Take a look at the scans above. Just below McBride’s belt is a little blue print mark that Pat Romolo has dubbed the “blue flame”. Pat and I talked about this print mark a year or so ago and I had planned to write an article about it. It was one of the (many) topics that I intended to write about, but never got around to.
Recently, I was very excited to pick up the McBride Tolstoi below. When I got it in hand, I noticed the blue mark on his left shoulder. I remembered the “blue flame” that Pat and I had discussed, but I thought this one might be slightly different. I went through our old emails to see if I had just found another example of the “blue flame”, or if this was a mark we hadn’t seen before. To my surprise, this blue mark was in a completely different place.
Excited about this new discovery, I sent an email to Pat. As usual, he noticed something that I had failed to see. It’s pretty rare to find one pose with two separate and distinct print marks. But what makes this even more interesting is that both my Tolstoi and the five cards at the top of this article all share another print mark in common. It’s hard to see (at least it was for me) but there’s a blue dot just to the right of his left elbow. On my card it’s pretty faint, but it’s a lot more noticeable on the “blue flame” cards.
I wanted to understand more about these three different print marks, so I went through all of the recorded sales of McBride T206s on cardtarget.com. I found two things that surprised me, and one that didn’t. I was not surprised to confirm that every card that exhibits the “blue flame” print mark also displays the “blue dot”. On the other hand, I was surprised to not find another McBride card that has the same print mark that my Tolstoi backed copy has.
Perhaps the most interesting discovery I made is that the “blue dot” appears on more cards that just those with the “blue flame” and my Tolstoi. However, it does not appear on all McBride cards.
Card Target has four recorded sales of American Beauty backs. One has both the blue flame and the blue dot. Another has just the blue dot, and the other two cards don’t have any print marks.
Of the eight recorded sales of Cycle 350 backs, two have both the blue flame and the blue dot, five others have just the blue dot, and just one of them has no print marks at all.
The Sweet Caporal backs carry roughly the same ratios. Of the nine recorded SC 350/25 backs, one displays the blue flame/blue dot combo, 6 others have just the blue dot, and three cards exhibit neither print mark. Of the 28 SC 350/30 backs, two have the blue flame/blue dot combo, 16 have just the blue dot, and ten have no print mark.
Things got a little interesting when I looked through the Piedmont 350 backs however. The vast majority of them display no print marks, while a small minority have just the blue dot, and an even smaller percentage exhitbit the blue flame/blue dot combo.
The reason I find print marks so interesting is that I think there is a potential for them to teach us some things about the printing process. The fact that multiple cards can be found with the same recurring print mark tells us that many sheets were printed with the same layout. That the “blue flame” is found with American Beauty 350 Frame, Broad Leaf 350, Cycle 350, Piedmont 350, and both Sweet Caporal 350/25 and Sweet Caporal 350/30 backs means that the layout of the sheet remained the same as each subsequent back was printed.
Having said that, I’m not sure I am any more knowledgeable about the printing process now than I was before I started to research these print marks. It’s definitely interesting that so many of McBride’s cards have at least one print mark, but if there’s a pattern, I’m not seeing it.
My hope is that by studying these print marks and others like it, we may be able to shed some light on how these cards were printed. Pat and I are working on a set of future articles where we will catalog all of the known print marks, and examine many of them in more detail. We don’t have a timeline for when we expect to finish, but I am hoping it will be completed before the end of the year.
