The purpose of this section is to provide periodic updates to information in my book. As I stumble across new sets, new information on catalogued sets, and so on, I will post the information here.  Please check back periodically as I never know what I will find from week to week. 

Analyzing The T220 Silver Borders

One set that has intrigued me for years is the silver bordered variation of T220 Mecca Cigarettes.  At this point it is generally accepted that the set consists of 25 cards (half the white bordered T220 issue) and is much scarcer than the white bordered set.  In reviewing registry sets and seeing individual collections of these cards, one thing I’ve noticed anecdotally is that certain cards appear to be short prints, as most collectors need them.  I also noticed that some recent near set auctions had the same 22 or 23 of 25 cards from the set (missing Mike Donovan and Jim Corbett).  I decided, therefore, to attempt an analysis of the set using set populations from the two major grading services (PSA and SGC).  My hypothesis was that if Donovan and Corbett were true short prints, they would have very low populations relative to the other cards in the set. 

A few words on methodology first.  Third party grading service (“TPG”) population reports are only partially accurate gauges of rarity due to a few factors.  The decision of whether to send in a card for grading is a voluntary one, the ramification being that people do not spend money slabbing undesirable cards.  In many sets, therefore, it is common to see a very high population of star cards as compared to commons, even in the absence of short prints, because submitters tend to send in the most valuable cards, which tend to be those depicting stars.  At least in the case of SGC, there are known errors in the T220 reporting that underreport the silver bordered graded cards, undoubtedly the result of listing them with the white borders when the pop report was first created.  I’ve corrected this where known.  Finally, and obviously, the cards sent in to the grading service do not reflect all of the cards out there, meaning that any analysis of pop reports has to be undertaken with the understanding that there are cards out there not reflected in the numbers.  Despite these limitations, over the decade plus since TPGs came into vogue, they have increased their samples in the pop reports to the point where they are useful rough tools for comparing the relative scarcity of different issues and the relative scarcity of different cards within any given issue. 

With those provisos in mind, I obtained the pop reports from PSA and SGC for the silver bordered T220 set.  The following are the results, broken down by scarcity:

Note that PSA does not even list the Donovan; it doesn’t exist per PSA (an idiotic state of affairs I cover on the Soapbox page; read if you enjoy Orwell).   

Two more notes:  The pop on the Young Corbett overstates its rarity.  There have been three recent auctions of near sets; all included raw Young Corbett cards.  Of the card collectors who’ve shared their raw sets with me, they have both Corbetts but no Donovans.  I would thus put the known population count of Young Corbett at 9 or 10 cards and the Jas. J. Corbett pop at 5 or more. 

The numbers support my observations.  The set can be divided into three tiers; Donovan, Corbett and all the rest.  Why Donovan is so rare (and Corbett is difficult as well) is something I cannot explain.  I know it wasn’t a case of Donovan being withdrawn a la Honus Wagner from T206 due to permission issues because he is in the white bordered set.  In fact, Donovan is the only boxer in the white bordered set with two solo (not in fight scenes) cards, one showing him as champion 30 years earlier and one showing him as the gray but fit boxing instructor of the New York Athletic Club (the pose used in the silver bordered set).  I know that the silver set was prepared before the white set because the silver card of Joe Coburn has a strange little man on its left side while the white bordered card has the man removed, though his silhouette still remains, meaning the white card used a reworked version of the silver card’s artwork. 

Why there would be two cards of Donovan but not of any of the other greats?  My hunch is that the silver bordered Donovan was a chase card of some sort.  I have to wonder if there wasn’t a prize associated with this set, one that is lost in history. 

Another Call For Help

After conferring with some sage minds in the boxing card field, we have another "does this exist" to be answered.  In the book I have catalogued the Fancy Script Blue Boxers as a set of 15 cards.  No one can seem to find cards of Mushy Callahan, Leo Lomski, Tommy Loughran, Sammy Mandell, Johnny Risko, Jack Sharkey and Billy Wallace.  Since no one can show one of these seven cards and I don't have them either, unless someone comes forward before the next edition, they will be deleted.  Just so you can see what the cards in question would look like, below is a fancy script Al Singer.  Note the ornate handwritten legend, hence the fancy script name:



Exhibit Blank Backs and Made In USA Ink Stamps

As you undoubtedly know from reading my book, Exhibit boxing cards from 1921-1928 have back copy and dated copyright notices.  Until recently, only a few cards were known to violate this rule.  A 1922 Frankie Schmalzer was known blank backed and with a 1922 copyright back and some of the 1928 cards were known in blank backed format.  I recently found some others from some other years.  Now, these may be error cards where the back printing was simply omitted; I don't know.  But they do exist. 

The ink stamps are a bit easier to explain.  ESCO sent some of its product to Canada, which required a designation of origins on the cards.  Rather than redoing all the art, the company used a rubber stamp to ink a small origins notice on some card backs.  This stamp appears in baseball cards as well and should not be considered to be damage to the card.  SGC will take factory stamps into account when slabbing cards. 

N386 Has A New Brand: Canada Chop

Every so often a new brand of tobacco will be found in an existing set.  Usually, the set itself is quite rare.  N386 contains John L. Sullivan and Jake Kilrain cards issued with Echo and Plowboy branding.  They are rare.  Three backs are known for the cards, ads for the two brands and a blank back with a D in a diamond, which appears to be a stamp advertising diamond brand matches.  Recently, an N386 Sullivan with the blank/stamped back surfaced with a front ad saying "Smoke Canada Chop" instead of Echo or Plow Boy.  The card sold for $4,650.00 on Ebay. 



1925 Exhibit Set Ad Piece

A friend, Paul Holstein (hi Paul) sent me a scan of a 1925 Pancho Villa with an advertisement on the back listing the set as 96 cards.  The image is below.  The problem is, I have a checklist of 100 cards.  Now, two of the cards are blank-backed (Izzard and Bonillas), so perhaps we take them out.  It still leaves 98 cards.  There are four confirmed Dempsey cards with 1925 copyright backs, though.  If we count them as one card, that takes the count to 95 cards.  So is there a 96th back out there?  Did ESCO advertise 96 cards but make some changes as the print run went on?  I suppose we will never know. 



E282 Goudey Oh Boy Gum Card Jack Dempsey Surfaces

OK, it ain't a 1948 Leaf Graziano, but it is just as rare, with only two specimens having surfaced in the last several years.  An E282 Dempsey appeared on Ebay in October 2007 and sold for quite a bit less than $27,600 (around $27,475 less).  Here is an image of this very elusive card from one of Goudey's first ventures into card manufacturing:



Jack Dempsey Training Camp Set Dated To 1923

In the last edition of the catalog I reported on a set of 12 small photographic cards issued in a cardboard clamshell box that appeared to be souvenirs of Jack Dempsey's training camp.  Owing to the research of my friend collector Arthur Rich, we can now definitively pin down the issue as circa 1923.  Arthur found a letter with original canceled envelope from June 1923 recounting a visit to the training camp and enclosing four of the cards.  Here is an image of one of the cards from the set:

1924 Flying Fists Benny Leonard Stand-Up

I am really excited about this one.  Benny Leonard starred in a series of short films in 1924.  The stand-up shown below is a promotional item from that series.  It does not appear to be popped out of a card but rather is a stand-alone die-cut like an E125.  I'm guessing that the delicate nature of the item (the head and arm are vulnerable to tearing) is part of why I've never seen anything like it before.  Here is what I learned about the films:

Flying Fists (1924)

A series of six two-reel boxing dramas, each story complete in itself. The episode titles are: #1: Breaking In; #2: Hitting Hard; #3: Soft Muscles; #4: The Comeback; #5: The Surprise Fight; #6: The Jazz Fight.

Writer: Sam Hellman                     

Cast

Benny Leonard    ...             Benny Lane

Diana Allen           ...             Helen

Frank Evans         ...             Helen's Father

Billy Mitchell        ...             Cream-Cheese

Since Leonard and a lot of the film business were based in New York I am willing to bet that the films were shot there. 

The stand-up represents the only memorabilia I've ever seen relating to Benny Leonard's silent film career. 



T220 Silver Borders: I need your help

I am starting the arduous process of preparing the 2008 book.  Part of my work is revising checklists.  As many of you know, T220 is checklisted at present at 26 cards.  I am having grave doubts about the existence of one of them, however.  Jack Goodman.  Although he is referenced in earlier guides and checklists as having a silver bordered card, no one I know has one and no one has been able to show me one.  And I know a lot of boxing collectors and have seen very advanced collectors with the card missing from their sets.  In fact, all of the top PSA registered T220 silver borders sets are incomplete and of the four I was able to access online at PSA's site, all are missing the Goodman.  I've checked with every advanced collector I know and none of them have the card.  So, I throw it out there for the wider audience: can anyone substantiate the existence of this card?  If no one can come forward with a copy by the time I go to publish the 2008 guide, I am dropping the Goodman from the checklist. 

1946 M-Uncatalogued "Ring" Champions



As noted in my book, this rare set was issued in the late 1940s and reprinted from time to time, either with or without authorization,  into the 1970s.  I have since found a few variations and differences in the subjects and have gotten a better understanding of how the set was composed.  I will share some of that information here.

The original set was printed on stock very similar to strip card stock and illustrated the heavyweight champs from Sullivan to Louis.  I can verify three colors of printing: black, blue and red.  At least two cards were changed from the first printing to a subsequent printing: Jack Sharkey (see above) can be found in either a full length pose or in a mid-thighs up pose, and Max Baer's card has different spacing and font in its legend.  It appears that in a subsequent printing some different, nicer, but still thin stock was used.  I discovered this when I purchased a pristine set, new to the hobby, from a seller who thought they were Exhibit cards.  At some point, in the 1950s or even 1960s, the set was reprinted on thicker stock in various colors.  I can verify that the set is a reprint rather than a reissue because the cards are later generation pictures of the original cards.  What I do not know is whether they were made by the same manufacturer.  You would expect that the original maker would have the original half-tone screens and would not need to re-shoot and re-screen the cards, but I can't say for certain.  I am able to attribute the date because later fighters are included in the reprints.  The last wave of these cards seems to be a 1970s issue, again based on the fighters shown.  That set, at least the one I saw, was printed on thin, slick stock. 

Rare 4 On 1 Exhibit Cards Discovered

In the book I catalogued one card from this set, featuring Dave Shade and Eugene Criqui with baseball players Ty Cobb and Joe Judge.  Well, this year the known set dramatically expanded.  First, a previously unknown card featuring Jack Dempsey, Rocky Kansas, Stanley Harris (HOF baseball player) and Heinie Groh (baseball) surfaced on ebay from a vintage collection being sold off by a Texas dealer.  This card was particularly exciting for me because it was the extremely rare postcard back with the "not to be used in exhibit machines" legend and an exhibit back coupon.  This is only the third card I've ever seen with that particular back.  The other two, a Blue Boxers card of Tony Canzoneri and a baseball card of Roger Peckinpaugh, surfaced in dealer lots some time ago and now reside in private hands (not mine, unfortunately). 

One weird thing: the Dempsey-Kansas card has the boxers and baseball players facing opposite directions and is the only card not printed in black.  There is a 4 on 1 of Cobb, Judge and two entertainers that follows this format too.  It is blank backed, has two toned front ink (red for the entertainers and blue for the ballplayers) and may even predate these four cards.  I hope to post an image shortly. 

In late June, an even more impressive lot of four of these cards surfaced in an estate in the Los Angeles area.  All four were postcard backed but without coupons.  The cards included the Dempsey-Kansas and Shade-Criqui cards referenced above, plustwo previously uncatalogued cards of Babe Ruth-Rogers Hornsby-Mickey Walker-Georges Carpentier and Walter Johnson-Al Simmons-Benny Leonard-Gene Tunney. 

Obviously, the expansion of this set is major news for exhibit collectors, baseball collectors and boxing collectors.  The discovery of new cards of Ruth and Johnson, who are widely considered to be the greatest baseball field player and pitcher, respectively, is very exciting for baseball collectors, as it adds new cards of these iconic figures to the "must have" lists of their fans. 

One interesting aspect of the finds are how they further tie the rare 4 on 1 issue into the Blue Boxers.  The boxers' images selected are all from the first run of the Blue Boxers, the 1925 stats back set.  The Kansas and Tunney images are not repeated in the postcard backed Blue Boxers of later print runs.  In conjunction with the team designations of ballplayers Ty Cobb and Rogers Hornsby, the use of the older images strongly suggests that the art from the 1925 Blue Boxer and first run of the 1925-31 PC back baseball sets were used to create these cards.  The discovery of the coupon backed Dempsey-Kansas card does raise a chronological dilemma, however, one that I admit I cannot answer as of yet.  As far as I can tell, ESCO began experimenting with coupons in late 1927, when it added a rubber stamped coupon to the backs of a scant few of its baseball cards.  These extremely rare variations were followed in early 1928 with the use of coupons on the backs of the 1928 Pacific Coast League baseball set (itself a very rare set), on some of the 1928 baseball cards, on many entertainment cards, and on some of the 1928 boxing cards.  The coupon on the Peckinpaugh PC back card has to be a late 1927 or early 1928 printing because Peckinpaugh is shown with Cleveland, where was hired to manage after the 1927 season.  There is also the issue of 4 on 1 mainstream cards, which first appeared in the mid to late 1920s for entertainment cards and in 1929 for baseball cards.  I suspect that the 4 on 1 cards shown below are first attempts by ESCO to create 4 on 1 cards and were printed only very briefly before being discarded for the aesthetically nicer format of the later 4 on 1 efforts.  The labels in particular look slapdash and unfinished as compared to the later cards with their clean front legends.  We will likely never know anything more than that about when these cards were issued but one thing is for certain: they are extremely rare.



La Salle Hats Mystery Resolved?

The La Salle Hat Company issued a set of cards in the late 1930s that has long baffled collectors.  They are unattractive, on thin stock, rare and obscure, which is never a good combination, and featured no discernable fighter selection criteria, advertising or other explanations of the issue.  At the recent National Sports Collectors Convention in Cleveland, we finally got some answers. 

A full set of La Salle Hats surfaced in its original envelope.  It turns out that there were only 8 cards issues and they were only of lightweight champions; Joe Gans was the final card missing from the checklist in my book.  The envelope reads "A picture collection of famous lightweight champs furnished with the compliments of La Salle Hat Company, Philadelphia and [there is a box to fill in a name]". 

The set was a late 1936 or early 1937 issue; the last fighter in it, chronologically, was Lou Ambers, who beat Tony Canzoneri for the title on September 3, 1936.  Oddly, the set runs from the 1890s to 1936 yet is missing Jimmy Britt (1904-1905), Battling Nelson (1905-1906, 1908-1910), Willie Ritchie (1912-1914), Freddie Welsh (1914-1917), Benny Leonard (1917 to 1/15/1925, retires), Jimmy Goodrich (1925), Al Singer (1930), and Barney Ross (1933).  Why these boxers were omitted from the set is unknown.  Leonard, who held tthe title 7 years during the greatest run of lightweights in history, is the most puzzling omission. 

Here is a picture of a card from the set: