Note: Much of the background detail in this story is stuff I learned from reading T206resource.com. Most of my readers will probably be familiar with the site, but if not, make sure to check it out.
In August 1909, Hindu Cigarettes ads featuring T206 images began appearing in the Times-Picayune Daily and Evening newspapers in New Orleans*. The ads ran for six weeks from August 2nd to September 10th. There were 12 ads in total.
The first five ads featured only major-leaguers. The sixth ad featured both Major Leaguers and Southern Leaguers. The final six ads featured only Southern Leaguers.
If you collect T206 cards with Hindu backs, you may notice something odd about the ads above and below. The following four poses appear in the advertisements, but were not actually printed with Brown Hindu backs:
Dooin
Lobert
Nicholls (Hands on Knees)
Waddell (Throwing)
It’s not known why these players were advertised but then omitted from the print run. A similar omission occurred with the Southern Leaguers. The ad below features Southern Leaguers Breitenstein, Hickman and Jordan, who were all printed with Brown Hindu backs. The text in the box at the bottom of the ad reads, “This collection consists of a large assortment of colored lithographs of baseball players in the Southern, South Atlantic, Texas, and Virginia Leagues.”
Players from the Southern, South Atlantic, and Virginia Leagues were indeed printed with Hindu backs, but none of the Texas Leaguers were.
*It is believed that the T206 Hindu Ads were published exclusively in the New Orleans Times-Picayune
George McBride was the epitome of the “good-field, no-hit” shortstop. In fact, he owns the record for lowest career Batting Average for an player with more than 5,000 At Bats (.218). Because of his lack of hitting ability, it took a while for him to secure a starting job. Once he did so, he took the job and ran with it. From 1901 to 1907, he bounced around between 6 different Minor League teams, along with the St. Louis Cardinals and Pittsburgh Pirates.
In 1908 as a twenty-seven-year-old, McBride was finally given a chance to play full-time by the Washington Senators. He played 155 games at shortstop and turned in a Defensive WAR of 2.6, which was good for 2nd in the American League. Of course, WAR wasn’t a stat in use by any teams back then. However, McBride’s defensive prowess was such that the team didn’t need stats to recognize it. In 1909, he was named Captain of the Senators, a position he held for his entire tenure with the club*.
1908 was the beginning of a decade of unprecedented defensive wizardry from McBride. From 1908 to 1916, there was only one season in which he wasn’t in the Top 3 on the American League Defensive WAR leaderboard**. He placed 2nd in 1908 as well as 1910-11, then 1st in 1912-15. In 1916, his last season as a full-time player, he finished 3rd in the A.L. in Defensive WAR.
McBride’s glove was so valuable that it catapulted him into the Top Ten in WAR for Position Players in the A.L. twice, in spite of his bat. In 1908, his 4.5 WAR was good for 8th in the A.L. despite his paltry .232 Batting Average and .566 OPS. In 1910, his 4.9 WAR placed 7th in the A.L. His offensive output was similarly uninspiring in that season, a .230 Batting Average to go with a .609 OPS.
In 1917, he was replaced at shortstop by Howard Shanks and skipper Clark Griffith began to groom McBride as his successor. McBride played 50 games in 1917, and then less than 20 in 1918-20. In 1921, Griffith stepped away from his on-field duties and named McBride the new manager of the Washington Senators.
Sadly, he only managed one season (1921). He was injured when a baseball thrown by Earl Smith hit him in the head during pre-game warmups on July 27th. He wasn’t able to leave his bed for a week and continued to feel the effects of the injury. At the time, it wasn’t diagnosed as such, but he likely suffered a severe concussion. On December 6th 1921, he resigned as manager. Griffith offered him a job as a scout, but McBride turned it down for health reasons.
In 1925, he returned to baseball and served as Ty Cobb’s bench coach with the Detroit Tigers. In 1929, he retired from baseball at the relatively young age of 48. He made a complete recovery from the head injury and eventually passed away at the age of 92 in 1973.
*McBride played his final game with the Senators in 1920
**1909 was a bit of down year defensively for McBride. He didn’t even crack the Top 10 of Defensive WAR.
This trio of Piedmont 350s from the same sheet was sold recently by Huggins & Scott Auctions. Seeing them got me thinking about other cards that we know came from the same sheet. In his fantastic book, Inside T206, Scot Reader surmises that the total number of T206s produced could be over 100 million. Given this staggering estimate, it makes sense that finding two or more T206s that were printed on a single sheet is no easy task.
One of my favorite things about this set is that it lends itself very well to research. If you learn something about a certain pose or front/back combo, there is often a logical pattern to be followed, which will lead you to more discoveries. The same cannot really be said for today’s topic. Finding T206 sheet mates is very cool, but it usually is the result of random happenstance rather than a larger pattern. In that same vein, there will be little structure to this article. I mainly just wanted to post some of the coolest T206 sheet mates.
Most of the times that we’re able to trace multiple T206s back to the same sheet, they will be of the printer’s scrap variety. The reason for this is pretty simple. In order to make connections between two or more cards, there has to be something that makes them unique.
Take these Hoblitzell and Oakes Piedmont 350s. They showed up on eBay one day in a group of offerings from the same seller. I wasn’t able to find out anything about where they came from, but it doesn’t take much of a logical leap to assume they were cut from the same sheet and kept together all this time. Their large, hand-cut borders and darker-than-normal colors are a dead giveaway. I’m not sure there’s anything to be learned from them, but they sure are cool.
These three Blank Backs share a similar cut as well as adhesive residue on all four corners of the backs. They were clearly kept together in an album or frame for many years. They made their way to market via SCP auctions, where I was able to buy them and keep them together.
The “Lash’s Bitters” T206s are another example of printer’s scrap that work as puzzle pieces that help us to re-construct a sheet of T206 cards. I have an article in the works featuring these awesome scraps, so I’ll keep this description short. The back of these T206s was used as a test sheet for trade cards featuring “Lash’s Bitters”. The fronts look a little odd as well. They appear to be missing a layer of red.
T206 collector John Dreker was kind enough to send me scans of these four upside-down and mis-cut Piedmont 150s that he owns. He found Davis in a group of 40 cards he bought in 2000, then bought Tannehill, Doolin, and Cicotte together in the same group in 2002.
This group of cards has been dubbed the “Test Print Sheet”. As you can see, the backs have a lot going on.
Much like the Lash’s Bitters sheet above, the back of the sheet that Griffith, Lake, and O’Leary were on was used as a test sheet for a Twin Oaks Tobacco advertisement.
This quartet of Blank Backs are very likely to have originated from the same sheet.
Recently, I’ve received a few emails recently from friends and readers asking me to explain the term “printer’s scrap” as it relates to the T206 set. I figured it would be a good idea to post something that everyone can read. In fact, I am probably long overdue in writing an article on the subject.
The T206 set offers a myriad of collecting niches from the straight-forward, to more esoteric pursuits. Of the many mysteries and intricacies of the T206 set, printer’s scrap may be the least understood. Because each example is unique, it can be very difficult to figure out a price for a given card. As a result, most collectors do not feel comfortable buying them, and tend to stay away. With this article, I hope to make you feel a little more comfortable the next time you come across a piece of T206 printer’s scrap.
The Short and Simple Definition:
Any T206 that was discarded by the printers prior to production being completed.
The Longer, More Detailed Definition:
The term “printer’s scrap” can be used to describe cards that vary greatly in appearance. The one thing that all printer’s scrap cards have in common is they were not inserted into packages of cigarettes/tobacco and were not released to the public. They were either thrown away at the factory and saved by neighborhood kids, or perhaps brought home by the printers and given to kids (or even adults) who collected them. This means that a sheet of cards could have gone through every step of the printing process, but then been discarded for some reason prior to being cut. If that sheet of cards was cut up by hand rather than being factory-cut and inserted into packages of cigarettes, the card is considered printer’s scrap. On the other hand, some of the more striking examples of printer’s scrap cards feature drastic printing mistakes, blank backs, or multiple players and/or back advertisements.
Let’s take a look at the various types of T206 printer’s scrap:
Brown Old Mill Southern Leaguers
The most sought after examples of printer’s scrap are the Brown Old Mill Southern Leaguers. These cards were created accidentally. Old Mill Southern League backs were supposed to be printed with black ink, but at least one sheet was printed with brown ink by mistake*. After the sheets were printed, the mistake was caught. All Brown Old Mill Southern Leaguers are hand-cut, and it is believed that none of them were inserted into packages of Old Mill Cigarettes. This back is either the rarest or second rarest T206 back, depending on whether you consider the Ty Cobb back a T206. Brown Old Mill Southern Leaguers tend to sell in the low five-figure range.
Johnny Bates Proof
Proofs
These are the early versions of the artwork for each pose. Some proofs feature the caption at the bottom while others do not. Each proof has cross marks on the borders of each edge that were used to help the printers with alignment. Proofs tend to sell in the $10,000 range, give or take.
Geroge Merritt with the Ghost of Sam Crawford
Multi-Player Prints and Ghosts & Multi-Strike Backs
These were essentially test sheets used by the printers to calibrate the equipment. You can imagine most of the test sheets would have been discarded after use, but luckily for us some were saved. Values vary greatly depending on how visually striking or unique each card is, but it’s rare to find one of these for less than $1,000.
Blank Backs
Blank Backs are the easiest form of printer’s scrap to identify. Sometimes people will have differing opinions on whether a card is scrap or not, but with Blank Backs, there is no such confusion. They exist in varying levels of completion. The fronts of some Blank Backs look like a completely finished product, and make you wonder why they were never finished. Some are missing one or more color passes while others have registration or “ghosting” issues as the telltale signs of why they were scrapped. Blank backs are currently selling for $800 and up with individual prices varying based on condition, player, and whether the card has any additional printing oddities other than the blank back.
Tom Downey “Yellow-Brown” Printer’s Scrap
Yellow-Brown Sweet Caporal 350-460 Factory 30
Though they were printed with normal backs, the “yellow/brown” scraps received only the yellow, brown, and black color passes. Very distinctive and unique, copies in Fair condition and above will typically sell for in excess of $1,000.
Bill Bradley Sweet Caporal 350-460 Factory 30 “No Print”
Sweet Caporal 350-460 Factory 30 “No Prints”
I plan to devote an entire article to these at some point, but the short version is this: These sheets of cards were almost completely finished, but they had one final step of the production process that still needed to be completed. They were supposed to get the Factory 42 Scroll Overprint, but for some reason, they never did, and were instead cut up by hand and kept together for over 100 years. The person who cut them did a very nice job, and the cards were kept in very nice condition all these years. Two or three years ago the cards were brought into a card shop in the Midwest and slowly sold over the course of a few months. There were hundreds of cards in the collection. Most were poses that are in the Sweet Caporal 350-460 Factory 30 checklist, but the ones that are known as “Sweet Caporal 350-460 Factory 30 No Prints” are the most sought after and valuable cards in the group. In my opinion, it’s a little too early to say what the market is for these as many of them went from eBay directly into collections and not too many have been offered again publicly.
Harry Krause Hand-Cut and Missing Color Passes
Hand-Cut and Missing Color Passes
These are easy to spot because their fronts look a bit odd due to the missing color pass(es). Their value is directly tied to three factors:
How striking the missing color passes are
Registration (the more messed up, the more desirable)
The borders (the larger the better, and the more jagged the edges are, the better)
Hand-Cut but not Missing any Color Passes
Because these look very similar to a card that was inserted into a cigarette pack, it can be difficult to determine whether a card should be given the “printer’s scrap” moniker or not. The Bob Groom below is a good example of one that’s hard to classify. All four edges are hand-cut, but the card is of normal size. In my opinion, it has to have been cut from a sheet by hand because if not, it would have to have had huge borders in order for someone to have been able to trim each side and have the finished product still have roughly normal dimensions. While rare, these cards do not sell at much of a premium over a similar factory-cut T206. In my opinion they are among the best values in the T206 world.
Hopefully these general guidelines will help you to evaluate any T206 printer’s scrap cards you come across. The general rule is pretty simple: The cooler the card, the more you should expect to have to pay for it. The most dramatic examples tend to get the most attention and sell for the highest prices. However, the less visually striking examples offer a combination of scarcity and affordability that can appeal to collectors of all budgets.
*I’m not certain if there were one or more Old Mill Southern League sheets printed with brown backs. I’ll look into it further, and if you happen to know, please shoot me an email (luke@thatt206life.com) or leave a comment.
