers during the 1909 season.


TED Z

[Abravefan11]

In my opinion the original 34 SL players were printed on one sheet or sheets first. The additional 14 came later and were included on sheets with other minor or major league players. This explains why even though the original 34 are available on more backs than the added 14, the added 14 are more common. They were mass produced since their sheets contained major leaguers as opposed to just SLer's. Also this is backed up by the Brown Old Mill cards only showing up within the original 34 group. Just those sheets had the Brown Old Mill printed on them.

Concerning the 48 major leaguers from the Coupon Type 1 set you need to keep in mind that 6 of those are Super Prints, so we're really discussing 42 350 Only players.

With that said I'm not mixing up the SL and ML players. The Coupon Type 1 were printed with front image sheets specific to that back. 68 front images in some order that then had the backs printed on them. They did not in my opinion segregate the ML and SL players onto different sheets for that issue as they did with the first 34 in the 150 series.

[tedzan]

There were 48 Major Leaguers on that COUPON sheet....not 42.

I hate to be argumentative with you....but, the Six Super Prints were originally 350-only subjects.
This is incontrovertible, since these six cards exist with AB 350 Frame backs.
Furthermore, they also exist with Sweet Caporal 460, Factory 30 backs; therefore, they are not 350/460 subjects.

As Scot Reader once described these six subjects...."they are 350-only, and 460-only cards at the same time"....
split personalities, so to say.


TED Z

[Abravefan11]

That's a good point and I'm willing to concede it to you if I could be sure the Coupons were printed during the early 350 print run. They may have been but I'm not sure I've seen enough yet to convince me of that.

[ethicsprof]

very helpful and very intricate elucidations. many thanks.
Tim, when you say that 'it would seem at first look like there is a correlation...
and there might be... but it's not a printing connection,' may I ask (using Ted's language) what the explicit correlation is and should it be considered
serendipitous cobbling or diligent intentionality by the designer?
forgive any excursus from the thread, please.

best,
barry